Hacker News Reader

Comment by crazygringo | Hacker News Reader

Am I the only one not particularly bothered by fake reviews?

Because there's a button for "Helpful" on each review, and the most helpful reviews more or less generally get voted to the top -- and there are almost always some really long, in-depth ones.

I don't even pay attention to star ratings anymore. I just read the top 10 reviews and get a pretty good sense of what specifically is good and bad about the product.

Even without fake reviews, star proportions were never that useful in the first place because they're not a random sampling of users, and people are way more likely to leave a review to complain than to praise, so it's biased no matter what.

View on HN

So the star ratings can be gamed but not the 'helpful' button?

I'm sure it could be in theory but it doesn't seem to be in practice.

I think the logistics would just be harder -- it's relatively simply to put a leaflet in the product advertising "leave a 5-star review, then e-mail us and get this bonus product/warranty/whatever."

Whereas to locate a specific review to mark "Helpful" would need to be via e-mail with a link to a specific review in question, coordinated across several of them, with so much volume that it outweighs the naturally "helpful" ones. I don't know, but I've never seen it happen.

If I were an unscrupulous seller, I'd write a nice review myself, pay a stooge to post it, then pay a bunch of other stooges to mark it helpful repeatedly for the next six months from different IP addresses. I don't think it'd be all that hard but then again I've never tried it.

Would be amusing if it was the queen's duck. (Probably more accurate to call it a honey pot.)

Basically, as long as the stars are there, they capture most of the fraud?

I'm with you here. I tend to read a few reviews to determine if I should give a new product a shot. If somebody takes the time to write a 250 word review that has some pros and cons and include some photos, I'm going to trust that review. Many products you can find a handful of reviews like this which is all I need to make a decision. If I'm caught between two products, I'll order both and return the one I don't like (make sure they have free returns). Works pretty well for me.

Same thing with counterfeits which people claim are rampant on Amazon. Either I manage to avoid them or they're very good counterfeits, in which case I wouldn't care.

I think the problem here is that the products that aren't cheating on their reviews will get ranked lower. So although they're perfectly fine products, if they drop to the second page of search results you might never actually open them up to read their real human reviews.

You can still read the real detailed reviews on the products you do look at, so you'll avoid buying a lemon, but you will be preferentially buying from review cheaters.

The problem is much deeper than that for sellers. Enough negative reviews can end your ability to sell on Amazon. Add to that, reviews are part of the ranking algorithm, positive reviews will play a role in where you place in a product search.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com