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chpatrick

The only people I trust for recommendations nowadays are obsessive specialist subreddits and Stiftung Warentest.

I haven't trusted Wirecutter since they were offering recommendations for kickbacks.

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> I haven't trusted Wirecutter since they were offering recommendations for kickbacks.

Do you have a source for that? I don't think that's ever been true.

They've always had affiliate links, but they've also always been clear that doesn't affect their recommendations.

You might be referring to this: https://www.xdesk.com/wirecutter-standing-desk-review-pay-to...

But it was pretty totally debunked. The NYT made a lengthy reply explaining:

https://www.nytimes.com/wirecutter/our-response-to-nextdesk/

It may or may not affect their recommendation, but it may affect what products they review in the first place. So instead of the "The Best TV you can buy", it's more like "The Best TV you can buy from a company with an affiliate program"

Can you call it a debunking when it's written by the accused?

That reply just says "no we don't, trust me bro".

The reply says a ton more than that. It goes into quite a lot of detail.

Of course you're free to come to whatever conclusion you want. But I don't really know what more you could ask for.

I think the very fact that the CEO of a review site contacted the makers of a reviewed product and asked for money is bad enough.

They asked if they have an affiliate program, or were willing to set one up.

That's the standard business arrangement for almost any review site. It's how they pay their reviewers.

When nextdesk said no, they still kept it as their recommended desk for a year, and then, when they switched it, they switched to one that also didn't have an affiliate program, and still kept nextdesk as the "upgrade" pick.

It's really hard to see any evidence that the money affected their editorial decisions.

As someone who had zero knowledge of this and isn't trying to be snarky, do you have a link to that? I searched around and found some stuff, but it's pretty old.

The same thing linked above:

https://www.xdesk.com/wirecutter-standing-desk-review-pay-to...

I don't know what you are trying to argue but the facts are abundantly clear about what happened -- 1, nytimes/wirecutter did f*ck up the whole thing -- The editorial team and the business team weren't on the same page 2, despite all that happened, editorial team acted independently and their pick still stood. If you don't trust their editorial independence, you shouldn't trust any other review by another publication or random Internet user either.

That's just what I said though. I trust a non-profit publication that does reviews as a public service (Stiftung Warentest), and I trust random internet users who just want the best product with no skin in the game (Reddit).

I don't trust for-profit review sites that have a financial incentive to pick one product over the other, like Wirecutter.

90% of the stuff written is just utter trash.

I'm not joking when I say the hairdryer article amounted to "trust this person because she's used hair dryers for a long time."

She was measuring airflow speed out of the hair dryers but not volume. Absolute moron.

That's the impression I get from Wirecutter. They're not unethical per se, but these reviewers appear to have picked up a task from their long list of products to reviews and have done the bare minimum at best.

I am not really arguing as you are correct about the low quality, however, that is how you measure air volume. Measure the air speed and multiply it by vent area. Hopefully(i doubt it) they included how big the vent was.

Additionally. I am a bit weak on my physics but I think air speed has a direct relationship with evaporating liquids. I would have to see some controlled tests. but hypothesis: given the same volume of air per minute. a higher speed will evaporate water faster, with specific testing on high surface area targets(like hair) for example: them stupid dyson dryers that project a super high speed low area stream of air

And now they want you to be subscriber for their trash content that likely only reviews products from companies with affiliate programs

Unfortunately many subreddits are already being targeted with astroturfing. It still works for niche things but be careful and review the account age and posting history of those who praise a product.

> Stiftung Warentest

does something like this exist outside of germany? Having a Stiftung Warentest subscription always strikes me particularly german.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_European_Consumer_Organisa...

On the one hand, yes.

On the other hand, if you want unbiased, quasi-scientific tests, who is gonna pay for it?

It is actually in your best interest if YOU are paying for it, since then you are the customer and not the product.

That said, it isn’t even that expensive. When I buy a washing machine, I just buy the Warentest article on washing machines first which makes the overall purchase, like, 0.5% more expensive.

I think the problem for people who are not in Germany is that manufacturers often release different versions for each market. So, for example, you might find that >50% of the models being tested by Stiftung Warentest exist only in Germany or other parts of Western Europe.

Tænk[1] in Denmark is a bit like that, which is not surprising given their customer is the consumer, not the advertiser. However they're not quite as much of an institution as Stiftung Warentest is in Germany.

[1]: https://taenk.dk/

Which? in UK is sorta like it.

You might be thinking about Wirecutter pre- and post-NYTimes acquisition, although it's a bit more complicated than that: https://archive.is/5JDw0

(I also like Project Farm, although I don't think of them as comprehensive.)

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