Freakin’ Awesome Karaoke Express (F.A.K.E.)
September 17, 2015 11:03 AM   Subscribe

"One of my friends suggested we should do karaoke night so we found Freakin' Awesome Karaoke Express and decided to give them a go... We had a blast, their service was amazing and they had unbelievably great selection of songs... I never would have thought of seeking a mobile karaoke service, but they were fantastic... My friend had been to a block party where they were hired..." Only problem: Freakin' Awesome Karaoke Express does not exist. Fake reviews are endemic to online businesses, they are rated as trustworthy, and they are amazingly cheap to buy.

Twitter prohibits fake followers, Yelp claims to aggressively pursue fake reviews, Facebook promises to "protect your account from fake likes", and the NY Attorney General has fined fake reviewers. But for just five bucks...

"Everyone online needs to use their best judgment," she said. "Just because a product has good reviews doesn’t mean it’s good. You can’t believe everything you read online."
posted by RedOrGreen (13 comments total) 7 users marked this as a favorite
 
There is no fake, just the misapprehension of the multitude of space time continuum threads. Slide man, slide.
posted by sammyo at 11:11 AM on September 17, 2015 [1 favorite]


I once read a glowing review, something about how the massage was so soothing and the atmosphere was relaxing and great and the woman who did her nails was getting a huge tip.

The review was for the Hollywood Spa, a gay bathhouse.

I was never sure quite what to make of that.
posted by Sophie1 at 11:14 AM on September 17, 2015 [6 favorites]


It's not fake, it's predetermined.

Oh, sorry. Wrong topic.
posted by Etrigan at 11:19 AM on September 17, 2015 [5 favorites]


Yes, but how much does it cost to get favorites on a MF post?
posted by Hamusutaa at 11:57 AM on September 17, 2015


$20, SAIT.
posted by Chrysostom at 12:01 PM on September 17, 2015 [8 favorites]


Related (although with a considerably less cynical backstory): the Moderately Ok Chinese "restaurant" in El Cerrito, CA.
posted by parrishioner at 12:10 PM on September 17, 2015 [2 favorites]


Goddamn it I started reading the post hoping there was a real business like that and now I am disappoint.
posted by Cookiebastard at 1:34 PM on September 17, 2015


1) A mobile karaoke truck actually sounds pretty sweet.
2) "Moderately OK" is a great name, suitable for any business, company, or establishment. From the follow-up article:
The name, he explained, was something he came up with in college. The idea was that if customers complained, he’d just say, “What’d you expect? We’re just okay.”
Ergo,

3) "Chiu's Moderately OK Karaoke Express" should definitely be a thing.
posted by mhum at 1:50 PM on September 17, 2015 [1 favorite]


There are already karaoke RVs.
posted by jjwiseman at 2:59 PM on September 17, 2015


I often suspect that I am reading fake product reviews on Amazon. I can't quite out my finger on it but there is something about the repetitiveness, the lack of specificity, the generic tone to so many of the positive reviews. Has someone written a neural net to filter the fake ones yet?
posted by mai at 4:50 PM on September 17, 2015


Someday somebody will write an article because they were browsing through "Popular collaborative fiction site Yelp" and they found a review of a restaurant that turned out to actually exist.
posted by mmoncur at 5:13 PM on September 17, 2015


Yes, but how much does it cost to get favorites on a MF post?

It's variable. Favorites are cheaper than Favourites (UK) and more expensive than Favourites (CDN).
posted by srboisvert at 5:41 PM on September 17, 2015


Yelp and Amazon reviews are certainly two places I never expected to house the internet's most cutting edge fiction.
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 6:05 PM on September 17, 2015 [1 favorite]


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