Toy Reviews Are Not Owned by the Manufacturer
An email this morning left me a bit stunned so I posted a quick tweet:
Craziest mail today? A toy company insisting I pull reviews since I didn't think the toys were perfect. Uh, no.
— philipjreed (@philipjreed) May 28, 2014
That soon turned into an ongoing discussion with several others on Twitter, and I’m now waiting to hear back from the manufacturer who sent me the message telling me to pull my reviews. I simply cannot believe that anyone would think it’s okay to send such an email; it’s kinda like those times when email is sent that basically says “You cannot link to our website. Remove the links.”
Does the world not understand how the internet and reviews work? Toy reviews written and posted on a website or blog are not the property of the toy maker and the manufacturer has no reason at all to even suggest that such reviews should be removed from the web. What’s especially killer is I’ve written nice things about the company’s toys before, there are just a few times I’ve found their work not everything I expected or wanted.
Reviews are opinions owned by the reviewer (except where the reviewer is paid by someone, then ownership of the review depends completely on the agreement in place). Every single review I have written and posted to battlegrip.com is mine and will continue to be mine.
Wow that is a disappointing thing to have to hear from any toy company. 🙁
And what a way to sour you on their future products.
would really like to know who this company is so I don’t buy anything from them. Any company who so blatantly tries to censor negative opinions about their products aren’t a company I want giving my money to.
Makes me think they are just out sweeping the net trying to remove and and all bad reviews of their product. Just like you said “that is not how the internet works”. How dare you be opinionated!?
Well, for the time being until the Internet© is sold off to big corporations, the First Amendment extends for all U.S. Citizens — I should think that other than slander or defamation of character there really could not be any recourse. Unless of course they pull the “Cyberbullying” card…which would in affect make every negative review about just about everything online.
Unless they respond by profusely apologizing for making such wildly inappropriate demands, naming the company, publishing the email, and linking to that post from every review you’ve written about their products seems like the obvious next step.
Unfortunately, I’ve received similar requests.
It’s called free speech and it’s not just limited to the internet.
Bully to you Phil for not bending. And how slimy that they’d even ask. If anything, they should take the opportunity to make a better product–then ask for a rematch.
I wish I could say I’m surprised, but I caught this story on Ars Technica–a reviewer was threatened with legal action as the result of a negative review:
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/05/lawyers-bully-redditor-for-negative-amazon-com-router-review/
As interesting as AM’s link was, I believe the two cases here are apples and oranges. The comments of the link make it sound as if the reviewer there was really making libelous statements; which is presumably why he went back and changed it. Bad reviews are okay on the internet, but libel is still libel. (Granted, given that said reviewer didn’t know enough not to post negative reviews using his real name makes me believe he probably had no clue about libel law.)
I can’t imagine Mr. Reed here making the same kind of mistake regarding what is fair game in a review.
This is crazy, Phil. I’m really interested to see how this develops. A company making comments like this is really stirring a hornet’s nest. Stand your ground!
Wow!
Really shocking considering how “nice” your review style is! Even your negative reviews always have a few positives!
Glad you didn’t budge!
Good for you holding your ground and standing by your review. That is what people want to know both the pro’s and the con’s, that’s what keeps it honest.