For sellers offering reviews

[typingservice]

…be careful. Amazon is starting to file lawsuits against Fiverr sellers offering book and product reviews. They’re listing Fiverr specifically in this article.

Seattle Times article: http://www.seattletimes.com/business/amazon/amazon-files-another-suit-in-fight-against-bogus-reviews/

or

Amazon filed suit against more than 1,000 people it said were offering to sell fake product reviews.(Scribd) http://www.scribd.com/doc/285422882/Amazon-Complaint

If I can’t list a link - Google:

Amazon files another suit in fight against bogus reviews

or

Amazon files suit against 1,000 Fiverr users over fake product reviews

p.s. In the Scribd document there are 1000 Fiverr usernames that are a part of this mess.

[sara1984]

It’s about time. I know the Fiverr buyers are just trying to earn a bit of cash, but fake reviews just screw up the whole system.

[fastcopywriter]

You don’t think publishers are asking their employee to review books? You don’t think authors ask their families and friends to review their books?

Come on! Paying for reviews is standard. Reviews can be used for anything, books, Yelp, google, etc.

[fastcopywriter]

Amazon is wasting their time, paid reviews are like paid testimonials, it’s just marketing. The most Amazon can do is get Fiverr to delete your gig. The trick to avoid that is not to mention Amazon at all in your gig.

Say you’re selling positive reviews, just don’t say where. In your private communications, your buyers will give you the links and you’ll do your job there.

Besides, this lawsuits are probably a violation of America’s First Amendment. A review is opinion, opinion is the most protected firm of free speech. It’s only libel if you tell outright lies about the product.

Example:

Drinking Coke gave me cancer. That’s libel.

Coke tastes like crap. That’s opinion.

So go ahead, gigsters, keep writing those reviews until Fiverr tells you otherwise.

[misscrystal]

They are not suing for libel or lying. They are suing for degrading their brand. You are right that they may not win though.

[sara1984]

Faking a couple of reviews happens. Some people buy hundreds. Big difference.

You’re right, Amazon can’t stop it from happening, but if they reduce it that’s something.

[fastcopywriter]

True, my best friend sells books on Amazon and he buys 10 to 20, he can’t afford more. Buying 100 would cost you $500, although some Fiverr sellers sell two or more reviews for $5.

[solow13]

Really? you not deserve the TRS badge as you clearly telling people how to crack the fiverr TOS.
Oh wait Fiverr is banking with scammers like you, I’m waiting for the day that each of the fake gigs will be shut down!

[artworkking]

Well said solow13!
This could be very easily stamped out. It took me 3 seconds to search for ‘Amazon Reviews’ on here and near enough every single one brought up in that search are contravening Fiverr terms & conditions. It would be VERY easy to simply ban every single one.
I’m guessing this isn’t a priority for Fiverr otherwise something would be done before these sellers get to level 2 status!

The fact someone can freely offer these services does bring Fiverr’s Terms and Conditions into question - what is the point if Fiverr do not actively support there own T&Cs?

What’s more is some of these sellers are hiding behind false usernames and pictures of pretty women - a million miles away from who they actually are.

So if the limit of what Fiverr is willing to do is to simply object to these scammers (and they are scammers) via their T&Cs then I say ‘poor show Fiverr’.

Actively enforce them!

[joeyperezwest]

I think this was the cause for the bug on the to do list, fiverr quickly purged the user lists in the court documents and some how the database moved the numbers around associated to display names on fiverr and it caused the system to show the wrong names on the gui end of the site…

[markp]

This is not about people asking for honest reviews. This for buyers asking for and sellers offering five star guaranteed reviews. The majority of the sellers offering this specific service even ask the buyers to supply the review…these sellers are also offering reviews for products they have not not or will not even see. There is nothing honest or ethical about this and it is not just about damaging the brand but individual sellers on the marketplace.

Consider this. How would you like it if other sellers on Fiverr were buying up reviews by the bucket load and getting more orders for their gigs while yours just fell away based solely on the reviews. If you are on a platform where the algorithm places a lot of weight on reviews honest sellers are going to be hit the hardest by this.

If anyone still thinks, so what, who cares, it has no affect on me so they can do what they like. Think about this. Sellers like this may ultimately affect your ability to get orders. Since the end of last week social media has been flooded with this. People who have never heard of or used Fiverr before are hearing about it in a solely negative light and making a very negative associtaion. Regardless of the fact it is the sellers who are being targeted the association is being made and the sooner sellers like this are gone the better.

[joeyperezwest]

That is what ticks me off, that amazon made fiverr look bad. Big companies do this to destroy competitors… Fiverr is a competitor.

[willpower_hk]

At least Amazon has made a big fuss which forces Fiverr to deal with this, be it winning or losing the lawsuit. I’m pretty sure it isn’t aiming at eradicating these spammers, but rather posing a warning effect.

[sara1984]

This actually happens, sadly. Many Fiverr sellers do buy reviews. There are review exchange websites where you buy each other’s gig then leave 5* reviews. Doesn’t cost you anything more than the $1 Fiverr charge in commission as you’re swapping orders.

Sometimes when I see a Fiverr seller become really popular really soon, I begin to think they’ve used this service. But hey, there’s no way to know for sure.

[superb_articles]

I really like what Amazon is doing. Oh c’mon! Based on the law suit document, some of these sellers are even asking their buyers to submit what they want as their reviews. That’s FAR from being honest. Also, it’s similar to the fake reviews that sellers do here on Fiverr by creating dummy accounts and posting what they want. So if Fiverr is seriously against that, I strongly support Amazon for doing this too. Kudos Amazon!

[logo_desing]

Fiverr should collect those accounts information from Amazon and block those account

[fonthaunt]

In the long run, this will probably help Fiverr more than hurt it. I think it will benefit Fiverr to get rid of accounts selling Amazon reviews and they could also do some press release about their steps to stop it. Since sellers are contractors, it won’t hurt Fiverr itself much if any, and they could come out looking like heroes if they play it right (which is fine by me if it benefits honest sellers.)

The other thing is, though, people seeing these articles will hurry to the Fiverr site for other reasons. Some want to see if it’s true you can buy reviews here, some want to buy services that are hard to get cheap and they’ll figure if you can buy reviews, you can get things like testimonials, ghostwriting, honest reviews on people’s blogs, etc.

Most important, people will come here just to “see the crime scene” and will see some gig that looks interesting, go off on a tangent, and become a buyer. They might have missed the Fiverr commercials that show in only limited markets, but they’ll see the news. I recently went looking for a business-related gig that I wanted to buy, and a gig image caught my eye prompting me to order something different from that new seller. I lost track of what I was really looking for, as window shoppers often do. 🙂

[fastcopywriter]

Me a scammer? How dare you. All my gigs are 100% Satisfaction Guaranteed or Your Money Back.

I have never scammed anyone in my life. My clients LOVE ME, I have served over 4,000 clients, I have made over $26,000 since January, 2013. I became a TRS in 2014, I have one featured gig, I have 30 negative reviews and 2,200 positive ones.

So who the f-word are you to tell me I don’t deserve my TRS badge? I EARNED this badge, I was CHOSEN by the editors, I have received GLOWING reviews.

Sounds to me like you’re jealous.

[fastcopywriter]

Why doesn’t Fiverr go after the book writers? After all, nobody would be writing reviews if it wasn’t for the writers that pay for them?

Amazon is EVIL, they’re the equivalent of cops who put a prostitute in jail but never the man that hires her.

People do all kinds of things for money. Do you not think Amazon hires actors? Of course they do, they have commercials, they even have actors that look and sound like real people.

If Amazon hates paid reviews, they should hate the writers that buy them. Go ahead, Amazon, unpublish every writer who has ever paid for a review. If you did, there would be no books for sale on Amazon.

Newsflash: 99% of writers are paying for reviews. It’s standard operating procedure.

[Guest reinier01]

Newsflash: If Amazon did somethig to improve the appalling quality of what they allow to be published, then maybe the whole issue of paid reviews for books might go away by itself.

[misscrystal]

There are still over 1000 gigs to write Amazon reviews so it won’t solve the problem no matter what the outcome is. As one person said, it just eliminates some competition. This will reassure consumers that Amazon reviews are trustworthy and is good public relations for Amazon.

[julipalmer7]

I am just following this discussion.

[fastcopywriter]

eBooks have revolutionized the industry, Ayn Rand’s Fountainhead was rejected by many publishers, then she was told to edit down Atlas Shrugged. Imagine what the brilliant writers of yesterday had been able to do if they didn’t have to put up with publishers, editors, agents, and the rest of the cronies?

Appalling quality? Whatever, some people like reading a book of memes, some like reading a 10-page erotic story, Amazon works best when they don’t pick the winners and losers, that’s what the market is for.

Paid reviews will continue for the same reason realtors do open houses with food and wine, you want to get people through the door. No reviews = No sales. Few people want to be the first to buy a book. Even teespring changed their platform, so instead of people seeing “0 sales,” they see “Only 3 more to get produced.”

[fastcopywriter]

Thank you. I don’t mind vigorous debate about any issue, but I will not tolerate personal attacks.

[fasty93]

HI
I m seller and few days ago I just figured it out that asking for “5 STAR” or “positive feedback” falls in the category of INFLUENCING the buyer and this will get the sellers account banned