Tech Review Sites and Payola

cheesecake23 writes "How often have you read a hardware review and thought: 'No way was that an honest opinion, the reviewer was bought'—? The Daily Tech has gone undercover to find out whether or not payola is accepted among the 35 largest online English-language hardware review sites. Questions asked and answered — Q: How many sites would take money (or sell ads) in exchange for a product review? A: 20 percent. Q: How many sites would additionally consider selling an Editor's Choice award? A: None. Q: Were any regions of the world more corrupt than others? A: No, it was 20-25% almost everywhere. Q: Does it depend on the size or age of the site? A: RTFA. Although no bad actors were explicitly unmasked, the article contains enough information to make a whitelist of quite a few good guys."

Comments

I wonder...

[WFFS]

How much to get an article on Slashdot? =p

They only take it from known conspirators

[mrcaseyj]

Maybe they only take money from people they know are from major companies, because if they took money from anyone who asked, they would be quickly exposed.

Re:They only take it from known conspirators

[mpapet]

Not really. It's quite simple actually.

The publication can't give a bad review. No more free review equipment.

If consumers _really_ wanted unbiased reviews, then publications would do it the right way. Buy the product off the retailer's shelf and test. But that's expensive and no consumer is willing to pay for it. This has led to opportunities that equipment manufacturers exploit.

Yes, the problem exists. IME the article in question is touching an ice cube on the tip of an iceberg, but no one cares enough to pay for the other, more objective, review. Want an honest review? Then pay for it. That's not going to happen though.

Give the names, you chickensh!t

[mi]

Although no bad actors were explicitly unmasked

And why not, exactly? Oh, because they might sue? Come dear, this site talks about government oppression (and the need to oppose it) constantly. Resisting the evil **AAs is considered civil disobedience (automatically noble, of course). But you can't list the few sites, who — verifiably, one assumes — have agreed to accept something in exchange for better reviews?

Sorry. No Pulitzer prize for this piece of investigative journalism...

Do you lie cheat or steal?

[edwardpickman]

"Heavens no, next question?"

Ask any Congressman and they'll be happy to tell you they don't take gifts from Lobbyist. Then you start asking have you ever accepted a trip, expensive bottle of wine or dinner, etc and the story changes. There are other ways of pressuring and where as I think there are legit sites like Tom's I think the percentages are much worse than presented. At the very least many sites are biased whether the bias comes from personal conviction or encouragement is the question.

I Learned To Ignore Most Reviews And Go To Forums

[chromozone]

I found many reviews to be very unreliable for the most part and stopped reading them. Monitor reviews are especially bad imo. Rarely will a reviewer even mention what type of panel it is (TN, S-IPS, S-PVA etc)and that's an irregularity in my view because cheap panels like the TN's get the same or better ratings as the usually superior S-IPS panels (which look obvioulsy different to anyone with 30 seconds instruction). Dell and Samsung seem to always get positive reviews. Then some riot ensues in the forums likes when Dell had banding issues. In the past year Dell has ben swapping inferior panels into displays after they already got reviews with superior panels. The forums are full of "Dell Lottery" posts and thread threads complining about buying one monitor and essentially getting another. After months of this, I think I have seen it mentioned once in an article in the may sites I see visit. Dell ads are flashing on the sides of most of these sites. Reviews seem to be becoming an extension of manufacturers marketing just like TV and print news always seem to be inserting the latest entertainment product made by the ABC, FOX etc. I find the best way to see it good reviews are merited is to follow how the forums react.

The beef

[adolf]

The beef is that he is his own personal shill. Nearly every story he submits is a link to his own blog.

Whether they're interesting stories or not, and whether his stories are worse than having no Roland at all, it's the sort of blatant self-promotion that people on Slashdot are finely attuned toward hating. It is an affront to the sort of chaotic diversity that we've grown accustomed to having here, and folks don't like it.

Re:Slashdot Payola

[metalcup]

What's so wrong about having sections for Intel and AMD? They are clearly MARKED (hell, they have their own sub-domains!).

This is a tech site - so what is so wrong if the top tech companies want to talk direct to the segment of the customer base that probably understands their products best?

We get to tell them what we like/feel/want/desire/whatever, they get to explain their stuff to us, and slashdot gets to make some cash to keep the whole thing going..

Everyone wins - so, where is the scam in that?

Google is your friend

[rlp]

First read the glowing reviews of the product on several tech sites. Then type the name of the product into Google followed by the word "sucks". Read those "reviews". The truth is normally somewhere in between.