Samsung admits to posting fake user reviews on the web | Hacker News Reader

Samsung admits to posting fake user reviews on the web

techspot.com

253 pointsalok-g127 comments

>perhaps the bigger issue here is this: if Samsung has been using these tactics against HTC, are they also engaged in similar marketing techniques with other rivals?

The even bigger issue is, who else is doing this more intelligently than Samsung?

Eventually all you have to do is mimic human behavior closely enough and it's untraceable. Sometimes that's expensive, but it's always doable.

It didn't sound to me like this is an automated system. Just humans pretending to be who they're not.

Yep, FTC doesn't like that. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astroturfing http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2009/10/endortest.shtm

This. I love Samsung hardware, but the company seems critically unable to think big. They have no apparent direction or higher thinking, they just make solidly good devices and throw gobs of money at marketing. It's bizarre - in spite of their devices and a reputation for quality gear, they still act like a cheap Korean knock-off company instead of a market leader.

It's no surprise that when they try to do evil, they do it in a clumsy and public manner.

Samsung are one of the biggest and most diversified companies in the world (did you know they are the world's biggest ship builder? Or that they offer life insurance?). I don't have difficulty imagining a lack of organisation and direction in management when they have so many arms doing so many different things.

>did you know they are the world's biggest ship builder?

Nope... they are not. That would be Hyundai, and the second largest is probably Daewoo. Samsung could be third. (I worked at Daewoo and Samsung shipyards).

Tangential funny: the shipbuilding division is called "Samsung Heavy Industries", usually abbreviated to SHI. Samsung means "Three Stars" in korean. The shipyard tug was called the "Tristar". Due to unfortunate typography, the name on the ship was "SHIT ristar". True story, I have photos.

Haha fair call. I actually misread and it's listed as the 2nd biggest shipbuilder. Still, people tend to be surprised as typically when I think 'Samsung', I imagine TVs, phones and laptops.

Samsung are also involved in building processing, rail and port infrastructure for Australia's Iron Ore region.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-03-28/samsung-c-t-wins-a-...

Not to forget Samsung Artillery.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K9_Thunder

Apparently[1], they are 20% of South Korea economy.

[1]: http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/07/whoa-sam...

The title is a bit misleading -- the story is not that Samsung used devious marketing methods, the story is that they were caught. Any number of companies hire shills to post phony endorsements, the trick is not to get caught.

In fairness to companies like Samsung, if everyone is doing it, to stand on principle is to risk being trounced by those who don't.

We are talking about Samsung here, this is the company that has pretty much ripped off every successful design in its history. I'm fairly certain they've never stood on principle for anything but a hearty office chuckle.

This is just xenophobia, unsubstantiated, and unfair to all the hard working employees.

It may be hyperbole (probably not every design is a clone of something else), but a strong argument can be made that a number of designs, from the Blackjack to recent devices, are pretty good copies of something made by another company.

Err, wait, I didn't get the subtle astroturfing joke, did I?

What does xenophobia have to do with it? We don't know where homosaur is from. Even in the US, there are many beloved foreign corporations, such as Nintendo. I don't think anybody discounts Samsung for being Korean, or even cares. Likewise, I doubt many people support Apple just because its American.

Regarding unsubstantiated, they have been openly accused and even found guilty in multiple courts across different countries. It's an ongoing case and you may disagree with the rulings, in which case "unsubstantiated" is not the word you're looking for.

As for being unfair to hard working employees, that is definitely true. Unfortunately for those employees, their executives' actions have brought their hard work into question. Any comments regarding a company are generally a reflection on the company's leadership, not any individual employee.

I'm from Murica, and yeah, I do not care about it being Korean and I don't particularly have positive feelings for Apple. I would assume in general Americans have a neutral to positive view of Korea in general so I don't know why that would matter. I do use Mac computers and have been forced by my employer to use their crap phones but I have no great affinity for them or their company.

But yeah, Samsung ripped them off hard. It really isn't even about Apple. Sure the hipsters got upset when someone had a phone that looked like their iPhones but Samsung as a company has a long history of completely ripping off all their designs. Apple was just the hottest at the time so they are who got copied.

I can come up with dozens upon dozens more examples throughout history of Samsung blatantly copying designs but I won't because who cares? Do a search of "samsung copies x" and you will find thousands of pages showing examples.

The only time Samsung doesn't copy well is when they're implementing the "and paste" variety on their phones. As a consumer I don't care but as a designer I do vaguely resent their lack of design innovation. Or even treading water.

(someone will now please link to the blog that shows the dozens of Samsung ripoffs over the years as I cannot find it in my bookmarks)

To be fair, it didn't seem like they were admitting anything. They basically said the marketing company they hired did and they regret it happened.

More common for big businesses who pay big bucks to get some exposure and then some marketing company pitches them unreal stats to get a sale, then commences to bending the rules and committing outright fraud to keep the paychecks coming in.

That's not being fair, that's regurgitating corporate pablum. Similarly to how every scandal in congress is blamed on a low ranking staffers whenever possible, corporate scandals are blamed on subcontracters whenever possible. Don't think for a second a company as profitable as Samsung doesn't know what it's marketers are doing.

I can easily believe in companies as big as Samsung and as profitable as Samsung a lot of people don't know what their suppliers/sub-contractors are doing. Bigger organization is, more chance somebody sleeps at the wheel, somebody takes shortcut, somebody is lazy, somebody just doesn't care. And if the money is abundant, there's less control over how exactly every cent is spent, so it could very well be that somebody hired this sleazy company to get good numbers for his annual review and his superiors were distracted by something else and didn't know a thing. I'm not saying that's what happened, but the size of the company makes it more, not less, likely. Sometimes big corps and big bureaucracies are evil, but many times they are also stupid.

Samsung's customer base is more than large enough to let positive reviews emerge from real customers. There is no excuse for this. None. Full stop.

Doing this is wrong for a company of any size, no matter if it's big or small.

I think this is good that they are getting called out, but I'm not surprised. I'm sure a decent number of big companies do this. My brother bought a new truck awhile ago, and the dealership ended up filling the gas tank for him for free. They just asked to fill out a comment card for him.

Imagine the furore if Apple was caught doing this.

Or Microsoft, Google, etc

Companies who are leaders in their industry do not usually need to do this.

I've heard of it happening at smaller organizations or sole proprietorships (small business), but it is strange to see from a company as large as Samsung.

What's important is how high up the chain this was sanctioned by. If it's a lowly manager somewhere, he/she will just get fired and this will all blow over. If it's right at the top, it's much more embarrassing.

Samsung's IP theft issues would lead me to believe that their credo is "whatever it takes to win" and this kind of behavior isn't out of line with their track record.

>Samsung's IP theft issues

You mean the time when Apple tried to patent "0-length-swipe" and a shape of a box?

No I don't. You know why ? Because it never happened.

I think he meant to say "rounded rectangle" not box.

Yes, because Apple did something bad its ok for Samsung to. What? It's a good thing most people and companies don't work like that.

Why am I not surprised. Samsung has a history of imo unethical and questionable business practices.

Samsung Inflates Galaxy Tab Sales, Gets Busted

http://modmyi.com/content/360-samsung-inflates-galaxy-tab-sa...

Quite smooth: Samsung actually sold 1/10 of the 2 million Galaxy Tabs it claimed in 2010

http://forums.appleinsider.com/t/151854/quite-smooth-samsung...

Looks Like Samsung Pretty Much Lied About US Sales To The Public

http://www.macgasm.net/2012/08/10/looks-like-samsung-pretty-...

Samsung Hires 'Actors' To Pretend To Be Happy Galaxy Tab Testers?

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110325/12360313633/samsun...

Samsung caught presenting actors as Galaxy Tab "consumers," fudging thinnest tablet claims

http://appleinsider.com/articles/11/03/25/samsung_caught_pre...

Here’s how Samsung flew bloggers halfway around the world, then threatened to leave them there.

http://thenextweb.com/insider/2012/09/02/heres-samsung-flew-...

Samsung Caught Fudging Testimonials, and Lying about Galaxy Tab’s Thickness

http://techie-buzz.com/gadgets-news/samsung-galaxy-tab-fake-...

That is an amazing list. They seem to be on top there together with Ryanair and european banks.

Samsung's antics are hardly contained to smartphones & tablets either.

It reminded me of a project we did by analysing the reviews using basic NLP techniques. http://goo.gl/TqhfL

Oh I had meant that their IP theft isn't limited to mobile devices, but you have a very good point with their reviews in general.

(with their oncoming push into notebook computers, I expect similar fraudulent reviews in that area as well)

"Ethics" in Asia are not the same as the rest of the industrialized world. While I can't speak for Korean ethics, I've had dealings in other Asian countries where business ethics are really more like guidelines, elastic ones at that.

I wouldn't be surprised if the execs who sanctioned this behavior on Samsung's part don't even understand that it was wrong.

I don't accept this - everyone surely knows its wrong, however its a matter of how wrong. Is it seen to be wrong like driving 5kmh over the speed limit is?

Its only a matter of getting used to. If you have been doing this, and you think your competitors are also doing it, after some time, you will (conveniently) forget that it was wrong to begin with.

Right ... and US companies are always ethical, and have always been that way? Or US companies have simply been burt so many times that they know not to play loose with the truth.

It's probably worth noting that Korea "chaebol" (conglomerates) can be a little odd. They have a lot of power over the local government and media, so they end up thinking they are invincible. They are sometimes said to be very shady, at times.

Exactly. While the US of course (as mentioned below) have corporations that exert influence over government, overstep the law, etc., it is generally NOT tolerated by the general public.

That's where it's different in Asia, where such behavior is business as usual.

Big Tobacco in the USA is of course a shining example of the West's greater moral values /sarcasm

Microsoft Monsanto Exxon and so on...

Of course it happens in the US. I think that's covered enough here and elsewhere. But i believe the basic ideal of ethics is a cultural one. Consider that certain cultures in Asia, China for example, have been doing things a certain way thousands of years, and some of those ways are repulsive to the average American.

Forgot to add this:

"Tax evasion, bribery and price-fixing: How Samsung became the giant that ate Korea"

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/tax-evasion-bri...

"Samsung's rocky legal past paints a picture of scandal and corruption"

http://www.theverge.com/policy/2012/8/7/3226651/samsung-lega...

"Samsung Bribery Probe Points to Pattern of Graft in South Korea"

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=a...

4/7 of those websites are explicitly pro-Apple, which makes it seem unlikely that they are telling the whole story, given how, unfortunately, these things tend to descend into us-vs-them/clan warfare.

(I'm not saying it isn't true, just they aren't necessarily reporting everything.)

> Samsung's IP theft issues

While this is definitely super-scummy and nasty behaviour from Samsung, it's hard to take any comment seriously when it uses such a flawed new-speak phrase like "IP theft".

Even more so when it tries to gain substance by referring to Samsung as the bad guy when "violating" (or "stealing" lol) Apple's rounded rectangle patents.

Apple has their bullshit software patents constantly invalidated everywhere in the world except the US. Good thing Samsung footed the legal bill to make that happen.

Maybe they'll even send the top guy to jail (but later release him to run the olympics...)

Dude, I don't see why you need to defend Apple so seriously and in all probability, they are no different and just because they haven't got caught yet, doesn't mean you can't rule out the possibility that they aren't into this.

As an example, during the Apple vs Samsung patent wars (after Samsung lost), a handful of publications were writing in support of Apple even when most of them knew that Apple was abusing the patent system to its core. Most of them looked very much like they were paid by Apple to write it. Some even went as far as saying the win for Apple is good for innovation (which obviously it is not)[1]. Another example is once an author from Techcrunch even admitted to getting compensated monetarily by Apple to write a post bashing a competitor.

Apple, Samsung, LG, Sony, Panasonic, etc. are no different from each other. So let's not get religious, shall we?

[1] http://gizmodo.com/5938193/apple-winning-the-patent-wars-is-...

Brave new levels of false equivalence achieved here.

One guy was caught but let's not criticize him because everyone not caught could have done the same thing!

Gizmodo bought a stolen iPhone 4 prototype, blackmailed Apple over it, and published photos of the phone. Since then, they haven't been invited to Apple's press events.

Given the history, it's silly to suggest Gizmodo is being paid by Apple to write positive stories about them. I doubt Apple would even pick up the phone if Gizmodo called them.

I'm not defending Apple. I'm not a huge fan of their stuff. But, they are their market's leader and the parent post mentioned the outrage that one might see if Apple did the same as Samsung in this case.

Not on HN, because it is full of Apple fanboys.

Well, at least you are objective.

You lost me at 'fanboys'.

That's handy, because that was the last word of his post.

Completely wrong. I challenge HN mods to reveal which articles are voting ring flagpedo'd religiously on this site.

mrpogson.com/2012/08/21/apples-paid-shillconsultant-caught-out/

Not really the same thing. That you created an account just to say that makes me wonder if you are in fact a 'shill' yourself.

But they weren't. Samsung was.

There's no need, they have John Gruber.

I just can't get over how mind-bogglingly stupid this was.

Even having decided to use dirty tricks to strengthen their overall marketing effort... What possessed them to try to go after HTC in Taiwan of all places? As HTC's stronghold, Taiwan is simultaneously the country where:

1. This sort of campaign is least likely to be effective.

2. Samsung is most likely to be caught.

3. Local regulators are most likely to be sympathetic to HTC's complaints.

I mean I understand that people generally overestimate their chances of success and underestimate the chance of being caught, but this is ridiculous.

Etiher there are some stupid people making local policy at Samsung Taiwan, or in the places with less chances of getting caught they got away with it.

No one is shocked to hear that astro turfing is going on on the internet.

A few too many "English Major style" reviews and it's pretty obvious.

That reminds me of how the genuine reviews on Yelp are of the terse, "This place sucks. Their dish XYZ was terrible, service took $NN." style that look spammy and get removed by their spam algorithm.

Phony endorsements maybe deemed as "misleading advertisement" as long as they remain trueish (They can argue that the paid reviewers did experience the product and did like it. Nothing much different from a celebrity endorsement) . Fake negative reviews on competitors are really despicable and IMO should be penalized heavily by law.

In general, as a consumer, I feel sick when vendors trying to fool me by pretending to be one of us.

I suspect this isn't the first instance they've done this.

Looking closer at Anti-Apple/ Pro-Samsung Google+ posts reveal some questionable user profiles.

I really liked Google+, up until #BoycottApple came around.

Really hard to follow any technology news without getting inundated with nonsensical rants against every breath Steve Jobs or Tim Cook took and takes, respectfully.

Sort of like how Reddit used a bunch of sockpuppet accounts to spark interest in their site?

I go there every now and then and still wonder if half the comments are left by bots/shills/etc.

Unfortunately, most of the default/large subs are full of jokes/one-liners/"viral marketing" (aka spam).

I wonder if this is related to the myriad of "NO SD CARD, NO REPLACEABLE BATTERY, NO BUY" type user comments that littered positive reviews for the HTC One.

I made one of those comments (although worded a bit better). I certainly wasn't paid :(

They could well have been responsible for some of them, but there are certainly a lot of us who feel that way reasonably strongly.

I doubt it. People who like those features are typically very vocal about them (especially since they're dying out).

It's sad that samsung would do this... Is it commonplace for companies to do this?

More than you think.

You decide.. https://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=infoman

The domain was registered one day after the HN account was registered, first post wasn't made for 14 days (aka. when the username no longer appears in green). In his defence, if he is a shill, he's not very good at it.

Edit: hnsearch picked up a hellbanned post (it should appear on the front page, but it doesn't) at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5567259 that mentions a couple more accounts

Google has a little spammer loose on HN. Neat.

Seems much more likely to be the people behind glass-apps.org than Google.

I'm not criticizing them, its neat to find something like this here. I can find it on almost any other site out there, but HN is not the place to game. Still, who knows if glass-apps.org is getting a nice check from Google. Not a bad thing, either. I know of companies whose sole reason of existence is to do this for bigger companies. Its just neat. That's all.

Confirmed:

http://information-man.com/impressum/

"Verantwortliche Ansprechperson: Iwan Uswak"

information-man -> infoman

whois glass-apps.org:

Domain Name:GLASS-APPS.ORG

Registrant ID:AT1001919805572 Registrant Name:Iwan Uswak

that makes this submission extra funny:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5440466

Meta-spamming. (:

Blog post in 3...2...1...

Looks like a bot that programmatically shovels trendy topical matter from RSS into HN. The submission and article headlines are identical, down to the curly quotes - smells of automation to me.

Bookmarklet.

> You decide.. https://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=infoman

do you think Google created this? Obviously not, Google get nothing from it.

He's just posting his own stuff...a little too often I agree, but nothing out of ordinary here beyond that. It's not like he's the first on HN who's ever done that.

It's exactly what you would expect from a company like Samsung.

A multi-billion dollar multinational conglomerate?

They're not exactly known for their ethical business practices.

“[Samsung’s] long-standing policy prohibits union organising [and has] attracted critical attention. Samsung’s overall corporate structure centralises the policy-making that governs the activities of its vast network of subsidiary corporations.

Samsung is a “chaebol” – one of the family-run conglomerates that dominate South Korean society. Almost Mafia-like in their obsessive secrecy and reach, chaebols have influence in most markets and industries in the country and wield huge political influence. They have also not been shy of using underhand methods to maintain their position. [...]

[Secretly recorded conversations] revealed that Haksoo Lee (vice-chairman of the Samsung Group) and Hong (Korean ambassador to the US and then publisher of the Joongang Daily) were planning to deliver upwards of 3 billion won – around £2 million – to presidential candidates ahead of South Korea’s elections. [...]

Samsung owns Joongang Daily… it also has unprecedented power over journalism because it has the economic power to buy advertising space and time. “It is hard to criticise Samsung as an individual journalist. It is considered insane.” [...]

In 2008, the current Samsung chairman, Lee Kun-Hee, stepped down after his house and offices were raided and a police investigation began into claims that the corporation was maintaining a slush fund to bribe court officials and politicians. Found guilty of financial wrongdoing and tax evasion by Seoul Central District Court on July 16 2008, Lee Kun-Hee was in serious trouble. But despite prosecutors requesting that he be sentenced to seven years in prison and fined $347 million, the sentenced handed down was three years suspended and $109 million in fines. [...]”

http://www.kernelmag.com/features/report/3028/samsung-power-...

Yes. Multi-billion dollar multionational do the worst shit.

As an example:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Coke-Machine-Behind-Favourite/dp...

http://ccrjustice.org/learn-more/faqs/shell%2526%2523039%3Bs...

It is so commonplace that I am not even surprised to hear about it anymore.

Yeah, I worked for an iOS game company that asked its employees to give its games positive reviews in the App Store and everywhere else they could think of. I don't think many of us bothered - I certainly didn't.

This is very common place and I don't think there is anything wrong with it.

What is unacceptable though is deliberately trashing your opponents.

Fake reviews are deliberately biased, and may contain false information about a product's quality and of course will ignore its flaws and defects. It's just advertising disguising itself as user experience.

It is probably very common (and as an impulse understandable) but I think it's still wrong even without trashing your opponents. Saying your product is better than it is is not much different than saying explicitly that it's better than the other guys. Either way, it a cynical lie.

It's against European law. But companies flouting the law doesn't bother some.

Lying is lying and not disclosing links is lying by omission. It's all personal preference but my line in the sand is pretty clear. If you eat to be ignored and derided, let someone else find your bias and kickback. Be up front and you will get a reputation for it. That's my 2c.

And is it illegal? I'm pretty sure paying for fake negative reviews of competition is illegal, because there is a clear victim. But how about positive reviews of companies' products?

> And is it illegal?

No, in most places it isn't. If a consumer was misled by a planted, phony review and bought an inferior product, he could go to civil court and demand monetary compensation, but civil courts largely deal with the kinds of damage claims that don't involve the legality of an action, only its harm.

Just remember that an illegal action would be prosecuted in a criminal court. A claim of harm would be prosecuted in a civil court.

Most of the activity surrounding phony reviews is not about the legality of the activity, but how much harm the public exposure might do to a company's reputation.

> I'm pretty sure paying for fake negative reviews of competition is illegal, because there is a clear victim.

Even in that case, it's not a question of "illegal" as much as misleading, and the remedies are usually civil, not criminal.

Posting fake positive reviews is illegal in Europe under the EU Unfair Commercial Practices Directive.

That's good news -- now if the U.S. will just catch up with the EU.

I think in Europe it should be illegal throughout the EU under the Unfair Commercial Practices directive. This would apply to any fake reviews.

Absolutely commonplace. Anything is 'fair' in business and nothing is off the table when it comes to money.

Even the small/local businesses do this. Just check Yelp reviews. Hell, Yelp used to allow businesses to move their best reviews to the top if they paid them enough.

1) http://www.eastbayexpress.com/oakland/yelp-and-the-business-...

2) http://www.zdnet.com/blog/apple/the-yelp-mafia/3116

3) http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2010/02/yelp-facing-class...

There was so much fallout from this back in 2009/2010 that Yelp had to turn the tables and pretend to play nice guy finally by outing businesses that buy positive reviews (starting last October).

Anything is 'fair' in business and nothing is off the table when it comes to money.

Many people have this attitude, yes. That doesn't make it universally true or even close, and it's probably less commonplace than you seem to assume, particularly for small/local businesses, which overwhelmingly don't have time to waste on shill reviews.

And while it definitely happens and is widespread, you're not doing your argument any favors by citing exactly one example and suggesting it shows a trend or proves a point.

> Many people have this attitude, yes. That doesn't make it universally true or even close

History shows humans will do anything to better their odds and leverage their success.

> And while it definitely happens and is widespread > citing exactly one example and suggesting it shows a trend or proves a point.

Guess you kinda just did the same thing? Just because I'm citing one example doesn't make it any less true and it seems we have two examples now: Samsung and Yelp.

Sorry, but this is rampant in e-commerce.

It is on HN, here's a short list of sites that have gone far out of their way to spam HN:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5567427

Great, now I have to prove I'm not a "Samsung shill" before being positive about Samsung products.

Not really. Most readers look at a person's entire posting history before making that kind of claim. And most people who post phony reviews, post too many of them to escape attention.

I'm not sure that people look at posting history even here, where posting is generally considered and careful.

Samsung has been doing this for a while in their home market of South Korea. I've heard tales of Samsung hiring 1,000 temporary employees with the sole task of blogging or commenting on blogs/social networks about their products.

I don't doubt this isn't an activity that most companies engage in, some more than others. There are probably a lot smarter companies who have yet to be caught and might not ever be caught. Some act surprised, but in this day and age of anyone being able to taint or inflate the reputation or a product, brand, location or business you can't really expect anything less.

I hope they get sued for this, but I don't believe it's a conspiracy. Rather, just a case of someone trying too hard to meet certain sale expectations and hold on to a bonus.

So was it a few bad actors, or just the few that got caught?

These things always go back to the top, it's cultural.

That's the way conspiracies work.

What did you expect, aliens?

Samsung is a big company, I meant it's someone in their Taiwan branch rather than their Korea hq.

it's interesting to note that doing this is illegal; i had no idea. it's also important to note that it's possible to determine whether an entity is engaged in the practice: http://www.technologyreview.com/news/428222/statistics-unmas...

One word to describe Samsungs actions Unethical.

This reminds me somehow of when Apple was fixing the reception bars to show more coverage than there actually were on the iPhones.

It was the other way around: Apple fixed the reception indicator to reflect coverage more accurately.

“We were stunned to find that the formula we use to calculate how many bars of signal strength to display is totally wrong. Our formula, in many instances, mistakenly displays 2 more bars than it should for a given signal strength. [...] To fix this, we are adopting AT&T’s recently recommended formula for calculating how many bars to display for a given signal strength. The real signal strength remains the same, but the iPhone’s bars will report it far more accurately, providing users a much better indication of the reception they will get in a given area. We are also making bars 1, 2 and 3 a bit taller so they will be easier to see. We will issue a free software update within a few weeks that incorporates the corrected formula. Since this mistake has been present since the original iPhone, this software update will also be available for the iPhone 3GS and iPhone 3G.”

http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2010/07/02Letter-from-Apple-...

Much of their fluffy positive press in the last few months has the scent of astroturf, too.

Samsucks again...

Marketing-fraud.

..in taiwan against HTC

They all do this.

Hm, when reading articles about Apple or Samsung, I tend to read the comments as well on Yahoo!. I notice within the first couple of hours, the comments are all pretty much Apple bashing. There are hundreds of comments in support of Samsung with tons of flaming going on. Reading this, it all makes sense.

Reading the comments is not something I ever do anymore, except here and on Asymco. It makes you feel cleaner somehow.

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