Quote:
Originally Posted by Sliver
My problem is less that ratings are supposed to be a favour to the business and more that the general public is not qualified to leave reviews
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I know what's a good and bad sandwich. I don't feel any special qualifications are required to decide when I've had an experience I liked versus one I was disappointed with. I'm supportive of the idea that bad reviews should disappear after a while, which is why I sort by "recent" when I'm reading the things, and yes, it would certainly make sense for there to be some sort of appeal process for people who leave the "3/5 stars - Good" reviews that were mentioned above, or just 1/5 with no explanation, or even just don't have any rating that doesn't come with a written explanation count towards the overall average. All of those are fine. But I can read a paragraph written in a negative review by someone I don't know and decide whether I think the person sounds like they have a legitimate grievance or is just a whiner, particularly if the business also has a bunch of good reviews.
Just for example,
here are the google reviews for Tony's Auto Service downtown. They've done work for me in the past I was happy with. If you sort by recent, there are some 5 stars and a one star and two star in there. For me it's pretty damned easy to make a judgment about whether or not to take the bad reviews seriously, particularly when the business replies in a reasonable fashion to explain what happened. And that's a freaking auto shop; if any business is going to attract the occasional bad review it's that.
I just do not see a problem here. If you look at the context for reviews, you can figure out pretty easily where to set your expectations for a given business. If see a bunch of 5 star ratings on a Shawarma place I'm not expecting a Model Milk dining experience. If I see 3 star ratings and complaints about crappy portion sizes or cold food on a Shawarma place, I'm happy someone left those so I know to order from the one down the street instead.