Is deepreview.net a scam?

[Clinton]

This thread came up in the feed today advertising zerodowncommissions .com for sale.

So I Googled zerodowncommissions and on the first page I get a review asking if it's a scam:

Is Zero Down Commissions SCAM or Even The Real Deal? The facts will shock you:

I follow the link to this deepreview.net site: their review of zerodowncommissions.

Apparently, no, it's not a scam and you should head off over to the site and buy it immediately (using the "private link" they've provided).

Then I look at this deepreview's homepage. They say the same thing of every program they've "reviewed". For every one they ask the same questions, "Is XYZ SCAM or Even The Real Deal? The facts will shock you..." and in every case I've seen they conclude that you should buy the product

So I've got questions for you.

Is DeepReview SCAM or Even The Real Deal? Will the facts shock me?

[TrustButVerify]

Clinton, I don't think either of us will be shocked

But just as a note, I think it's somewhat clever how they found the most hard to read combination of colors that make the disclaimer impossible to read.

Your initial charge will be $1. You will then be charged $37/month for the life of your membership

http://awesomescreenshot.com/0b9s0vj3e

[DomainMagnate]

it looks like just a regular review site, they review popular, well selling CB products and naturally recommend each to get more sales. "Is xx a scam or not?" is a catchy title that gets more clicks in the serps, so many review sites use it. I wouldn't put much faith in anything they write as its clearly biased by CB commissions, but any review is, unless it's on scam.com or something like that.

[Clinton]

I wouldn't put much faith in anything they write as its clearly biased by CB commissions, but any review is....

It is a depressing state of affairs if the automatic assumption of any review must be that it is biased. "Clearly biased"? Clear to whom? And is the target customer/visitor one to whom it is NOT clear i.e. one who can be taken in/fooled?

If so it's a scam, not a "regular review site". Or is there no difference nowadays?

[Kay]

It's just a typical MMO tactic, along with the rags-to-riches story, and the gumf about how the other products don't work but this one does. It's just the same as all the other "review" sites which sell these products for aff commission after having "reviewed" them. It's actually a method recommended by several prominent IMers, along with all the other dodgy stuff they encourage people to do.

Gee, wouldn't it be nice to find a review site that you could trust to tell you the truth?

[Clinton]

There are sites that do tell the truth. I know the original founders of trustedreviews.com (though many of them, like Lars, seem to have moved on). They review laptops, PC components and the like. They actually DO review them.

Now I could tell you a lot of stories about bias in the IT press. My company used to submit machines for review to all the big IT publishing houses. And I know the games they play! PC Pro and I had a long battle because they kept running a series of "UK's Best ____ Computer" and not inviting us to submit a candidate PC because we were not advertising with them. Even in areas where we were clear market leaders by far, they'd run a test of "UK's best Low Noise PCs" or "UK's Best Video Editing PCs" and brazenly come up with a top 10 chart that didn't include us. If you're an advertiser you get better access to the editorial staff, you get invited to industry events to meet those editorial staff, you can speak to your marketing rep to get the editorial staff to contact you or make some concessions (especially on submission deadlines) etc etc.

So there's bias everywhere, I accept. But there's value in the editorial. Experts do tests, spend time analysing stuff and then come up with their opinion.

Is that of no value in this time and age? Should existing websites that do honest reviews "see the writing on the wall"?