Quote:
Originally Posted by theducks
There were comments about negative product reviews by customers whose expectations were not made.
Lousy product descriptions and lack of pre-purchase access to full user documentation (same issue with shrink-wrapped boxes in stores) are as much at fault as higher expectations.
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A big part of the problem is sorting out why reviews are negative. Take the two examples I listed: in both cases, the user was expecting to be able to do something that is outside the normal range of usage for the item. You're not supposed to scrub out your fish tank every week (not if you don't want dead fish, anyway), nor is it reasonable to expect a photovoltaic panel to have the functions of a battery. It was like someone complaining that a lawnmower was too heavy to be held sideways in mid-air and used to trim hedges. So you have the average star rating, and without reading through all the reviews you don't know if people downgraded something because it broke easily, or because it didn't do what it was supposed to, or because they wanted it to do something totally whacked and it wouldn't do that.