{"id":3522,"date":"2015-05-02T21:34:16","date_gmt":"2015-05-02T21:34:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/?p=3522"},"modified":"2016-08-13T06:30:23","modified_gmt":"2016-08-13T06:30:23","slug":"the-social-graph-wont-save-us-from-whats-wrong-with-online-reviews","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/the-social-graph-wont-save-us-from-whats-wrong-with-online-reviews\/","title":{"rendered":"The social graph won’t save us from what’s wrong with online reviews"},"content":{"rendered":"

Joseph Reagle<\/a>, Northeastern University<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

In early 2015, the Belfast Telegraph sent reporter Kim Kelly undercover<\/a> to visit Northern Ireland\u2019s \u201cworst\u201d hotel \u2014 according to its on online reputation. Kelly reported that although some TripAdvisor reviews had called it a \u201chell hole\u201d and \u201cdustbin,\u201d she was pleasantly surprised with the \u201cclean and compact\u201d rooms.<\/p>\n

This story is indicative of how important online reviews have become and the skepticism many have toward them. In a 2014 survey<\/a> of Americans by the market research firm YouGov, 90% of respondents said that checking online reviews was an important part of shopping. An equal percentage believed that such reviews are sometimes manipulated \u2014 for motives not difficult to discern.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
I hear the coffee\u2019s very good here.<\/span>
\nJay<\/a>, CC BY-NC-SA<\/a><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Online reviews translate to big bucks<\/h2>\n

As I document in my new book Reading the Comments: Likers, Haters, and Manipulators at the Bottom of the Web<\/a>, online reviews affect merchants’ bottom lines. Multiple studies have shown that good reviews permit merchants to charge<\/a> higher prices<\/a>, increase restaurant bookings<\/a>, and sales of books<\/a>, hotel rooms<\/a> and video games<\/a>. Accordingly, review platforms are worth millions. TripAdvisor 2011\u2019s IPO was valued<\/a> at over US$3 billion. In 2013, Amazon purchased<\/a> Goodreads, the book review and discussion site, for US$150 million. Google had its own review acquisition spree, including Zagat in 2011<\/a> and Frommer\u2019s Travel in 2012<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Beyond consumers, merchants, and review platforms, there\u2019s another actor keen on benefiting from online reviews: illicit manipulators. From overseas \u201csweatshops<\/a>\u201d (that earn pennies per post) to the \u201cboutique\u201d reputation services<\/a> for the rich, there is a vast market for online deceit. By finding patterns in posts (such as the ratio of positive to negative words) and activity (such as a negative review quickly followed by a positive one), studies<\/a> estimate that 10%\u201330% of reviews are fake. Similarly, Yelp discloses that about a quarter of its reviews are \u201cfiltered<\/a>\u201d as unreliable \u2013 they are not easily seen and are excluded from services’ average number of stars.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Like it? Loyal? What\u2019s in it for me?<\/span>
\nSearch Influence<\/a>, CC BY-NC-SA<\/a><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Social steps in<\/h2>\n

What to do? Some suggest the \u201csocial graph\u201d as a solution: favoring the comments and activities of users’ friends over the recommendations of strangers. Instead of reading an anonymous review of an eatery, you are informed that your friend Alice enjoyed her sandwich there.<\/p>\n

But this solution assumes that platforms themselves (and your buddy Alice) can be trusted. Review sites including Yelp have been accused of extorting<\/a> merchants by rigging which reviews are seen depending on whether merchants paid for advertising \u2014 especially when Yelp\u2019s own employees write a bad review after a merchant declines to advertise<\/a>. So far, Yelp has prevailed<\/a> in the courts and review platforms will continue<\/a> to profit by manipulating the visibility of users’ praise and pillory.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Me no like.<\/span>
\nSean MacEntee<\/a>, CC BY<\/a><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Facebook was accused of abusing both its advertisers and end users with its \u201cSponsored Stories\u201d program, which it described<\/a> as \u201cmessages coming from friends about them engaging with a Page, app or event that a business, organization or individual has paid to highlight so there\u2019s a better chance people see them.\u201d Businesses that had Page accounts were upset when they found they were having a more<\/em> difficult time reaching their fans: on average, only 15% saw these Sponsored Story messages. If clients wished to reach more fans, they needed to pay for more Sponsored Stories; many<\/a> complaints<\/a> soon followed<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Worse yet, end users were surprised to find themselves appearing in Facebook ads. A plaintiff in a lawsuit against Facebook appeared in ads because she had \u201cliked\u201d an online French language course in hopes<\/a> of getting a discount. Facebook is not alone. Google+ has \u201cshared endorsements<\/a>\u201d and, in addition to its \u201cpromoted tweets<\/a>,\u201d Twitter will reportedly start filtering and shaping<\/a> its users’ timelines later in 2015.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Geek & Poke by Oliver Widder<\/span>
\nhttp:\/\/geek-and-poke.com<\/a>, CC BY<\/a><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Additionally, moving to the social graph is only likely to implicate one\u2019s acquaintances in the same game. Users, too, are tempted to exploit the social graph. When our friend Alice posted that she enjoyed the sandwich, perhaps it was because she also got a free drink for doing so? Shoppers click \u201clike\u201d in hopes of a discount and recommend products to acquaintances so as to get a referral fee. Much of this is driven by the extraordinary value of review today, the rapacious desire to rate and rank everything, the consequent dynamic of competition and the sense that everyone else is already doing it.<\/p>\n

The social graph will not save us, it may very well make shills of us all.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

This article was originally published on The Conversation<\/a>.
\nRead the original article<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Joseph Reagle, Northeastern University In early 2015, the Belfast Telegraph sent reporter Kim Kelly undercover to visit Northern Ireland\u2019s \u201cworst\u201d hotel \u2014 according to its on online reputation. Kelly reported that although some TripAdvisor reviews had called it a \u201chell hole\u201d and \u201cdustbin,\u201d she was pleasantly surprised with the \u201cclean and compact\u201d rooms. This story […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":40,"featured_media":5869,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[38],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3522"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/40"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3522"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3522\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5870,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3522\/revisions\/5870"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5869"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3522"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3522"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3522"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}