Long-form
The Journal.
Essays, investigations, and methodology pieces about product reviewing as a discipline. Not reviews of products — arguments about how reviews should work and analyses of how they actually do.
Articles published: 3 · Last updated: Apr 23, 2026
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Why most product reviews on the internet can't be trusted
And why the exceptions are worth paying attention to.
Most product reviews aren't fake. They're worse: structurally reliable machines for generating upward-biased recommendations that sincerely feel honest to the people writing them. Here's how the system works — and why fixing it requires more than better intentions.
Published April 23, 2026 · 11 min read · 2,280 words
Read the article →How to spot fake Amazon reviews: a 13-point checklist (2026)
Fake reviews have gotten harder to spot and more common than most shoppers realize. Here's a systematic method for identifying them — using language patterns, behavioral signals, and platform indicators that work even when the review looks completely legitimate.
Apr 23, 2026 · 15 min read
The testing window problem: why 30 days is the minimum for most products
Most affiliate product reviews on the internet were written after the reviewer used the product for less than a day — often less than an hour. That's not enough time to know if it actually works. Here's why the testing window is the single biggest predictor of whether a review is useful, and what 'properly tested' means for different product categories.
Apr 23, 2026 · 10 min read
About the Journal
The Journal is where I write about product reviewing as a practice rather than reviewing specific products. The reviews are at /reviews. This section is the underneath-it-all reasoning: why certain products get reviewed and not others, how the review process actually works, and what's wrong with the broader affiliate-review ecosystem this site is trying not to be part of.
Some of these pieces are opinion. Some are research. Some are practical guides. All of them are the ideological infrastructure that reviews sit on top of.
If you're here for the reviews, start at /reviews. If you want to understand the reviewer first, start here.