Could Amazon Reviews Be Corrupt?

adeelarshad82 writes "In the first academic study of its kind, Trevor Pinch, Cornell University professor of sociology and of science and technology studies, independently surveyed 166 of Amazon's top 1,000 reviewers, examining everything from demographics to motives. What he discovered was 85 percent of those surveyed had been approached with free merchandise from authors, agents or publishers. Amazon is encouraging reviewers to receive free products through Amazon Vine, an invitation-only program in which the top 1,000 reviewers are offered a catalog of free products to review. John Dvorak puts up an argument which hints that some of these Amazon reviews may be corrupt."

Comments

"Dvorak hints"

[keith_nt4]

I can't believe I read that entire summary only to be lead into a link to a Dvorak column. It's like the slashdot version of being rick rolled. And I fell for it. Bravo samzenpus, bravo.

Re:I do

[ehrichweiss]

There's no doubt there. I recently purchased a book that was reviewed fondly here on ./ and noticed that all the reviewers on Amazon were RAVING about it; every review had 9 out of 9 "this review was helpful" ratings. Then I read the book and found it to be utter garbage, so I wrote a review detailing why it was not living up to the reviews or promises. Within a couple of days there were 9 people saying my review wasn't helpful...but there weren't 9 MORE people saying the other reviews were helpful(they remained at 9 out of 10)...just that mine was unhelpful.. I'm 100% certain the reviews were rigged. I don't dare reveal the book for fear the author has mod points...