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Fakespot shuts down today after 9 years of detecting fake product reviews

(blog.truestar.pro)
406 points doppio19 | 1 comments | 01 Jul 25 20:26 UTC | HN request time: 0.208s | source
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dankwizard ◴[02 Jul 25 02:16 UTC] No.44439699[source]▶
It was falling behind. The dodgy stores were getting more creative and Fakespot needed to play catch up.

You've got stores that would include a $5-$20 coupon/gift card in the item in exchange for a positive review. Sure, this didn't 1:1 translate but if a user did it would look like a legitimate review.

You've got a plethora of LLMs out there just itching to GENERATE.

Then an expensive option I was suprised happened - I bought a Dyson clone vacuum cleaner off of Amazon. A few weeks later, the company emailed me and said 'We have a new model. Buy that one, leave a review, we'll refund the purchase'. So I did it. This happened about 10 more times in 2024. My outdoor shed is entirely stick vacuums.

Feel a bit dirty doing it but that's ok I've got 12 vacuums that can clean my conscience.

I think Fakespot would have difficulty with all 3 of these scenarios.

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Retr0id ◴[02 Jul 25 02:48 UTC] No.44439818[source]▶
I can understand going for the "free upgrade" the first time around, but why continue racking up more vacuum cleaners after that? Do you plan to sell them later?
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Mtinie ◴[02 Jul 25 02:57 UTC] No.44439871[source]▶
It’s the rational option if someone is giving you something for less than it costs you and the moral implications of the action is minimal (at best).
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km144 ◴[02 Jul 25 12:49 UTC] No.44443118[source]▶
Probably the most HN-coded response I can imagine to someone asking why you would possibly want 12 vacuum cleaners.
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1. Mtinie ◴[03 Jul 25 02:15 UTC] No.44450987[source]▶
Who knows. I have lots of siblings and my spouse does as well, so that’s nine vacuums accounted for. Add in both sets of parents and I’d have one left over to gift to someone who also needs one.

I’m not sure how to take your comment other than uncharitably so I’ll just concede that you obviously have smaller dust collection needs than I do.