Giveaway of the Day Forums

1. 

   Anonymous
   Unregistered

   GOTD. Please consider only allowing Thumbs Up or Down if the program has been downloaded.

   Under the present system, you're allowing the vendor to pay an outsourced outfit (or demand all their own employees) to hop over to the GOTD page and run up the numbers on the Thumbs Up. That allows them to later sully your name if they have a "problem product" and refer back to the number of Thumbs Up their product got on GOTD in their advertising.

   It will come back to haunt you, I think. Here's an example through a fictitious scenario:

   1. WeAreEditing, Inc. posts their word processing software through the GOTD system.
   2. One of the features they tout is how "Humanized" it is.
   3. "Humanized" means "User Friendly" in, say, India, where WeAreEditing originates
   4. WeAreEditing didn't really create the word processor--they paid to have their brand on it.
   5. WeBeEditors, WerdKings, and TinkYouVeddyMuch are all companies that use the same branded word processing engine.
   6. TinkYouVeddyMuch, Inc. was the first company to use the word processor. The Public is very familiar with its features (and problems).
   7. A GOTD user sees that the 280 Thumbs Ups vs. 38 Thumbs Downs occurred.
   8. The GOTD user believes the 280 Thumbs Ups came from GOTD downloaders and decides to try it.
   9. After downloading and trying WeAreEditing's new word processor, GOTD users realize it is an exact clone of TinkYouVeddyMuch's word processor--one they've already spent bandwidth, time and frustration evaluating.
   10. The GOTD user has a revelation: All the Thumbs Up's must've come from a proxy click-spam outfit. I'll bet the 280 Thumb's Ups in the first 8 minutes of allowed download don't match the number of downloads.
   11. To the GOTD user, GOTD drops a notch on the love scale because the GOTD user just spent 45 minutes realizing he/she has already evaluated this software under the guise of TinkYouVeddyMuch's product.
   12. The GOTD user sees the word "Humanized" in the comments--some of the early comments that happened in those first 8 minutes.
   13. The GOTD user has another realization: GOTD just contributed to a waste of my valuable time because they don't restrict Thumbs clicks to downloaders only.

   TinkYouVeddyMuch GOTD. TinkYouVeddyMuch.

   Posted 13 years ago #
2. 

   Whiterabbit-uk
   Games Guru

   I see your point Kerry and agree that it should be restricted to those that download the programs; though to be honest I'm sure most regulars to the giveaway project ignore the yeah/nay vote as it's been too unreliable in the past. It's the same with many of the comments. Most don't really give any useful feedback. I moderate the game side of the giveaway project and less than 0.1% of those that download the games actually bother to comment and of those most don't really add anything of use to say. It's usually the same old questions about registration etc that have been answered hundreds of times.

   I've been trying to persuade the community to post useful feedback (both positive and negative) because I believe that if developers see this they are more likely to contribute more programs to the giveaway project. That said, most developers never bother to make an appearance to answer some of the genuine concerns that some users have, which makes it counter productive for them. Those that do try their best to help get respect and probably boosted sales as well.

   Posted 13 years ago #
3. 

   BuBBy
   Teh adnim

   Trust me - I've seen it all before. For today Tipard and Aiseesoft there is a relationship. Either it is the same company - a child compay - a sibling company - or whatever.

   Now if you go back through time and look at the previous thumbs up/down results for all the giveaways in this category (ie. Video converters) you will find something interesting - every single time Aiseesoft has a product on GOTD - the thumbs up score is higher than any of their competition. In fact it is higher than ANY other giveaway. This is the case even when the reviews of "real users" isn't overwhelmingly good.

   They even get higher thumbs up than other products that can get double or triple the number of downloads - assuming that the participation percentage remains somewhat consistent between total downloads & total votes.

   So just take it as granted that Aiseesoft (or their associates/shills/customers etc) stuff the voting box. It happens every time - and it really isn't surprising any more. Just ignore the voting results, knowing that they are completely meaningless.

   There is no prize for the highest votes - and high votes doesn't mean the product is any good - because what a "yes" vote constitutes isn't actually defined anywhere.

   Does yes mean:

   - Do you intend to download this software?
   - After seeing the screenshots and reading a paragraph explaining what the program tries to do, are you impressed?
   - Have you installed this software and reviewed it extensively?
   - Do you like to vote on whatever side seems to be winning or popular?
   - Do you remember where your mouse is?

   If ever you needed to see how this type marketing makes sense in certain parts of the world, take a look at the following webpage: The "Top 5 Best DVD to iPod converter Review"

   The top 5 best products in the review are from either Aiseesoft or Tipard - so they must be good to beat the competiton. I'm always impressed when a company can review their own products and announce that they are the best in a review.

   If it wasn't so incredibly lame - it would be funny.

   On another "independent" site (where Aiseesoft and Tipard win all the awards - and all the sidebar links are to the Aiseesoft and Tipard websites) - they explain:

   http://www.topsevenreviews.com/how-we-review.html

   Even in the GOTD Freeware section - entries such as:

   http://www.giveawayoftheday.com/soft/4693726/
   Showing the product Tipard something or other - and the publisher is Tipard Studios.

   But perhaps earlier - others show up as
   http://www.giveawayoftheday.com/soft/4987467/
   Product = Tipard, Published by Aiseesoft.

   So that probably explains why we are seeing the old stupid shill tricks from Aiseesoft in a GOTD for Aiseesoft.... ahem Tipard.

   Also as a moderator I can see previous comments posted and several of the humanized comments have previously posted only in one other giveaway... and that was for

   Aiseesoft.

   Posted 13 years ago #
4. 

   Anonymous
   Unregistered

   TinkYouVeddyMuch.

   Posted 13 years ago #
5. 

   benalt
   Member

   I think that in order to vote you should need to register like for these forums and even after registering, voting permission should only be allowed to start the day after registration and onwards.

   Posted 13 years ago #
6. 

   ChrisS
   Administrator

   I fully agree about the problem but any solution will require money to implement and will ultimately chase away mouse-clicks, and fewer mouse-clicks means less money coming in. GAOTD is in a tough spot, the economy is in the toilet and it's not coming back anytime soon. There are precious few companies willing to release free full-version software to the downloading public and that number is dwindling daily.

   I'm sure that GAOTD knows that the spammers and thumbs-uppers are gaming the system and, in doing so, are harming the reputation of GAOTD but outside of implementing a paid subscription site there's not much that they can do about it. They need the mouse-clicks and they need their ever dwindling universe of software suppliers because I doubt that enough people would participate for a subscription site to succeed.

   Posted 13 years ago #
7. 

   T Mike
   Member

   From a dev point of view, how tough would it be to get the actual 'vote' yea/nay off the main page and onto the splash page that loads as a confirm when software has been registered ? Oh yes, that would mean an update to the main page 'tally' @ that time.
   That may slow down some of the fake clicks & give the public a feeling of a more honest tally.
   I do think a registration to participate in the offering of the day is not an unreasonable request-

   Posted 13 years ago #
8. 

   wizzard_of_ozz2004
   Games Master

   As Bubby said, clearly Tipard and Aiseesoft are at the very least affiliated if not the same. This has been discussed before several times and this has become Aiseesoft's chosen tact. Please refer to here and direct any further comments on the already created thread so as to keep the forum nice and clean. For more on untrustworthy developers, see here.

   Let's not forget this conversation on thumbs up and down.

   Posted 13 years ago #
9. 

   graylox
   Moderator

   Thanks, wizz. :)

   Posted 13 years ago #

RSS feed for this topic

Topic Closed

This topic has been closed to new replies.