Pre-emptive note: I realize everything described below already happens on purportedly honest reviews. They key difference is that the dishonest review channel *promotes itself* as being focused on doing so.

The Dishonest reviewer is a video review channel that offers biased "reviews" of products. While many of the reviews would be unsponsored (though still biased), the dishonest reviewer behaves differently from honest reviewers in several key ways:

• Will offer significant more creative control of their reviews. Will happily take down or modify content, especially if bribed.

• Will not say anything negative about a product.

• Will follow basically any requirements made by the company requesting the review (see legalities section below for necessary exceptions).

• Is completely open about being dishonest. Possibly even starts off reviews by saying, "Hi, I'm [name], here to offer a dishonest, biased review of [product]."

Why would people even watch this channel?

Having frequently seen reviewers complain about shady practices, I find the idea of watching such practices in action fascinating. Also, I think this sort of channel would be a great source of dry humor.

This is awful publicity. Why would any business participate?

• Some especially shady businesses want publicity, even if it's bad. E.g., quoting Marques Brownlee about Escobar phones : "Why did they send me this package and this phone, if I've already made a video tearing them down and talking about how their phone is a scam? [...] They've done the math and realized this is still good press for them."

• Some businesses promote themselves as being a bit anti- consumerism and would be "in on the joke."

• Some businesses push themselves blindly to every channel that will let them.

• It will probably be an effective advertisement. If a dishonest reviewer says: "My dishonest review of X is that X is awesome," some people will unconsciously think, "I trust the dishonest reviewer, so X must be awesome." I realize that sounds really dumb, but human brains aren't perfect.

• Plenty of companies believe that sponsorships should work the way they work for the dishonest reviews. They don't believe there's anything wrong with what the dishonest reviewer is doing and may not anticipate bad publicity for working with the dishonest reviewer (and realistically, there's a decent chance they'd be right; it's not like the dishonest reviewer claims their reviews are honest).

• Products with zero brand awareness can probably benefit from *any* exposure.

Legalities: Such a reviewer would need a few basic, non- negotiable policies in place (e.g., citing the videos in marketing materials is forbidden, all videos will have a disclaimer in place for the entirety of the video, etc.) Starting such a channel would probably be safer after consultation with a lawyer.
-- aguydude, Aug 26 2021

...and now for something completely different.
-- 2 fries shy of a happy meal, Aug 26 2021


This will probably support stuff getting sales that shouldn't really be mass manufactured. Not really in favour.
-- wjt, Aug 26 2021



random, halfbakery