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Amazon Lawsuit Aims To Kill Fake Reviews (theguardian.com)
Mark Wilson writes with a story at Beta News (relying on this report at The Guardian) that Amazon is suing more than 1,000 fake reviewers for their misleading, paid-for reviews:
The ability to read reviews of products before making a purchase is one of the great advantages of online shopping. But how do you know that what you're reading is a genuine review and not just glowing praise planted by the seller or manufacturer? Fake reviews are a serious problem, and Amazon is trying to do something about it. The retail giant has filed a lawsuit against 1,114 individuals for writing 'false, misleading, and inauthentic' reviews. Amazon says that the fakers are tarnishing its reputation, and the attempt to clean up the site is something that will be welcomed by consumers.
From the Guardian's version of the story: Amazon said there had been misleading five-star reviews and comments about products, such as: “This has lit up my life” about a USB cable. A bogus comment said “definitely buying more I was impressed with how bright the lights on the cable are”, while another reviewer gave a product top marks and added the comment “cool charger”.
Amazon is not suing Fiverr, a startup that raised $30m from investors last year, as the company says in its terms and conditions that advertising for services such as writing bogus reviews is banned.
What about reviews written tongue in cheek for humor? Amazon seems to actually embrace them:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/featu...
How is the USB cable review different than the ones in the link above?
Better known as 318230.
Far more serious are real reviewers, who are happy to give a 4 or 5 star review to anything they get for free:
http://www.amazon.com/forum/am...
Amazon explicitly allows this, which I guess is better than driving it underground, but does nothing to account for this heavy reviewer bias:
"if you offer a free or discounted product in exchange for a review, you must clearly state that you welcome both positive and negative feedback. If you receive a free or discounted product in exchange for your review, you must clearly and conspicuously disclose that fact."
https://www.amazon.com/gp/help...
I've seen MANY products whose 4.5 star averages are purely because the seller sends out tons of free samples in exchange for positive reviews. Meanwhile, products that are considerably less expensive but don't bribe their customers unfortunately get less prominently featured in search results because their average rating, sales counts, and review numbers are so much lower.
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This isn't a situation where they're randomly suing reviewers. Amazon is suing people who (a) posted an offer to submit a fake Amazon review in exchange for payment, (b) received payment, and (c) posted a fake review.
Published reviews should be restricted to people who have actually purchased the product from Amazon, especially with items that cost a significant amount. That would dramatically cut down fraud. As it is, Amazon reviews tend to be most effective when there are a few hundred or thousands for a product and the product is in the $50+ range. In those cases, it can be highly educational to read through the reviews because people often highlight product flaws and provide advice and workarounds for common problems.
I was for quite a while a high rated Amazon review (I'm still on the "top reviewer" list) and I get a LOT of offers from companies to send me products in return for a review. It's interesting how that works ... and note up front that I do very little of this any longer, primarily because accepting such offers harms my reputation as a reviewer no matter how honest my reviews were.
I got some really laughable emails saying things like, "We'll send you a product in exchange for a five-star review." Nope. No thanks. Or, "please post review with 3 pcs. pictures." Thanks but I do reviews my own way.
In responding to some of the offers, when I state that I say what I think and write reviews on behalf of the prospective buyer, not the seller, a lot of the free offers disappeared. But some remained, and when I received a bad product and wrote an unfavorable review, some manufacturers demanded that I remove it (not going to happen, if you sell a bad product, live with it).
But it got really distasteful so now I generally review things that I bought on my own.
However, I can easily see how the system has become very corrupt, and so I just don't take free products from manufacturers any longer.
No, they spend Consumer Reports' money on all of them. Consumer Reports has a policy that they never accept vendor-funded review copies specifically to avoid this conflict of interest, and also to ensure that they in fact get the same product that's being shipped to customers.