Amazon has started delaying user reviews posted on its video streaming service by up to three days to combat fake ratings.
The move follows a series of “review bombings” triggered by an “anti-wake” backlash against the diverse casting of the company’s Lord of the Rings prequel series The Ring of Power. efforts to deal with it. Caucasian actors cast as elves and dwarves.
On review aggregator site Rotten Tomatoes, the show has an average rating of 84% from critics, but an average audience score of 38%. Even on IMDb, an Amazon-owned film and TV site, the show earned him his 1-star rating of 17,500. This equates to 25% of title reviews. Downgrade “abnormal voting activity”.
However, Amazon’s Prime Video streaming site, where the new show premiered, is currently not showing any customer reviews as a result of the delay. According to Variety who first discovered the new practicethe streaming service uses delay to determine if a review is “real or fake”.
The company also has another weapon against review bombing. Users can’t post reviews for The Rings of Power until they watch the show. As a result, the first review will appear on Monday morning, 72 hours after the first episode aired on Friday at 2am UK time.
Whether positive or negative, review bombing is a massive, dedicated, and often unruly critic who uses sites like Metacritic and Rotten Tomatoes to leave mass messages, undercut ratings, and sometimes even knock outs. It’s become a reality for media franchises with fan bases. influence the commercial success of the work.
The campaign has ranged from backlash over casting decisions (the 2016 Ghostbusters remake was review-bombed for an all-female star) to complaints over geopolitical disrespect (the video game Life is Strange: True Colors , reviewed bombed by Chinese players). Includes a Tibetan flag that you’ll quickly miss).
But in taking action against fake reviews of its millions of TV shows, Amazon risks charges of hypocrisy for cracking down on reviews elsewhere on its e-commerce site. This year’s Which study “found that malicious businesses still exist that exploit weaknesses in Amazon’s review system,” said Rocio Concha, director of policy and advocacy for the Consumer Rights Group. Shoppers read thousands of fake 5-star reviews.”
