4 star reviews. WTH?!!!

[Moab]

This is a rant. Big surprise coming from me huh?! Lol!

Why do people love a product, leave a great review, but only give it 4 stars?!!

This bugs the hell out of me. I've seen people say in their reviews that they reserve 5 stars only for products that really blow them away. So even if the products meets or exceeds their exoectations. They rarely leave 5 star reviews. 

I applaud their willingness to review and share advice in the first place. But reviews DO NOT WORK THAT WAY! It obviously effects the overall average review score. And brings the product down in terms of general comparison to other products in the same category.

It particularly bothers me on sites like GGG - Garage Grown Gear. Which showcases small businesses dedicated to new and creative products for hiking. By small independently run businesses. Some jerk off loves their product. Writes a good review. And then trashes their overall rating by only giving it 4 stars. 

"Because they reserve 5 stars only for those products that really impress them." 

This is so stupid! You're not helping anyone by doing this. Your just hurting someone working hard to bring new products to the outdoor world. Because of your inflated sense of ego. As if the world is just waiting with baited breath for your next 5 star review! 

Come on man?! All your doing is bringing down someone's brand who's working hard, probably in their own home, on their off time, to help you enjoy the outdoors!

[Anianna]

I had a professor who refused to give 100% regardless of how well a student performed on anything for this very reason, even when application of the grade should have been objective rather than subjective.  It can be pretty infuriating.

This is why I read the reviews instead of taking them at their overall rating.  I've encountered reviewers that think one star is best and five stars is worst, people who confuse product reviews and seller reviews, people clearly trying to reach customer service rather than leave a review, and people who are just incompetent and there's nothing wrong with the product.  And those are just the human reviews.  

[Moab]

I had a professor who refused to give 100% regardless of how well a student performed on anything for this very reason, even when application of the grade should have been objective rather than subjective.  It can be pretty infuriating.

This is why I read the reviews instead of taking them at their overall rating.  I've encountered reviewers that think one star is best and five stars is worst, people who confuse product reviews and seller reviews, people clearly trying to reach customer service rather than leave a review, and people who are just incompetent and there's nothing wrong with the product.  And those are just the human reviews. 

I read reviews for sure too. But sometimes I'll look at like the top three products, compare the overall reviews and then read the top one or two products reviews. 

I just read a review on GGG. And the guy was pissed a water bottle didn't work with three different cap bidets he had. I was dude! It's a water bottle not a bottle for your bidets!!!! And he gave it 3 stars because if that! I wish you could leave follow up reviews in reviews?! But then everyone would probably figure out that half if the reviews are just plants from computer programs or AI!

More and more I turn to AI for my research on products. Overall it covers a such large cross section of reviews and information - even if it's slightly off - the amount of research is light years ahead of anything I could accomplish myself. It would take an entire day go thru what AI does in a few seconds. 

[Moab]

I needed to research travelers insurance before coming here to the Phillipines. Can you imagine the time and effort it takes to compare insurance plans?! Mind numbing! Like it would take days. You'd have to use a spreadsheet just to compare them all! I got a college level research paper on travel insurance in about 10 minutes. (I used Grok 3 deep research. Which is incredible if you haven't used it. It's an advanced AI research tool that can take up to 10 minutes to finish. But you hit sesrch. Go about your business and leave the app to do it's thing. And it so it's out a massive research paper. While working in the background.) I don't think I could have stomached it. Let alone finished it. 

And the thing you realize is that you can ask really stupid vague questions. And fine tune the search results in additional searches using common language. It's not like a search query in a search engine at all. One question one answer. You get an answer and can then say like "ok. Add this aspect to that above answer?". Like any follow up question you'd ask any expert in any field. Which changes or fine tunes their answer. And it can be simple language. I don't think most people understand how massively powerful it is. The human interface is literally such common language. It's having having a professor sitting their in front of you answering your further questions thru a conversation together. I don't even use search engines anymore. There are a total waste of time. 

[Anianna]

I had a professor who refused to give 100% regardless of how well a student performed on anything for this very reason, even when application of the grade should have been objective rather than subjective.  It can be pretty infuriating.

This is why I read the reviews instead of taking them at their overall rating.  I've encountered reviewers that think one star is best and five stars is worst, people who confuse product reviews and seller reviews, people clearly trying to reach customer service rather than leave a review, and people who are just incompetent and there's nothing wrong with the product.  And those are just the human reviews. 

I read reviews for sure too. But sometimes I'll look at like the top three products, compare the overall reviews and then read the top one or two products reviews.

I just read a review on GGG. And the guy was pissed a water bottle didn't work with three different cap bidets he had. I was dude! It's a water bottle not a bottle for your bidets!!!! And he gave it 3 stars because if that! I wish you could leave follow up reviews in reviews?! But then everyone would probably figure out that half if the reviews are just plants from computer programs or AI!

More and more I turn to AI for my research on products. Overall it covers a such large cross section of reviews and information - even if it's slightly off - the amount of research is light years ahead of anything I could accomplish myself. It would take an entire day go thru what AI does in a few seconds.

Amazon used to let you respond to reviews.  You could explain to people suffering user error how to get better results.  

[Moab]

I had a professor who refused to give 100% regardless of how well a student performed on anything for this very reason, even when application of the grade should have been objective rather than subjective.  It can be pretty infuriating.

This is why I read the reviews instead of taking them at their overall rating.  I've encountered reviewers that think one star is best and five stars is worst, people who confuse product reviews and seller reviews, people clearly trying to reach customer service rather than leave a review, and people who are just incompetent and there's nothing wrong with the product.  And those are just the human reviews. 

I read reviews for sure too. But sometimes I'll look at like the top three products, compare the overall reviews and then read the top one or two products reviews.

I just read a review on GGG. And the guy was pissed a water bottle didn't work with three different cap bidets he had. I was dude! It's a water bottle not a bottle for your bidets!!!! And he gave it 3 stars because if that! I wish you could leave follow up reviews in reviews?! But then everyone would probably figure out that half if the reviews are just plants from computer programs or AI!

More and more I turn to AI for my research on products. Overall it covers a such large cross section of reviews and information - even if it's slightly off - the amount of research is light years ahead of anything I could accomplish myself. It would take an entire day go thru what AI does in a few seconds.

Amazon used to let you respond to reviews.  You could explain to people suffering user error how to get better results. 

I feel like social media, reviews and the dominance of forums by reddit. Have been intentional to cut down on people achiving knowledge valuable to the masses. For quick and easy access.

If everyone used online repositories of information to vet, update and store knowledge. Imagine how much it could help the people. I once saw forums as that place. Take this site for instance. 

If we used stickies to continuously store information on say canning food? Remember the great knowledge you shared about canning safety? If each section had a series of relavant stickies. The first list being locked in the sticky thread. The rest below dedicated to the possible amending if that information in the first post And we vetted that information. Updated it. And kept it stored their. It would be a lot more effective that searching for random threads and posts in a given subject.

A sticky on canning could include all the relavent information about canning. And the discussion in that sticky could be continually discussing, debating, vetting and adding to it. Even if it were a loose concensus on the subject. Or included links to relavent posts within the thread with alternative views. 

It would provide a far greater service than just continually asking and answering the same questions. Answered by users of various merit on that subject. Or by searching old threads or posts with the same various opinions from varies degrees of expertise.

Kind of how reddit does. Or social media. You can search old posts. Or you can ask a question. But each time your going to find varying degrees of valuable information. 

If each time a new opinion or piece of information were shared. It would be much more beneficial. To have say the resident expert consider adding that information to the first post in the stickied thread. Or even amending that first post. 

Otherwise you never end up with a solid block of knowledge on a given subject.

The conspiracy part of my brain considers the threat to business and government of an informed populace. There used to be stickied threads on Slickdeals with scripts that could help you negotiate cable bills or cellphone bills. Or contracts. It really helped people cut thru the sales strategies of major corporations screwing the public over with deceptive sales practices. Somehow they were taken down. I can guess what powerful entities made that happen. 

Forums on individual subjects did the same thing. But then this massive forum reddit came along and turned those databases of knowledge back into a hodgepodge of posts and threads that aren't easy to find. And everyone is left at the same starting point every time. Asking a question. Getting questionable Answers sometimes helpful. Sometimes not. And each time someone revisits that subject it starts all over. 

Instead of discussing it and vetting it once, archiving that information and the valuable debate that went into the vetting process. We just do it over and over again. 

I feel it likely (again conspiracy hat) reddit was an answer to the gov saying "what are we going to do about online information depositories that may be against our interests?" Or major corps saying "how do we keep people from avoiding our sales processes? And spending as little money with us as possible?" 

Letting people share, vet and archive that information. Has to be seen as threatening to gov interests and Corp interests. And forums or any online discussion platform that stores this type of information must be stopped. What better way than one big forum like reddit. That does all the things in one place. But loses the most valuable aspect of online discussion. Cataloguing that information for quick and easy retrieval. 

Social media is the same way. Your limited to searching posts or asking the same question. and receiving the same "maybe" good responses that starts the postting, debating and concensus process all over again each time. 

I know you can't get the internet to agree on anything. Let alone everything. But most, basic subjects, take canning for instance, you can at least come up with a general consensus on equipment, safety, techniques etc. The first time  lengthy well contributed conversation happens. 

Otherwise they keep us repeating the same process over and over. With questionable results.  Instead of setting a basic archive the first time. And amending it as you go along. 

This has always bothered me watching internet discussion evolve from afar over a long time period. And the various financial titans with a  vested interest and the means to pervert it.

[MacWa77ace]

@Moab what's the time lag now for you now that you're in the PI?

The only way I give a five star review is if the cost to quality ratio is crazy off in my favor. Cost to quality ratio equals value. So if the item costs $10 but has a C:Q value of $100 then they get 5 stars. But mostly stuff that gets the 4 stars is has a C:Q ration of about 1 to 1. Its worth is what I paid for it and its fine for that price.

I have gone back later and downgraded good reviews when i ran into an issue.

The other thing is that you have fake positive reviews [from the sellers and their marketing dept] and fake negative reviews [from the competition]. So a one star or 5 star raises red flags for me.