Originally Posted by
mstateglfr
I included your full post because I do agree with your points.
Just decided to respond to the red part because it stood out to me. I dont think it is a 'these days' issue. Yes it is widespread now because it is easier than ever for people to voice their views, but the lack of value when it comes to reviews in the cycling industry is a decades old issue.
I am constantly entertained by the bicycling magazine reviews from the 80s and 90s.
- Full on deep dive reviews that are filled with total BS marketing speak and say very little.
- Comparison reviews where the same feature will be a positive on one bike and a negative on another bike.
- Poetic waxing based on image and reputation rather than product quality or differences.
- Reinforced stereotypes of bike styles or brands, and total shock when something doesnt align with their biases.
They really are entertaining, and many really are totally worthless reviews by industry 'professionals'. Reviews these days have to be taken with a large grain of salt, just like reviews from 30-45 years ago.
Agreed on that, a lot of the pro-reviews can get a bit into the marketing B.S. to total worship of some brand because they gave them a buck or biased reviewers or what have you. However my main focus was more on the consumer side rather than the professional side. Reviews are a tough thing I understand that I have posted restaurant reviews and product reviews as well (but usually I wait till I have used it or been to the restaurant a bunch of times). The pro-reviews have sucked for a while to a degree but there are occasionally still some good ones but if you are a review website and you need to produce a bunch of content regularly to keep money coming it can be so much easier to go OK let's just slop something out then let's actually provide people with a good review.
I think most people sadly are happy with a crappy review because they don't know any better. If all you have had is powered lemonade flavored drink mix you may not care about a nice fresh glass of fresh squeezed lemonade made with a rich simple syrup because you don't really notice it.