MEH! YOU NEED TO SELL THESE!

@capguncowboy YES! We have a pink one known as the vagina lounger.

@DaveInSoCal OMG! Is that your Cali pool?

@compunaut lol, I wish. It’s my friend’s parents pool.

@RiotDemon
There are places you can sign up for this. However, many people who visit Amazon.com (me included) regard reviews that involve free or discounted products as being useless and manipulative. I wish retailers would ban these reviews and (by contract w customers and sellers) not allow reviews by shoppers unless shoppers agreed not to accept discounted or free products in exchange for a review.

@f00l I like getting free/discounted stuff for reviewing! Don’t dry up my gravy train!

I will admit that there are shit-ton, bordering on a fuck-load of shills out there.

@DaveInSoCal
The prob is that the reviews are useless and clutter things up. Freebie/discounted reviews mean skip the item almost always.

@RiotDemon If you want to get started, AMZReviewTrader.com is a great place to go. They have the largest list of reviewable items. Here’s two tips: NEVER pay more that 10% of an items actual value (check Amazon, don’t trust what the seller puts as retail), and focus on things that are free. Phone cases, screen protectors, charging cables, and chargers are generally easy to get on this site, and eventually you’ll be able to get cooler stuff. Just got a $5 dashcam and tested it out today for the first time. Works pretty good, but the instructions are awful. Going to mess with it more tomorrow.

You’ll want to spend some time reviewing past Amazon purchases to get your reviewer profile rank higher.

Most important, have fun! I’ve been doing it since the end of March, and have reviewed about 150 items with a total value over $3,000 and paid $185. I’m getting better at it too: In July I received 41 items and only spent $11.

edit: There’s a great subreddit for this:

@f00l I understand that. I totally take those reviews with a grain of salt. The one thing I got for free, the company just asked for an honest review, and I gave one. I didn’t hold back.

@f00l I guess we’ll agree to disagree. I’ve tested a ton of great products that would never have gotten noticed with no reviews. You learn to filter out the “fluff” reviews from people who obviously never really used it. Especially people who leave 500 word disclaimers.

edit: Actually, I guess we mostly agree. So many of those reviews ARE garbage. I know Amazon is in the middle of a huge purge and deleting users and reviews that they’ve been able to identify as shills. Hopefully that improves the system, although I’m not terribly optimistic.

@RiotDemon
The prob is that even if the reviewer is honest, no-one seems capable of thinking about a freebie or heavily discounted product in the same way as they think about something they paid normal price for. (Me included.)

So the reviews are untrustworthy and worthless to a normal customer. If there are compensated reviews, or if i cant figure out if there are compensated reviews, I run. If I had to consider a product that has such reviews, I start with the 1 and 2 star. The rest of them - who knows?

@f00l That’s very true. I sometimes have to stop and reassess while I’m writing my reviews. At the same time, it’s not the reviewers job to price shop. I can’t tell you if it’s worth the money to YOU. All I can tell you is if the product meets my quality standards, does what it’s supposed to do, and if there are any issues with it that I can identify that you wouldn’t know just looking at the website.

These loungers are a great example of this. At $40 each on Amazon I think they’re WAY overpriced. At $20 on AliExpress I think they’re far more reasonable. But for me, the pricing sweet spot for something like this where I could impulse buy would be around $10. That being said, the product itself it GREAT. SO MUCH FREAKING FUN! But it’s essentially a luxury (or non-essential) item, so everyone’s price point is going to be different.

@f00l OOH, I thought of two other points that reinforce the lower value of “disclaimer” reviews:

1. The individuals buying/reviewing often have no prior experience with the style of product. For ex, I reviewed a fountain pen. I liked it, but have no past experience with these things. How could I possibly know if it was really good or bad?

2. Long term durability is an issue. I test and review within a couple of weeks. If it’s something I use regularly, I’ll update my review later on if something changes. But what if it’s something I review and then throw in a box somewhere? I have no idea if it will last longer than 2 weeks!

It seems there are more cons than pros for the consumer, but I still have a ton of fun doing it! That’s it, I’m off this topic for now.

@DaveInSoCal
I forgive you for the fun. How about:. Only cool people who post on Meh are allowed to do this?

The prob with compensated reviews, apart from a natural tendency to “see the good” or “return a favor”:

When I want to purchase something, I want it to be the thing you would buy, that would accomplish the task, at normal price, and be worth it, pref the best product that meets those criteria.

People who get “whatever” for free or at intense discount as essentially experiencing the pleasures of a gift or near-gift. They are not asking themselves - even under a disciplined attitude - whether they would seek out this item with their own time, and purchase it with their own $, and a year or so later be glad they did? Let alone was it the best value, or durable, or whether it was something you would rather not have than have, if trying to avoid clutter.

So I would at least like all compensated reviews to be marked, so that could reference them only if I wished.

@f00l YES! The disclaimer is crap. There should be a tag that appears at the top of the review affirming that it was purchased at a discount/free in return for review. That way people would know BEFORE reading it, and could filter them out using Amazon’s review filter if they didn’t want to see any of those.

Also, you’re 100% right. MOST of the items I’ve reviewed were like gifts that I have no real need for.

@DaveInSoCal omg, all the prices at amztraderrev are horrible!

@ELUNO Mostly, yes. ONLY try to review things that are < $1, and then only if they sell for over $10 normally.

@ELUNO I found some free stuff… But you have to Amazon prime or spend $49 to get free shipping, lol

@RiotDemon Here’s a fascinating post by someone who stumbled into this world: http://mjg59.dreamwidth.org/44006.html

@dashcloud thanks for that. Being on amz review or whatever it’s called for a whopping one day… I notice a huge flaw. As a new person, I can only get two coupon codes until I review something. I’ve already gotten one coupon code, but the item won’t arrive for 2-3 weeks. Until I review the item, that code holds one of the spots available to me, which means that I have to be patient, or review it before it even arrives, which is completely dishonest and against the rules of the site. I wonder how often people do that. I’ve also been turned down for an item. I’m assuming my reviews are way too honest. I looked at my past history and everything is pretty much 3-4 stars. Maybe I’m too harsh and honest.

@RiotDemon If you do enough of those, you could eventually try for an Amazon Vine invite, which is the official reviewer program, but it’s more exclusive.

@DaveInSoCal Thanks. A new thing to check out! I know it is not a deal and probably worthless shit, but why do I WANT what looks like the Eye of Sauron so badly?!

@mfladd this looks like a necklace I got on eBay… These are not the same, but they’re cheap:

http://m.ebay.com/itm/Fashion-Silver-Jewelry-The-eye-of-Sauron-Moon-Glass-Cabochon-Pendant-Necklace-/281762888984?nav=SEARCH
Why the moon? No idea. I have the same exact necklace but with a galaxy instead. For $0.99 I’ve been fairly happy with it.

http://m.ebay.com/itm/Sauron-Eye-Photo-Cabochon-Glass-Tibet-Silver-Chain-Pendant-Necklace-/371525793133?nav=SEARCH

And then they jump to $5… Meh.

http://m.ebay.com/itm/Eye-of-Sauron-Fashion-Black-Pendant-Necklace-Top-quality-/112033681409?nav=SEARCH

@mfladd Mordor is all the rage today!

@RiotDemon But who doesn’t have Prime these days?! Thanks for letting me know free items exist. I’ll look around for them.

@RiotDemon don’t worry about getting turned down for stuff. Also, always be honest with your reviews. You’ll move up into a higher tier soon enough. Focus on building up your review request list. You can also sign up at reviewkick.com.

@ELUNO I don’t because I’m one of the few people that doesn’t buy enough on Amazon to justify it. It used to be really easy to get free shipping because you had to buy around $35. Now that they’ve changed it to $49, I shop there even less. Sometimes I’ll buy from a local shop online, and have it ship to the store for free. I feel better about the local store getting the business.

I’m sure if I coughed up the $99 I’d purchase even more on Amazon to justify it.

@RiotDemon Well, I guess I am too invested in Amazon’s products. Having a couple of Fire TVs, tablets, Echos, etc, it really makes sense to have Prime other than for shipping.
Plus I got a couple of sweet deals during Prime Day!

@connorbush I’ve never used snagshout. It looks like people buy stuff on Aliexpress then resell it there at a profit. I haven’t found anything that’s actually discounted there.

@DaveInSoCal it is 10 percent great deals 90 percent crap of which you speak

Went ahead and made a new email, signed up for amzreviewtrader, and applied for a couple options that were FBA and under $15. That’s worth a shot even if they suck.

I’m still down to buy several with the Meh logo on them, especially since they work as pool floats too. I’m in favor of this as the next Meh branded item.

@djslack i have two “new metal” and one “tabiger” and both are great. I emailed the seller directly through Amazon and offered to provide an honest review on Amazon if they would send me one for free and they did.

Some people are clearly getting duds (like my buddy), but i suspect quality control at some of these Chinese factories are lacking.

@DaveInSoCal Score! Requested 3 on the review site, one was declined, one is pending, and one was just accepted. Sunday I’ll have a $7 version of this to try out and review. Thanks for the tip!

@djslack sweet! Good luck! If you really like it, write a good review with pics and video. Other sellers may see it and email you offers directly (if you add an email address to your Amazon profile).

I need something else for my dog to pop.

@vanslaterco I initially read that as “for your dog to poop on.” I love Triumph.
/giphy Triumph the Insult Comic Dog

@ELUNO Ha! So did I!

@thismyusername so you read vagina lounger and thought of irk, cute.

@carl669 what a clusterfuck this site is!
Having issues, issues, issues.

@carl669 I bought it for 9.99. I couldn’t get the cash credits to load, whatever. Thanks!

@carl669 I’m all for saving money on my quest to sit in a giant vagina, but agree that was an absolute clusterfuck.

@Pavlov @mfladd clusterfucks seem to be the name of the game on some of these ultra cheap deals sites. but, i’ll forge ahead if i want the item bad enough.

except you meh. you’re not a clusterfuck.

@carl669 Ass Kisser

I still thank you for a $10 inflatable vagina.
cc: @capguncowboy

@mfladd haha there’s a face… he’s watching from the wrong side!

@carl669 nope they make it really easy to take our money.

@carl669

Frozen and without
Tacos. @f00l is sorry for
@carl669. Cold.

@f00l

i’m without tacos?
this will not be true shortly.
because, taco truck.

@carl669

@f00l is glad to know
@carl669 has tacos.
Fuck winter. Fuck snow.