Interesting article, in my opinion, about TripmisAdvisor regarding the power of TripmisAdvisor and its inability to control bogus posts from people with obvious agendas. I've battle for years over there trying to expose "experts" who are biased and reports that are obviously motivated by a scorched earth policy.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/26/bu...ls.html?src=mv

I finally quit in disgust.

I also no longer use tripadvisor --- mostly for the reason that a large number of the positive posts seem to be from posters that the hotel management has hired to boost their rankings. I feel, due to this, I can no longer get objective evaluations of hotels on TA. Hopefully someone will invent a site that can eliminate the problems of flooding the posts with phony reviews.

I really wish BOTH of the posters above would help those of us who are still stupid enough to use and post on Trip Advisor and tell us just how they KNOW for CERTAIN a post is

bogus
posted by someone who was paid or gifted to do so by the "management"

Otherwise I will consider both posts above as ones from people with their OWN axe to grind.

WBpii, it seems you must have linked to a different article than what you claim it says. Nowhere in the article you link to is there any evidence that TripAdvisor is filled with dishonest posts. There is ONE EXAMPLE (out of 35 million reviews) of a reviewer claiming illegal activity at a restaurant, which TA did remove when the owner of the restaurant was able to show that the accusation lacked merit.

NOWHERE in the article was it even suggested "that a large number of the positive posts seem to be from posters that the hotel management has hired to boost their rankings." Quite the opposite: the article noted business owners grouping together to sue TA to get TA to drop NEGATIVE reviews.

Full disclosure time.
Do I read and write reviews on TripAdvisor? Yes.
Do I take seriously reviews that consist entirely of sentences like, "This is the worst lodging in the world. Avoid it like the plague."? No -- I'm intelligent enough to know that TA never claims ANY of its posters are "experts." I thus read through all the reviews, mentally eliminating the meaningless ones, and try to catch a glimmer of the quality of the place that I won't get by going to the lodging's web site.

I recognize the inherent weakness in TA's approach. That's why I (1) post constantly on the site, hoping to review lodgings in a clear, concise, and consistent manner; and (2) approach everything I read there with the same analytical eye I approach something I read here.

Dukey, your post is rather hostile especially using the word stupid. I never said that, nor did bob. We merely pointed out what we see as problems over there. You are free to continue posting there.

If you have followed TA for enough time, you know that it has acknowledged that there are some posters who have a financial interest in the subject matter. In my experience, I have seen many owners boost their own business. TA even has a "please delete" function for that type of poster but, it is hard to detect them. I'll let Mbob discuss his post.

I include in the bogus definition what I call scorched earth posts. To me there is a difference between those who criticize a resort rationally, i.e. I didn't like the bed, front desk was rude, expensive or bad meal, as compared to those who go absolutely ballistic. You know, I didn't get the room I wanted, the resort sucks, dirt everywhere, they tried to poison me. I categorize those as NOTHING is right, everything was wrong. I've seen this type of post for every resort on TA Hawaii. Emotions color the poster's opinion in such away that he/she loses objectivity. So bogus is not that they are false, but, the poster is so angry that there is no objectivity. I think he NYTimes article alludes to this.

I hope this helps.

Finally, I encourage you to believe that I have my own axe to grind. This is definitely true when it comes to TripmisAdvisor. My motto for the net, question everything. Still, I didn't write the NYTimes article and there are many who think like I do.

Paul, it's all in your interpretation. I am very glad you are such an intelligent poster.

I take the reviews for what they are worth. And I try to do unbiased reviews of places, just giving my experience, not being overly critical.

I do read & write TripAdvisor reviews and always give details and specific examples of why a particular establishment excells or falls short, IMO. When looking for a recommendation, I look for trends across a substantial period of time. As others have rightfully opined, some individuals hay have an interest in a false review. A concensus opinion holds more validity for me.

_____________________________________________
Vic's travels: http://my.flightmemory.com/vogilvie

I find Tripadvisor a very useful tool and I consider it one of the best travel sites. It's far from perfect and the sheer volume of traffic on the site can be both a pro and a con but used judiciously it's an excellent resource.

I ignore any "scorched earth posts" as well as the glowing reports which may or may not come from management and read between the lines (checking a posters' other reviews can be helpful to get a broader picture of travel style can help).

I hear ya

It didn't take me long to realize that the Hawaiian gang of perts were not my cup of tea. Although there were a few good eggs in the bunch, they seem to own hawaii as there own and can be quite confrontational with their pert opinions and knowing superiority and downright meanness.

I refer to tripadvisor for reviews but do check several other sites before making a decision to book.

I've found it helpful to check individual profiles for reports that appear too positive or too negative to determine if an individual has a particular bias or set of expectations that doesn't reflect my needs or concerns.

We recently stayed at a hotel in LA, Hotel Figueroa, which received as many negative reports as positive on tripadvisor. Checking a few well respected travel sites, the hotel was highly recommended for it's funky decor, character, and price. We had a wonderful stay (and I need to get around to leaving a positive review).

Every one of us has different expectations - that's the limitation of any travel site. You need to understand the pov of the reviewer.

I wouldn't rely on tripadvisor as my sole source of information, but it does provide some information, if you understand how to interpret it.

"...they seem to own hawaii as there own and can be quite confrontational with their pert opinions and knowing superiority and downright meanness."

So very true. Maybe this doesn't happen outside of the Hawaii forum.

I use TA quite a lot, as well as the forum and just love it. So far so good. Since I get such good info from the site, I always try to post my hotel reviews there too.

TripAdvisor is one of the best forums where a person can go and get an answer right away about something in another country/city/state etc.

In the BA forums, we have had people write and say that they were robbed or something went wrong and it is heartwarming to see the responses, people going out of their way to make phone calls to see if they can help, sending emails to the right people etc.

I admit I am a DE for Buenos Aires.
It is easy to catch owners of businesses pimping their services sometimes. Guides , hotel owners, apartment rental owners etc .. it is not fool-proof but one thing you can do, that most people do, is they read a lot of sources, not just TA and put together their own opinions.
I have my favorite places here and there in various cities and countries and those will be the ones that I recommend. We all do that.
Reviews are a matter of taste...

You have to shop around for hotels and restaurants, don't depend on one source.
Easy.

I must say though, when we decided to move to BA, the experts etc on those forums were a Godsend with their helpfulness and willingness to answer a million questions.

well said Scarlett, a few bad apples need not paint the whole forum black and the many good qualities.

Whatever the case, my experience is that TripAdvisor has not (yet) steered me wrong. Quite the opposite. I do ensure that there is a statistically significant number of reviews (which depends on the location), and I mentally throw away outliers.

It's one of several factors when deciding upon a hotel, restaurant or other travel related item. As such it's a useful tool to have in the kit.

... similar to reviews on amazon.com

Scarlett, your experience is not mine when it comes to DEs. It would be wrong for me to say all DEs are as mean and nasty. But the ones I battled were and that's my experience.

Regarding the reviews, many have made the intelligent point that it's the cumulative scores that matters but, not everybody takes the time to look at the history. They read a few and move on. First impressions are very important. Unfortunately, there is really nothing that can be done.

Thanks all for the interesting discussion.

I use Tripadvisor a great deal but have contributed very few reviews. My way of using Tripadvisor is to check the best reviews and the worst reviews to come out with an average picture of that property.

In the last couple of years I've also started googling "xyz hotel reviews" to see what other websites have to say about a property.

Tripadvisor has led me way wrong only once - in a smaller US city where the rave reviews of the hotel nowhere matched reality. When I returned, I wrote up the real situation and that hotel rapidly dropped out of its first place for that city.

To those who like Scarlett work hard to make Tripadvisor a good website - thanks for your hard work.

I don't see the difference between Tripadvisor, Fodors, or Expedia Customer reviews. There are other sights, but those are the ones that I tend to use the most. It is all someones opinion and it can be accurate or inacurate. I am always a little concerned when someone has only posted one or two posts or reviews. I find it much easier to plan my travels using these sights than the way I traveled before the internet era(get AAA book and use their opinion of hotels and restaurants).