Marketplace reviews, what is the point anymore.

[Sid Nagy]

Time says very little about the quality of a product IMHO.
One likes something or not.

[Softcakes]

55 minutes ago, Luna Bliss said:

You sure do give a lot of low-star reviews -- this must keep you quite busy.  From your photos it looks like you're using high-quality items on your land though, so I'm wondering why you're needing to make hundreds of low-star reviews.

If you buy thousands of items, and spend a lot of time in SL, why is there an issue with that seemingly small amount. I'm spending money, there's a button that says review, I'm very understanding that people may find writing a review harsh but wholly, 100 reviews are less than 5% of all items I own; if even.

A low star review is anything under 4. 

58 minutes ago, Luna Bliss said:

Also, I tested with an alt and a fellow merchant, and low-star reviews are not automatically being removed, as you are claiming.

I am not claiming they're automatically removed, now you're confusing me.

Did your merchant friend report your review, unsure as to why a low star review would magically go away.

[Rowan Amore]

19 hours ago, Softcakes said:

Recently I bought an item and I didn't enjoy it, I wrote simply what was the issues and why someone might be mindful of buying this object, I was reached out to a few hours later by the creator, me thinking he'd be nice as it seemed as such from the start, even thinking to remove the review, or edit it in his favor, yet on asserting why I disliked the item on being asked he began with aggression.

With all due respect, you never did answer my question.  Was there an actual fixable issue with the item or did you simply not like the item?    Without having to name drop, what exactly was the issue?  

IMHO, simply disliking an item without there being a specific issue that can be addressed by the creator, would be an unhelpful and useless review.  

[Softcakes]

20 minutes ago, Rowan Amore said:

With all due respect, you never did answer my question.  Was there an actual fixable issue with the item or did you simply not like the item?    Without having to name drop, what exactly was the issue?  

IMHO, simply disliking an item without there being a specific issue that can be addressed by the creator, would be an unhelpful and useless review.  

With all due respect, any review should be fine to post if there's money spent and reason for it; why add a review button?

As well as that, by your own reasoning then... Is any review that is 5 stars and lack any real reason given for the love, would that be a waste of a read and an unhelpful review, or are 5 star reviews simply protected from being incorrect or false? 

Where someone says, as I did say in my previous answer- "I love this product," that's really not being critical nor stating any sort of reasoning for the max stars and love of said product.

One could therefor also be sure to get the opposite type of reviews' not everyone are eloquent keyboard warriors nor may their main language be English.

I wrote a short objective review, he didn't like it. Nothing to it.

Seeing as he most likely blocked me on asking about the review hearing my response, clearly he wasn't going to "fix," any of my concerns as the slightest criticism had him fairly upset. 

The reason for reviews in a lot of peoples minds aren't to get a quick refund or angrily get back at the creators' it's to tell other consumers and showcase the good and bad, people take it way too seriously, and that's why it's a system that doesn't work.

 

Edited April 9 by Softcakes

[rasterscan]

Review system's just another griefing tool. Notice how ebay had to modify their similar system, years ago now, allowing a few days 'cooling off' period before allowing negative reviews ? I JIRA for a 3 day cool off before 1 stars allowed but they said no way

[Zambe Boo]

3 minutes ago, rasterscan said:

Review system's just another griefing tool. Notice how ebay had to modify their similar system, years ago now, allowing a few days 'cooling off' period before allowing negative reviews ? I JIRA for a 3 day cool off before 1 stars allowed but they said no way

You're correct. Another issue that we have in MP is also people filing false DMCAs to get products removed, regardless if they hold a copyright or not. They only have to file it and LL pulls your products. That is the worst type of trolling. I have had to prove more than once that I am the original creator of images from this.

[Softcakes]

4 minutes ago, rasterscan said:

Review system's just another griefing tool. 

That would mean someone willingly spent money to grief another person, why?

[Softcakes]

1 minute ago, Zambe Boo said:

I have had to prove more than once that I am the original creator of images from this.

Really? That's beyond terrible to have your own creations pulled off MP just because someone think it's either funny or some sort of petty revenge...

[Rowan Amore]

16 minutes ago, Zambe Boo said:

You're correct. Another issue that we have in MP is also people filing false DMCAs to get products removed, regardless if they hold a copyright or not. They only have to file it and LL pulls your products. That is the worst type of trolling. I have had to prove more than once that I am the original creator of images from this.

You can't actually flag an item as infringing on your intellectual property right FROM the MP flagging system.

The process from there requires more info than simply reporting something as infringing or people would be filing them willy nilly.

If a legally sufficient DMCA notice is submitted, Linden Lab will then remove the identified materials as appropriate. Repeated copyright, trademark, or other intellectual property violations by a Resident may result in their accounts being suspended or terminated.

[Softcakes]

7 minutes ago, Rowan Amore said:

You can't actually flag an item as infringing on your intellectual property right FROM the MP flagging system.

The process from there requires more info than simply reporting something as infringing or people would be filing them willy nilly.

If a legally sufficient DMCA notice is submitted, Linden Lab will then remove the identified materials as appropriate. Repeated copyright, trademark, or other intellectual property violations by a Resident may result in their accounts being suspended or terminated.

I do want to say this' they may be right in that it's happened falsely to his store, just because the TOS of LL are stated there, what does it mean? Someone can just put in the extra info and lie, what's it to them. I'm intrigued by this believe in no one because LL has rules, people surely break rules even then... 

[Rowan Amore]

2 minutes ago, Softcakes said:

I do want to say this' they may be right in that it's happened falsely to his store, just because the TOS of LL are stated there, what does it mean? Someone can just put in the extra info and lie, what's it to them. I'm intrigued by this believe in no one because LL has rules, people surely break rules even then... 

There are actual RL ramifications if you falsely accuse someone of this.  They also require your RL contact info and some sort of proof.  

 

i. a subject line that says: "DMCA Copyright Infringement Notice";

ii. your complete contact information, including your full name, mailing address, telephone number, and email address;

iii. a description of the copyrighted work or works that you claim have been infringed;

iv. information reasonably sufficient to permit us to locate the specific allegedly infringing material on our site, including the URL where the content appears, or other means of identifying the allegedly infringing content with particularity;

v. a statement that you have a good faith belief that use of the material in the manner asserted is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law;

vi. a statement under penalty of perjury, that all the information in your notice is accurate, and that you are the copyright owner (or, if you are not the copyright owner, then your statement must indicate that you are authorized to act on the behalf of the copyright owner); and,

vii. your physical or electronic signature (typing your full name will serve as your electronic signature).

[CaithLynnSayes]

2 hours ago, AmeliaJ08 said:

If you have Chrome/Firefox and the Tampermonkey extension there is a nice little script available that displays the age of the items in MP. It is in the metadata, for some reason it just isn't displayed.

I know of only one script for Tampermoney and MP and all it does is add the tags/keywords used for an item as clickable links. Maybe you're talking about some unofficial script i haven't heard of, yet.

[Love Zhaoying]

2 hours ago, Softcakes said:

With all due respect, any review should be fine to post if there's money spent and reason for it; why add a review button?

As well as that, by your own reasoning then... Is any review that is 5 stars and lack any real reason given for the love, would that be a waste of a read and an unhelpful review, or are 5 star reviews simply protected from being incorrect or false? 

On the other hand, perhaps to you, "3 stars out of 5" means "average" while to other people it means "let the buyer beware"?

Does someone need to especially "shine" or exceed your expectations to get "5 out of 5"?

 

[Softcakes]

1 hour ago, Love Zhaoying said:

Does someone need to especially "shine" or exceed your expectations to get "5 out of 5"?

It doesn't have to blow my mind to earn a 5 star.

[Clem Marques]

6 hours ago, Love Zhaoying said:

On the other hand, perhaps to you, "3 stars out of 5" means "average" while to other people it means "let the buyer beware"?

• The only genuinely positive rating in the context of the SL Marketplace is 5 stars.
• A 4 star rating is "let the buyer beware"
• A rating that is 3 stars or less is a bad rating ("help the buyer AVOID" )

That's my personal opinion on it, both as a merchant and a customer.

Edited April 10 by Clem Marques

[Sasy Scarborough]

You seem to think that a lower rating does not cost the seller, it definitely does, because it can contribute to lowering the stars shown for an item.

We have discussed a lot of this at the Web User Group meetings, that the review system needs to change, that you should if you purchased an item, just be able to leave a rating and leave, no names no having to write anything, because not all people want to be seen as endorsing a product. The other way we also discussed the idea that like other rating systems, that clicking the avatar and seeing their full review history would work in everyone's favour, if someone is constantly a downer about all things, then the person reading the reviews could consider that. That someone that seems to only review one brand, would potentially be the discussed 'buying ratings' kind of situation. That someone showing very mindful reviews could be someone you look to as a guide in your future shopping habits and so on.
Second Life content creators are often doing it all, and when you poke them, they get really hurt by it, because they take it personally, and many have never worked in customer service industries, so this is all very new to them even if doing it for years. 

Customers also abuse the system in a way that is very unnecessary, leaving one star reviews to say ' I cannot find the blue' instead of actually attempting to contact the seller or their staff if there are staff. Marketplace has a long history of communication drops, those reviews messages not getting to anyone at all, so if someone is reaching out via them, they go unseen, sometimes for years. Then others want to jump in and growl instead of trying to work out a solution.
Review is a misnomer for how Second Life conducts itself as a whole, and the way people rate with stars is too personal to them only. I have asked that we have a clear outline on the stars that 1 means this and 2 means this and so on, so that no one is putting down 3 stars because they like it, but don't love it, because they want to save their 4 - 5 stars for something SUPER DUPER \o/ because that is exactly how some people rate things.

In IMDB I had to decide that 7 meant I liked it but probably would not watch it a second time. But no one else knows that is my method.
So when someone does a 3 star rating  to them 3 stars can mean I use this pretty much exclusively and am happy with my purchase vs a 4 star rating  I would strip my whole region and build a pedestal to mount this on it.... to then be overtaken by a 5 star rating that just means you IMd the creator for their paypal account, because you feel that anytime you are in that items presence you want to give them more money and you have currently purchased it 87 times for friends family, and every single stranger you have met since the day of purchase. Then meet the person that feels that every purchase they make that actually arrived should get 5 stars because the very fact that they paid for it means the 5 stars justifies their expense, and they would not want to contradict their choices by lowering the stars  

Any review left on Marketplace is a 'LOOK AT ME before you buy this thing' whether positive or negative, it is in no way a connection with the creator, because if you wanted to do that, you would just IM them, send a notecard. It will always be seen as hurtful if not flowery. The only thing lower than a 4 should just be that it did not deliver what was advertised, and no response from seller, to warn people that possibly that creator has like many just left, so you get no customer support and don't want someone to lose their lindens like you did.

I saw a review once that was bashing a creator because the swing they were selling did not come with the tree, but then it also did not come with the house, the grass, the region and the persons hair, skin, body, shoes, and clothing. Kind of like the Pink House review  I also once got an IM/offline all outraged that they got a bag not pants, because they did not know to unpack the bag for the pants.

I have dealt with some reviews that have been horrid and cruel and just outright wrong, because you will also find that some customers feel that leaving a bad review on who they see as competition for their favourite brand is somehow doing Gods work. Then also theft, accusations of things that did not happen, and do not exist and been so harmful, and yet sat there for years. The Review response turn around is hit and miss, and sometimes something can happen in a day if you report it vs happening 6 months later that you forgot you even flagged it. But it definitely has to be flagged, and no one is going to flag the 5 star reviews because they should not like your good ones if they don't like your bad ones, that would be on you to go in and remove them if you feel that strongly about that...but that actually just proves the points made, if you were to remove good because of something bad on another item, you would be exactly what you are mad about, that people leave nonsense reviews and can use them as weapons.

 

[Softcakes]

7 hours ago, Sasy Scarborough said:

You seem to think that a lower rating does not cost the seller, it definitely does, because it can contribute to lowering the stars shown for an item.

It's almost as if it's a review and it adds and removes stars based on the average amount of them given out to any given item on the MP.

The amount of items with 0 reviews surely doesn't help, I've said this over and over now but, anyone should be able to leave a review, if I can state my outmost love for anything I've bought and it's purely, "I love this product." No more and nothing else, then I anyone should equally be able to leave a review stating the opposite. 

I want people to be able to feel free to leave a 1 star where they give a clear idea of what I'm about to buy, but that's not happening.

7 hours ago, Sasy Scarborough said:

I have dealt with some reviews that have been horrid and cruel and just outright wrong, because you will also find that some customers feel that leaving a bad review on who they see as competition for their favourite brand is somehow doing Gods work. Then also theft, accusations of things that did not happen, and do not exist and been so harmful, and yet sat there for years. 

I've seen lots of reviews in-where people add a 1 star for quick and fast help.

But I've also gotten items where the actual object to rez and recive from had been forgotten and the creator is barely on, so leaving a 1 star to warn others until the seller comes on is key to being helpful to the community in SL, which is something I dearly want more of, to help consumers get a good review prior to buying, that's what I feel a review system should be.

Just recently I bought a set of bushes without the actual bushes being in the folder I'd bought, the seller came back to me in a few days and was kind and of course fixed the issue. 

7 hours ago, Sasy Scarborough said:

Any review left on Marketplace is a 'LOOK AT ME before you buy this thing' whether positive or negative, it is in no way a connection with the creator, because if you wanted to do that, you would just IM them, send a notecard. It will always be seen as hurtful if not flowery. The only thing lower than a 4 should just be that it did not deliver what was advertised, and no response from seller, to warn people that possibly that creator has like many just left, so you get no customer support and don't want someone to lose their lindens like you did.

 

I think you as many have this one mind when it comes to reviews, anything under 4 is unacceptable and very cruel to the creator.

If I message someone who's a seller and I tell them why the product isn't working as intended, 9 out of 10 they become mad and take zero criticism and choose to ignore, mock, be hateful, if you want people to start fights, messaging someone randomly as to why the thing they put hard work into directly would surely bring that fight.

I'm not really into confrontations and I enjoy being able to put a simple review that helps others on the MP.

It's clear others just wants to be not helpful yet claim to be by leaving 5 stars, no real reasoning for it and never be questioned-

Yet me and many others leaving a proper review with 2-4 stars get hounded for not ticking it up.

If someone can't handle the review system as a seller on MP they could make an only in world store, free of reviews

 

Edited April 10 by Softcakes

[Zalificent Corvinus]

24 minutes ago, Softcakes said:

The amount of items with 0 reviews surely doesn't help, I've said this over and over now but, anyone should be able to leave a review

The reason most items on the MP don't have reviews is most people don't LEAVE reviews. You can't leave a review on something unless you bought it. II like most people don't usually go back to the page for a thing I've bought unless there's a problem, so, no reviews left. And if I *did* go back and leave a 5 star, odds are a bunch of people would just say "oh an obvious sock-puppet shill alt of the merchant, review is fake and worthless"

You *could* change the system to allow ANYONE to leave a "review" on ANYTHING, regardless if they have bought it or not, but that just opens the way to thousands of disposable alts spamming hate-reviews on the listings of rival brands.

 

28 minutes ago, Softcakes said:

I think you as many have this one mind when it comes to reviews, anything under 4 is unacceptable and very cruel to the creator.

There was a promotional offer from one "Famous Brand" on the MP once, I bought one for my self, it never arrived, others had the same problem, the listing accumulated 45-50 reviews in a few days.

Of those 45-50 reviews, about 25-30 were 3 stars and under, complaining of the failure to deliver the product, AND the appalling standard of the customer service. The rest, were what I'd describe as "fraudulent".

"I am a loyal fan of this brand, and while this item hasn't arrived yet, IF it is delivered I'm sure it will be WONDERFUL! 5 STARS"

 

3 Days after I placed my order, I went to the merchants in-world store, to the ONLY redelivery terminal in SL for their items, to check if my purchase had been tranfered to their re-delivery system, it had, so I DELIVERED the item MYSELF.

3.5 Days after purchase, the Brands most toxic CSR sent me a Hate-IM, DEMANDING I remove my negative review, AND my negative reply to the abusive and snotty comment left on my review by the Merchant, AND they also THREATENED me, saying that if I didn't comply, they would Abuse Report me, and being a "Famous Brand", their single AR would get me banned from SSL forever.

I told the CSR to go stick their head in a pig.

4 Days after purchase, the Merchant IM'd me with more abuse, and claimed THEY had personally sent me a copy by hand, and made the usual threats. The impression was that the CSSR and the Merchant didn't make a habit of telling each other what they wee doing. The actual "hand sent" copy from the Merchant, arrived 1 WEEK after it was claimed it had been sent, 11 days after purchase.

 

During that week, the 25-30 reviews of 3 stars and under ALL vanished over night, purged by LL, leaving only the fraudulent "it will be fab if it arrives" 5 star reviews, and a single 4 star, which also claimed it would be fab, but admitted it dropped 1 star because the thing hadn't arrived yet.

 

So, apparently, leaving a BAD review for a "famous brand" because of failed delivery and bad service, is unacceptable. But lauding the praises of goods you didn't get, is just fine.

 

Some weeks later, the whole listing vanished, then reappeared, with NO reviews, presumably because the marketing department for this brand realised that 20 odd reviews saying that the item hadn't arrived but would be fab, looked a little suspicious, and not at all flattering.

De-listing and Re-listing to erase reviews is a violation of the MP rules, gets your product officially de-listed, and could get your store closed if you make a habit of it.

 

Somehow the "famous brand" managed to avoid such punitive action.

 

58 minutes ago, Softcakes said:

If someone can't handle the review system

MP reviews are and always have been utterly useless. The systems biased, and gamed to hell and back.

Small "nobody brands" can't get obvious hate-review trolling removed, big "famous brands!" can have almost anything removed, in bulk.

 

Earlier in the thread @Sid Nagy suggested that some merchants "give the money to pay to people so they can buy and leave 5 stars". In fact they don't, you give them the money, there is NO way to enforce the deal, they could buy and leave no stars, or just keep the money and buy from somebody else.

What they do is post a nice notice in their VIP group chat.

"Buy my new MP product at full price with your own money, leave a 5 star review, and send me a polite notecard telling me this, and I'll send you off the company books, a generous cash in hand discount, and/or an unlisted product I claim is worth 50% of your purchase"

 

I've only ever left ONE review on the MP, I won't waste a second of my life leaving another, good or bad.

[Love Zhaoying]

8 minutes ago, Zalificent Corvinus said:

"Buy my new MP product at full price with your own money, leave a 5 star review, and send me a polite notecard telling me this, and I'll send you off the company books, a generous cash in hand discount, and/or an unlisted product I claim is worth 50% of your purchase"

That's like some RL sellers, "leave us a 5-star review and we will send you a gift certificate for Amazon", etc.

[Love Zhaoying]

1 hour ago, Softcakes said:

The amount of items with 0 reviews surely doesn't help, I've said this over and over now but, anyone should be able to leave a review

I disagree.

[Luna Bliss]

19 hours ago, Softcakes said:

20 hours ago, Luna Bliss said:

You sure do give a lot of low-star reviews -- this must keep you quite busy.  From your photos it looks like you're using high-quality items on your land though, so I'm wondering why you're needing to make hundreds of low-star reviews.

If you buy thousands of items, and spend a lot of time in SL, why is there an issue with that seemingly small amount. I'm spending money, there's a button that says review, I'm very understanding that people may find writing a review harsh but wholly, 100 reviews are less than 5% of all items I own; if even.

You said hundreds, and not just a hundred.

I just can't believe all these items you've reviewed were contested by the creator and removed.  If this is the case though, you're not reviewing items correctly (inside the rules set forth).  You consistently refuse to give a concrete example of how you review items, and this is suspicious.

IF, however, this has indeed happened to you (hundreds of your reviews cancelled) you may be considered as someone who is harassing merchants and so your feedback is disregarded now.  There was one such customer I experienced personally a few years ago. He left such an odd review on one of my items I decided to look him up to see if he was a griefer, and Google at that time listed many reviews he'd given, all negative and strange, so I submitted a ticket on him. Not sure why MP reviewers don't show up in Google anymore but would be nice if they still did.

This is only one example of a customer hassling merchants. I have many stories to tell over 20 years as a merchant. Most of my customers have been great though.

[Luna Bliss]

19 hours ago, Softcakes said:

20 hours ago, Luna Bliss said:

Also, I tested with an alt and a fellow merchant, and low-star reviews are not automatically being removed, as you are claiming.

I am not claiming they're automatically removed, now you're confusing me.

You said many were removed within an hour.  So technically, yes, not immediate.  My point was that I don't see where contested 2 or 3 star ratings are always removed.

[Softcakes]

22 minutes ago, Luna Bliss said:

You said hundreds, and not just a hundred.

English isn't my main language, hundreds to me simply means over a hundred and being hyperbolic is apparently hard.

Even if I'd given a thousand reviews your point to me is just as ignorant as being picky on this point, your belief is a terrible opinion if you're blindly trusting of a system that's clearly faulty, even if you do not believe me, many can attest to having had their reviews taken down, if your reply is as I've showcased in other responses, to demean and state that I'm 100% in the wrong and I'm breaking TOS, on every one of my reviews.

Then do yourself a favor and kindly rethink, if you do actually see anyone in a bad light the moment they're speaking up or has a concern, that's just a tiny bit sad to me.

if a product doesn't come with the given items and I write, "I didn't get what was stated," the seller un-lists and lists, now I have no way of reviewing. 

Same thing again, if the seller then simply says I am breaking TOS in that review, instantly deleted and next person comes along and buys, has the same issue yet nothing can be done, since we're in the wrong? 

I surely hope you have a bit more faith in people other than get upset when challenged on a stance.

- I've posted many, many 5 star reviews.

I mentioned the same person who had my 2 star taken down had several other products I'd bought, where in I'd put up 5 stars being very happy and writing about the quality.

How is it that the 5 stars stay up when I'm the one writing them, if every time I'm as obnoxiously terrible at writing my reviews. 

How are you remotely being helpful, if you don't believe it happens then state that and be done.

28 minutes ago, Luna Bliss said:

You said many were removed within an hour.  So technically, yes, not immediate.  My point was that I don't see where contested 2 or 3 star ratings are always removed.

Picky, what's that meme with the, "acchually-" And yes, weird that you don't see them contested if they're taken down, what is your point or actual complaint other than trying to nitpick at something I've either answered prior.

You don't believe me, then why do you care? Because you're a seller and haven't had this experience, okay?

[Softcakes]

1 hour ago, Love Zhaoying said:

That's like some RL sellers, "leave us a 5-star review and we will send you a gift certificate for Amazon", etc.

Some stores do this to bump up reviews, get 100L sent to you if you leave a "good," review. 

1 hour ago, Love Zhaoying said:

I disagree.

Fair. More so meant that if you buy something you should be able to leave a review on that product, negative or good, if it goes one way it should apply to the other.

[Love Zhaoying]

1 minute ago, Softcakes said:

1 hour ago, Love Zhaoying said:

I disagree.

Fair. More so meant that if you buy something you should be able to leave a review on that product, negative or good, if it goes one way it should apply to the other.

Understood, of course I interpreted what you wrote as, "should be able to leave a review whether you bought it or not".