I have enjoyed my brief stay here at Mouthshut very much, but unfortunately, I have also encountered a few problems. I have a few concerns I need to voice, as well as some questions I would like to ask of the members.

First, What is Mouthshut all about?
Of course people might disagree on this issue, but for the most part, it is a platform to tell the world their experience with products, and a place to read about products. Because some products are better than others, Mouthshut has devised a process by which members can rate reviews as to how highly they recommend them. Since reviews that are highly recommended are placed higher than reviews that are not, the ratings serve one purpose, placement of reviews. This means that when someone comes to the site to read reviews on a product they are considering buying, they will see the review that is recommended the best by the community first. This means that members should rate reviews on how helpful they are to a prospective consumer, regardless of their opinion of the product. If they have a different opinion, they can write their own review, but ratings should be blind to personal opinions. I was appalled to find members rating reviews based on their opinion of the product, and not the helpfulness of the review. If someone thinks that a movie is bad, and writes a very helpful review of the movie, I think it is preposterous to rate that review poorly because you disagree with the author’s opinion. If the review is helpful to a consumer, than rate it so, if not, than rate it accordingly.

Of course, Mouthshut is not just a platform for consumer helpfulness as I have quickly discovered in my brief stay. The staff has made it clear that it is also a place for writers and consumers to join together in a community and build a friendly atmosphere for consumer helpfulness. Instead of paying members for the amount of traffic their reviews generate to the site, they pay only for Member visits. On top of it all, they offer incentive to rate other reviews. I really appreciate their efforts to make it a friendly environment.

One of the major discrepencies I have encountered here is a maximum on review length. Of course there needs to be a minimum on the length of the review so that people don’t just waste space with worthless one line statements about a product, but if someone has a lot to say about a product, they should not be limited on how much they are allowed to say. I have written a few electronic reviews, but I can’t post them because they are longer than the 8,000 character limit.

From my experience with reading reviews here, I think that the biggest problem is with members not being specific and thorough enough in their reviews. I have yet to see a review here that is just a worthless ramble. I think that this maximum encourages shorter and less helpful reviews. If someone writes a review containing all the necessary information about the product, should they take out some important information because the review is too long? This just makes the review less helpful to a prospective. I think a review that is long but contains all the necessary information in an organized fashion is much more helpful than a review without the information. If the information is lacking, everyone suffers. If it is presented in an organized fashion, then consumers can look over the review and only read the aspects of the product they are interested in.

I think this is only hurting Mouthshut if they want to be consumer friendly, and I hope that something can be done about it. From my experience, both the minimum and the maximum review lengths need to be lengthened.

Basically, I have found the site to be very helpful and friendly, and except for these two flaws, I have really enjoyed my stay here. I hope that I will be able to publish my reviews that are at the moment too long, because I feel that they will be a positive addition to the website. I will not shorten them because that would only mean taking out necessary information, and then the review would not be my best. Please leave me your comments on these two issues as I am rather new here and may be submitting an uneducated complaint.