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Originally Posted by rawrster /img/forum/go_quote.gif
actually i find the majority of userlander's posts here quite helpful. It's good to have multiple opinions on a product esp one that is so highly regarded by the OP at such a price. He's told us his opinions on them with both the positives and negatives so he has a good amount of useful posts here.
And in regards to his question..it could be a valid one but I don't believe HPA's relationship (whatever it is if its just a reviewer or something more) would affect his reviews and say only positive things about them.
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X2 on paragraph 1.
On the issue of reviewing on HF, speaking from very limited experience and skill (esp compared to HPA), when you get gear gratis from a vendor, it's very, very hard to be brutally frank about a product if you don't care for it. So you try to be as fair as possible, point out the good and the bad. It's a little different when you pay for it out of pocket, or work as a professional reviewer for a money-making site or magazine, no? In those cases, if you really dislike something, it's much easier to be brutally honest (but of course you should still try and be balanced). After all, you put out your hard-earned money for it.
When a company is going to start funneling products to a member gratis on a regular basis, in my humble opinion, they really don't expect to be blasted in a review. It's human nature on the vendor's part. And likewise, when you are on the receiving end, again, it's human nature to give the vendor every benefit of the doubt. Otherwise, the free merchandise will certainly come to a grinding halt in short order, and more importantly, your credibility as a reviewer will be kaput.
The only way to discern any bias in favor of a vendor who supplies free samples is to match reviews with known "review samples" of gear over time, and see if the reviews/reports are mostly favorable by a large percentage. If that happens over the course of say 50 products, then pro-vendor bias would make the reviewer suspect. Using 1-2 reviews is not a good sample.
In my view it is critical, on this forum, that anyone reviewing a product that was given, not loaned, but given by a vendor say so up front. It's just common sense that that be the case, so members can adjust their perception of the review accordingly.
No doubt the hardest thing about being an amateur reviewer on HF is getting something free and then really liking it, because no matter how much you might try to deny it/defend yourself, some members are going to say you can't possibly be objective. And they could be right, depending on your relationship with the vendor, etc.
So no reason to attack userlander, for sure. His question is valid. And HPA is well aware of the thin line an amateur HF reviewer walks when the benefit from free gear. It ain't easy.