Viewpoints Review

"Time flies when you're having fun."

One of the interesting things about many stock phrases - cliches, if you will - is that though some may seem corny and eye-roll inducing, they nevertheless contain a grain or two of truth.

Consider this, Exactly one year ago today, I was writing what was then only my third submitted review here at Viewpoints.  Only 11 days earlier I had registered as a member, and I was still trying to find my "writer's niche" in this still-new community of online reviewers.

 And - if I may use another cliche - here we are, Gentle Reader, a year later, and it seems though it was only yesterday that I was putting the finishing touches on that review of Star Wars - Episode I: The Phantom Menace.  I still remember feeling some apprehension at the time about investing so much of my writing time to a review in a site that was competing with other, more established sites, but I put that bit of negativity away and plowed through the proverbial door of opportunity with enthusiasm and confidence.

Looking Back....

To be honest, I don't remember exactly how I heard about Viewpoints before I decided to become a regular member/contributor.  I know I was dimly aware of the site's existence sometime before the summer, but I'm not sure if I received one of the invites sent out to some of the present Publisher's Circle members. I might have, but because I was (and still am) an active member of a similar review site, I ignored it, partly because I didn't think I had the time to write for both sites, but mostly out of fear that there would be negative consequences if I signed up with Viewpoints.  (I won't get into the sordid details of that issue here, but for some insights into my feelings about "the other site," please see this.)

I do, however, remember that by the fall of 2007 I had heard enough good "buzz" about Viewpoints that I decided to ask one of my online friends who already was a member here more about the site.  I basically was interested in a few basic issues; some involved the review-writing process (format, minimum word requirements, and if there were any restrictions on subject matter and/or content), but mostly what I wanted to know centered on the "virtual community" aspects of Viewpoints.

My friend (who shall remain nameless) told me that we can, in essence, review almost anything we want.  If it's a product, destination, or even a local service (say, our family doctor or dentist), we can write about it.  If a movie (Star Wars, for example) is in the catalog, we can write about it. If it's not (like most of the films I've reviewed here), we can add it on our own to the site. 

This appealed to me; as an online reviewer, I've always had to deal with sites where either (a) if you write a review that runs counter to a majority opinion you might as well expect lots of "not helpful" votes (Amazon is notorious for this) or (b) you're hamstrung by a catalog/database which is, in computer slang of the 1980s, mega-kludge.  And though you learn to develop a thick skin and be more patient with sites which have tech hiccups, you also start dreaming about other Web sites where you're free to rant and rave about products without fear, and you feel a bit less dependent on databases which may or may not be entirely bug-free,

Viewpoints - Why I Love Writing Here

 Essentially, there are three reasons why I believe that Viewpoints is a great place for reviewers.

1. Great sense of "community" -  While it is true that the three sites where I have been an active reviewer all have thriving virtual communities, Viewpoints has been, and hopefully will remain, the most open and friendly one.  I'm not knocking the others, but Viewpoints' members tend to avoid what is known as "drama."   No one - as far as I know - has ever left anyone a hostile or discouraging comment in either a review or the Comments spaces in a home page.  Even during the 2008 political campaign, threads about the candidates and/or issues were lively, even passionate at times, but it never got ugly or led to any "flame wars."

 2. Viewpoints cares - Again, while I'm not saying that other sites don't pay attention to the concerns of the men and women who write reviews, I think that Viewpoints' owners and staffers show more interest in what we think and need than the bigger, more established outfits. When Matt, Jolie, and Meredith (just to name a few of VP's major "honchos") are considering tweaks and/or improvements to the site, they don't just carry them out and tell us later; they actually take the time to ask us what we think. If there are details we have issues with, they listen carefully and, more often than not, act on our suggestions.

3. It's fun! While it is true that I've enjoyed writing in other sites and still get some satisfaction from doing so, there's always something that comes along and leeches some of the joy out of the whole experience.  In one site it can be constant bugs and delays between submission and publication; Amazon.UK.com was notorious for its lag between the time I hit "Submit Review" and when it was posted.  If I was lucky, it would be published in three days.  If I was unlucky, it would take two weeks or more, and lots of times reviews would be lost in the ether.  Not a great deal of fun, let me tell you.

In other places, either you have to jump through hoops to meet other members' standards and write more than you think necessary to get good ratings from them, or you have to endure "drama" and messy internal politics in order to keep a rank or be, um, popular.  It's almost like being back in high school, where you're either socially accepted as long as you are liked by the In crowd or you basically skulk around in the shadows, with only your friends giving you moral support - and helpful ratings.

Viewpoints, to its credit, somehow avoids these two pitfalls.  True, unlike Amazon where Customer Reviews are only an anciliary feature (it is, after all, an online store first and foremost), Viewpoints' primary mission is to provide "real reviews by real people," so the software and other technical resources are geared mainly to help us write, submit, and even update our reviews.

And though Viewpoints does have a ranking system (Writer 1, Writer 2, Writer 3, and so forth), it doesn't have other sites' good-in-theory-but-iffy-in-execution pecking orders where a handful of other members pass judgement on everyone's reviews.  Now, this works all right as long as the majority of the "hatted" members are fair and mature and can rate accordingly.  But when some of those people form cliques and start treating "their" categories like feudal fiefdoms and the reviewers like serfs, well, then the pecking order becomes a liability.  Viewpoints has obviously studied this problem carefully and wisely decided to do things differently.

My Viewpoint: So, Dear Reader, this pretty much sums up my feelings about Viewpoints after having been here a year and some days.  It's been really a great experience seeing it become a lively, thriving, and definitely fun place in which to write reviews, share ideas, and make friends.