cobysev

Old (early 40s) guy here. I exclusively discovered new music through the radio. I had several favorite radio stations that would introduce me to new music, then I’d use Shazam to find out what the song and artist is, then look up their albums.

But I’m extremely anti-advertisement nowadays, so I don’t listen to the radio any more. And I hate online music sources because they’re all algorithm-based and suggest similar stuff instead of new music I’ve never experienced before. It’s easy to get stuck in your own bubble with algorithms. Plus, they’re littered with ads, even if you pay for a subscription service. Which I’m also very much against doing.

So… I mostly discover new music through my wife, who is still using the radio and online music streaming sites. All the music I own, I rip to my PC in the highest quality I can, then stream it to myself through Plex, so I have my own ad-free radio station anywhere I go.

Sync for Lemmy has a paid version that gets rid of ads. Its developer was one of the most vocal when Reddit started charging developers for access to their API. Sync for Reddit was one of the most popular third-party Reddit apps before then.

Its developer is also absent all the time. They poke their head in every few months, fix a bunch of problems, then disappear into the nether for an indeterminate amount of time.

I actually switched to Voyager because I was annoyed at how difficult it was to get anything fixed on Sync. And of course, Voyager is free.

Again, I make my own judgment call. If something has tons of negative reviews, then I might read some just to get an idea what everyone’s upset about.

If it’s a common complaint about a specific thing, then I’ll decide whether that thing is a deal breaker for me, or not that important. If it’s just a bunch of random complaints, then I won’t trust any of them and make my own call.

But in general, I don’t really pay attention to reviews. I guess Steam reviews on games are pretty much the only ones I ever read, simply because they’re displayed prominently right at the top of every game’s store page. If a game is review bombed, I might read some recent reviews to see what the deal is. But I’ve definitely bought games that have tons of negative reviews, simply because people didn’t give reasonable explanations for their negative reviews.

I don’t trust others’ reviews. Some people rave about a product or service and then I try it and it’s actually garbage. Or worse, you can’t really tell what’s a legit review from a customer and what’s a paid review by someone within the company. Or AI generated.

In the end, I prefer to make my own judgment call rather than trust reviews. So I don’t expect anyone to trust my reviews.

Which is kind of ironic, seeing as I write lengthy movie reviews and video game reviews. But in my defense, I do that purely as a hobby, so I can rave about something I really like (or on occasion, dislike).

I do it for fun and I don’t make money on anything I post. Which, in my opinion, makes it a more pure review because I’m not motivated by pushing a product or meeting a deadline. I’m not required to highlight certain features, push a popular trend, or promote an event or sale. I can just speak from the heart, write whatever I want, and geek out about something I personally enjoyed.