User Rating Systems

User rating systems have redefined how manufactures, sellers, and buyers operate in an open market world. Everyday people are doing some sort of shopping for music, movies, software, clothes, and countless other products. Before internet user rating systems these buyers had to rely on word of mouth or past experiences with a specific brand to decide if they wanted to buy a new product. Also, it was far more difficult to discover a quality new product. There was no iTunes telling you other bands you might like or a rating system warning you that the newest release by a band isn’t up to par. Buying any sort of electronics would require relying on one employee in a store where other emotions such as commission could be working to push a seller to bad advice. For a product such as movies, buyers could only turn to professional movie reviewers. I can’t tell you how many people have said to me they don’t care what the professionals say as it usually isn’t useful or doesn’t follow the mass audiences’ opinion. Below is Yahoo.com and RottenTomatoes.com movie reviews for the movie 21:

As you can see from the above 21 reviews, both sites provide you multiple groups to give you averaged review scores of the movie.  Both sites split up the review scores between users and professional reviewers.  I particularly like Yahoo’s set up with the letters grades one on top of the other, and you can easy click on the link below them to see why people are giving the movie the grades they are.  Also, you can do some basic analysis such as is if professional reviewers and users both gave a movie good reviews then it is probably just a really good drama or action as comedy and horror have a tough time ever getting really good reviews.  Or, if the movie is a comedy and the professionals hate it (they do for most comedies, which is another flaw fixed by user reviews) but the users love it then it is probably is just a funny slap stick comedy.  Rotten Tomatoes employs a vast range of reviewers for their review meter you see above.  The list of reviews ranges from Richard Roeper and other top critics in the field to small time bloggers and movie website owners who just know alot about movies.  This allows for a more balanced average, which I have come to trust.  If a movie isn’t above 50% on Rotten Tomotoes, unless its subject matter such as 21 is exremely intersting, I will not go see it.  I trust the site and the way they aggregate reviews.  User reviews have allowed us to come a long way from relying on cirtics or freinds who always seem to reply “Ya it was alright” or “I thought it was a pretty good movie.”  In movies or any of the other countless industires user reviews can be user, they have forced anyone selling on the open market to reaise the quality of their product as people are finally watching and avoiding products with bad reviews.

Kirk Banks

Tags: 21, Critics, CS292, iTunes, Movies, Roeper, Rotten Tomatoes, User Reviews, Web 2.0, Yahoo

Ref: 21-Rotten Tomatoes: http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/10009192-21/

21- Yahoo: http://tinyurl.com/5l6zwe

~ by kirkbanks on April 11, 2008.