User reviews.

[Tony K.]

Editor reviews are nice and all since they do have training and knowledge for the technical aspects and analyses of BD. Not to mention, on occasion, the ability to write some pretty good movie interpretations. But there's always room for another opinion. Hence, the user review. Looking through some of 'em, however, I'm pretty sickened by the lack of detail, poor structuring, and apparent dismissal/obliviousness of basic English grammar/spelling that 90% of 'em seem to have. And yet, despite some of the really good reviews, you still see some of the itty ones ranking higher.

So I wanna' ask a few things:

1) Do you find user reviews relevant in the first place? If so, why or why not?

I personally read 'em more often for technical analyses of video transfers and audio quality. Movie reviews will always be subjective and opinions will vary from person to person. But even still, people can use completely blatant and unsupported one-liners, resulting in a natural, communal down-vote, which I'm sure we can all at least agree on that.

I don't expect every review to be a short essay since we all have different levels of intelligence, enthusiasm, and writing skill. But some kind of effort would be appreciated, don't ya' think? "the audio rockzz!!!" or "THIS IS REFERENCE" doesn't tell me squat. I want better, or at least more slightly-informed-sounding, opinions on why people think such and such BD is good or bad. Is that too much to ask for?

2) What kind of reviews to you prefer, short or long? Why or why not?

I started writing my own reviews as a way to make up for some of the ittier ones. At first, I didn't wanna' make 'em too long because I had this obsessive/compulsive tendency of making one paragraph per field. Though recently, I find myself starting to get more and more into movie interpretations resulting in several paragraphs per movie review now.

Is that too much? Am I getting too ambitious and ahead of everyone else's attention spans? Suffice it to say, the more I like a movie, the more I'm probably gonna' write about it. And yet again, despite some of my efforts to convey my thoughts and feelings I still see the long-winded reviews getting the shaft over the shorter ones. Is there a general preference you all have?

That's all I got for now. I'd appreciate any feedback.