Man Getting Sued Over An Amazon Review

Anyone have another link to the original review? Seems to be taken down everywhere.
 
It's hard to support the company's actions from a PR standpoint, but after reading the details of the story; the reviewer is clearly a troll and had zero evidence to support his libel claims. I hope Amazon reverses their position and wipes all of the bogus 1 star reviews.
 
Who did the most damage, the internet troll or Mediabridges management. I agree that this company will take a hit and people will lose there jobs but the blame lays entirely on the management for going after a someone in this fashion.

They slandered him in return, LOL.

https://m.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=665256830195089

From the media bridge response.
"The review was not made as an innocent statement of opinion. Instead, it was made as an outright statement of something he knew to be a fact, when in truth it was completely untrue: “but I'm here to warn you: A lot of these reviews are fake”...........An individual that had never even purchased our product posted a "review" stating that all of our positive reviews are fake."

Um, his Amazon review was verified..... meaning he purchased their product. You know, if you're going to call someone out for fucking up the facts, don't fuck up the facts yourself in your return volley.


-----------------------------

Then there's this gem distorting facts.

"Our corporate attorney sent him a letter requesting he remove the review. We fully expected he would simply do so, or at least change the review so it was not making any defamatory statements. We were publicly being accused of unethical acts & requesting it to stop. Our goal was to have the false accusation removed. Was this unreasonable?"

Well, here's a snip from the letter:

pf6fzip.jpg


Yeah, just take it down the review.... and never say any opinions about us again, fuck your right to share your opinion!



Seriously, even if the guy was in the wrong Mediabridge's management handled this so poorly they deserve the financial repercussions.
 
I ordered a Mediabridge router last year (needed a new one that supported 3.0 DOCSIS).

Obviously I went to amazon and typed in routers, saw the mediabridge with all of it's high reviews and thought "It's not that expensive and people seem to like it."

I tried googling but outside of Amazon I really didn't find many reviews about it.

I ended up ordering it any ways and it was simple and easy to setup/use, worked fine for what I needed.

After ordering it I got an email from the company thanking me for my order and posting their support number/email and asking me to review the router after I have had gotten it.

I assumed then that that is how they had so many high/good reviews.

As far as "rebranding" goes umm, a TON of companies do this, especially when it comes to computer equipment, from hard drives, to power supplies, to monitors, etc.

Couple months back I ordered a backup power adapter for an Asus laptop off Amazon. After we'd had it for a while I received a letter in the mail from this company, offering me another adapter to use and keep in exchange for an impartial review of the product. We didn't need another adapter so I declined. Since they threw the word "impartial" in there I was prepared to do it if my wife had wanted another one. That seems ok to me.

Asking people to review your product and then suing them when they troll you? It's a bizarre case. I think it will hinge on the findings from recent cases like those stemming from gossip sites such as topix.com, where people have been successfully sued for creating multiple accounts to make up fake conversations that contain libelous claims. The court is actually able to subpoena these websites and find out who is making the posts. If this guy did anything like that, he's going to lose. Sounds like he didn't and it will be one of those weird times where the troll wins. Whoever made the decision to go after this guy with a lawyer letter is way out of touch with the way the world works today. Net neutrality finds a way.
 
It's hard to support the company's actions from a PR standpoint, but after reading the details of the story; the reviewer is clearly a troll and had zero evidence to support his libel claims. I hope Amazon reverses their position and wipes all of the bogus 1 star reviews.

I sincerely hope that this troll's lawyer can prove his original claims now that Mediabridge can show the irreparable harm that he caused to the company. Mediabridge sold there products only through their website and Amazon and Amazon sales were likely the bulk of the business. I hope everyone supporting an Internet troll is willing to contribute to his legal defense when Mediabridge shows that his unsubstantiated claims about their products and their attempts to protect their brand integrity caused them to lose their storefront.

Should I also mention that real people are going to lose their jobs because of this troll and the complete tools who supported him? Way to go Internet. Way to take it to Corporate America. Because of you a small business will likely close its doors.
People keep using that word. I'm not sure it means what they think it means.

The two things they took issue with were "a lot of these reviews are fake" and "this is a IDENTICAL to this other $20 router".

No, maybe not all the reviews are fake, but they're sure as hell not all legit either. Maybe it's not IDENTICAL to the Tenda router, maybe it has a bit more memory - but it's close enough that it has the exact same FCC ID.

I don't know about you, but I don't have a lawyer following me around writing my internet posts for me. He may have been legally in the wrong here, but he was trying to steer fellow customers away from what he perceived to be a bad product. The reviews seemed fishy so he pointed it out. It's the "same" as another, cheaper router (for varying definitions of "same") so he pointed that out too. Is that trolling? Trolling isn't when someone posts something factually incorrect, it's not when someone posts something annoying, it's when someone posts something for the express purpose of tricking people into giving a negative reaction. Here's what Wikipedia says:

In Internet slang, a troll (/ˈtroʊl/, /ˈtrɒl/) is a person who sows discord on the Internet by starting arguments or upsetting people,[1] by posting inflammatory,[2] extraneous, or off-topic messages in an online community (such as a forum, chat room, or blog) with the deliberate intent of provoking readers into an emotional response[3] or of otherwise disrupting normal on-topic discussion.[4]

He was using the Amazon review platform for exactly what it was supposed to be used for. He may not have had his facts straight. His statements may even have been technically libelous. But he is not a troll, and the leadership of this company were scumbags for going after him in this manner, and they are scumbags for trying to defend it as they're laying off their staff.
 
LOL, after reading what I could, it seems like Medialink has done more damage then the review itself did.
 
The best way to handle this would have been for them to reply to his review stating that the reviews weren't fake or paid off by them and stating that the router is different or what not.

Going through a lawyer and then getting the hornets nest of the internet stirred up will never end well.
 
Since i can't read the review...

Did he say anything like it's a fact? The article seems to point out half of what he said is an opinion and the other half is like it's fact.

If he did say it like it's fact, I can't say I'd support him, since it'd be defamation if he was lying or making assumptions. But if he could prove it was the same router, I think he should be able to counter sue for defamation, since they're calling him a liar and therefore harming his character.
 
Here's what Wikipedia says:

Oh...... But there's this emerging concept of the "benevolent troll".

Sometimes trolls are useful and/or entertaining. Occasionally I'll troll someone if I think they deserve it--it's part of being on the internet. Everyone should put on their troll hat at least once in their life and see if they are any good at it. Most comedians are trolls.

I think of Ed Snowden as a benevolent troll pretty much. Not too much different from what this guy did to get the Cease and Desist for the Amazon review here. He said something in a very public and provocative way that pretty much everyone with a brain already knew. Sometimes whistleblowers behave with absolute grace; say, Daniel Ellsberg--who is highly, highly regarded (even though he's a Jew! :D) and then they don't end up looking like trolls even if they're right.
 
I just emailed their sales department. I would recommend everyone else do the same.

i did the same. I think the guy is wrong and the company should refute it, but sueing him is out of line.

the 5000+ reviews are not affected that much by his 1 review with some poor information
 
When I put on my lawyer hat there are a couple things about this "case" that strike me as completely illegitimate.

1. Amazon published the review, not the man. When you submit a review to Amazon they display a message claiming that they are essentially validating it before it "goes live". I can guarantee if you use certain words in your review it will never go live. If Amazon is publishing user reviews that are objectionable to one of its vendors, they should take it up with Amazon... oh... they are too chicken shit for that or had already run into a brick wall and so they pulled this stunt. It's almost as if the counsel who wrote the letter on behalf of this manufacturer purposefully created a shitstorm. But how can you predict when something absurd will go viral on Reddit?

2. The manufacturer has threatened to sue the reviewer instead of simply suing him. This tends to lead me to believe they are aware that their case is not valid.

This is Streisand Effect on crack.

I think the Streisand photograph story sounds like a ploy for attention--"Don't look at my house, you bastards! (whisper: look at my house!)".

This is more like, the legal department at that company is made up entirely of incompetents and complete alcoholics and they got frustrated and decided "Let's crush this guy or see if we can cause a nerd uproar and get fired! Fuck em."
 
Just read this.

I guess it kinda sucks they lost the ability to sell on amazon.
And it sucks for the troll as he is now neck deep in shit unless he can prove the claims he pulled out of the review... We are talking the troll is going to be liable for the loss of this company.

I don't know exactly what was wrong with the router he bought but perhaps mediabridge will become line light llc and get a new amazon license.
 
There's a reason why Amazon revoked their seller's license. It's because they broke their terms of service with amazon by sending the threatening letter in the first place.

They no longer have an amazon store front. But the reviewer didn't break their amazon contract. Now they want to blame him, saying it's his fault that their employees will be out of a job. Because he clearly forced their company to break a contract that was their main source of income...
 
Free Speech (as defined by the Constitution of the USA) is only protected from government laws and regulations ... libel and slander are usually civil penalties and are not protected speech (as there is no government involvement in them) ...

Free Speech was never protected from interference or limitations by non-government groups (which is why an employer can fire you for saying things they don't like or prohibit) ;)

What he meant is that stating your opinion is a wiggle out clause. On the radio when someone is about to go out on a limb to rip on someone they cover their asses by leading with "in my opnion...". You are no longer considered to necessarily be stating fact, but rather what you believe. You're allowed to state your beliefs whether they are based in reality or not.
 
I have put harsh reviews up on amazon and never worried about them. You can say anything you want as long as it can not be construed as slander. I.e. you can call it crappy product that did not do what the ad said it would but you can not say the other reviews are fake. You can how ever report them. Amazon is usually pretty good about looking into stuff like that, mostly because their reviews bring in a lot of money for them. Basically they protect their reviews from tampering because if people think they can get away with tampering with them, more people will attempt it make amazon's job even harder and make them waste more money fixing it, while less people will be using them, cutting into amazon's profit.

They have some issues around big releases because they big on more cs and they usually try to get creative and thing they will get a promotion for saving amazon a few cents here and there and cost the company more in word of mouth.

The way I look at it mistakes happen, it is how the company deals with mistakes that is what you want to pay attention to.
 
WOW - Even if they are 100% in the right, what kind of company posts something like that on their facebook page? It's like my 10 year old is running a multimillion dollar company, and throws a hissy fit whenever she doesn't get her way.

Amazing. Way to cement your company name as the "oops, don't buy from them" brand.

Can someone copy and paste this?
 
Wow, you think this company is hurt? Not even close. There store is offline because they have put a wall up, it's cheaper then taking time to clean things out after the public pisses all over it in a hissy fit. Those two posts off that letter were four months apart, that dude must have a real hard on for this company. It's just a little too psychotic looking to me. In two weeks this thing will be forgotten and joe six-pack will be right back there buying $20 routers. And Amazon will be getting their slice just like before. Sometimes the masses are idiots and this certainly looks like one of those times. They think they are using the power of the internet to combat evil, what fools.

Yeah, I think they have damaged their placement in the Amazon marketplace. They might have the best $49.99 router on the market but their name is not Asus, Dlink, etc. so they need that 4.5 star rating and that position to encourage people to buy their product before they make a name recognition purchase from someone else. That's why they sent the letter to the guy in the first place,to protect their position/rating. If you actually think the #1 position & 4.5 star rating doesn't matter for them you don't know how that marketplace works.
 
Yeah, I think they have damaged their placement in the Amazon marketplace. They might have the best $49.99 router on the market but their name is not Asus, Dlink, etc. so they need that 4.5 star rating and that position to encourage people to buy their product before they make a name recognition purchase from someone else. That's why they sent the letter to the guy in the first place,to protect their position/rating. If you actually think the #1 position & 4.5 star rating doesn't matter for them you don't know how that marketplace works.

What they should have done was try and make the customer happy instead of threatening to sue him.
 
What they should have done was try and make the customer happy instead of threatening to sue him.

They could have also ignored the crap out of him or better yet posted a response to his review from the seller for each one and let it be.
These things are like finding a buried bomb from WWII. You have no idea if it will go off and it most likely won't but if it does the result is major damage. So, let's hit it with a hammer a few times.
 
Yeah, I think they have damaged their placement in the Amazon marketplace. They might have the best $49.99 router on the market but their name is not Asus, Dlink, etc. so they need that 4.5 star rating and that position to encourage people to buy their product before they make a name recognition purchase from someone else. That's why they sent the letter to the guy in the first place,to protect their position/rating. If you actually think the #1 position & 4.5 star rating doesn't matter for them you don't know how that marketplace works.
Bingo, it will hugely impact their bottom line. Same with ebay sellers, if you're not a name brand that rating is EVERYTHING.
 
That's not a problem, that's a choice. It will play out good or bad for them or maybe it's have no real effect at all. But the company isn't wrong, they made a choice and it is justified. Whether it turns out to be a smart one or not remains to be seen.

I am perfectly happy letting this guy get fucked up in a civil suite so other can learn what this dude failed to learn. Your actions have consequences and free Speech doesn't mean you can say whatever you want to say. Some just have to be an example for others.

This door swings both ways. The company may be legally justified, but just as you said, actions have consequences. In this case, the consequences include a backlash from the general public, which is something they should have thought of before lifting the lawyer axe.

Sometimes the masses are idiots and this certainly looks like one of those times. They think they are using the power of the internet to combat evil, what fools.

The masses are idiots and fools, eh? Are you including [H] forum members in this blanket statement since many of us have been contacting this company, including myself? If so I would warn you that name calling is against the [H] rules which you agreed to abide by when signing up for this forum. Speech and actions have consequences, after all. It would be a shame if you had to be an example to others now wouldn't it?
 
What they should have done was try and make the customer happy instead of threatening to sue him.

They tried that initially, asking the guy to justify his claims. The guy just kept trolling with his baseless arguments. For those who didn't get a chance to read the thread before it was removed, the guy didn't have a problem with the product. For some reason he thought it was his duty to call out the company's reviews as fraudulent and to say that their product was a re-brand. If it was as simple as issuing a refund and moving on they likely would have.

I agree the better thing to do from a company standpoint would have been to address the issue and move on. If the guy follows up just ignore his follow up posts or ask Amazon to remove them. The company went too far not realizing that people would read dramatic headlines about a person being sued (he wasn't) over an Amazon product review (it wasn't) and wage an Internet campaign to destroy the company. Lesson learned. This case will probably be cited in business textbooks for decades.
 
Do not laugh, but I see this as a company tried to scare an average Joe with a fire cracker because they can and this average Joe put this fire cracker back up in their arms (ocr), because he can. If they can prove all those things were indeed false claims, then they will end up with is one fire cracker in their arms, but if they can't or someone can actually prove that some of these claims are indeed true, then their left cheek can say goodbye to their right cheek.
 
They tried that initially, asking the guy to justify his claims. The guy just kept trolling with his baseless arguments. For those who didn't get a chance to read the thread before it was removed, the guy didn't have a problem with the product. For some reason he thought it was his duty to call out the company's reviews as fraudulent and to say that their product was a re-brand. If it was as simple as issuing a refund and moving on they likely would have.

I agree the better thing to do from a company standpoint would have been to address the issue and move on. If the guy follows up just ignore his follow up posts or ask Amazon to remove them. The company went too far not realizing that people would read dramatic headlines about a person being sued (he wasn't) over an Amazon product review (it wasn't) and wage an Internet campaign to destroy the company. Lesson learned. This case will probably be cited in business textbooks for decades.

Wrong way of doing it. The routers are close enough to the same that they have the same FCC ID's. Regardless of what the guy posted, threatening him with a lawsuit was not the answer. Issue a refund and post up a review reply differentiating your product and showing why people should consider it.

Instead, they went looney toons lawyer on the guy and Amazon blasted them off the marketplace. They have zero tolerance for that shit.
 
They tried that initially, asking the guy to justify his claims. The guy just kept trolling with his baseless arguments. For those who didn't get a chance to read the thread before it was removed, the guy didn't have a problem with the product. For some reason he thought it was his duty to call out the company's reviews as fraudulent and to say that their product was a re-brand. If it was as simple as issuing a refund and moving on they likely would have.

I don't remember anyone else mentioning this exchange in the comments on his review, and I did not get a chance to see it before it was taken down.

Are you referring to this thread? If so, that's an entirely different incident with an entirely different person.
 
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Wrong way of doing it. The routers are close enough to the same that they have the same FCC ID's. Regardless of what the guy posted, threatening him with a lawsuit was not the answer. Issue a refund and post up a review reply differentiating your product and showing why people should consider it.

Instead, they went looney toons lawyer on the guy and Amazon blasted them off the marketplace. They have zero tolerance for that shit.

...and then what do the do about the claim that they post their own fake reviews?
 
...and then what do the do about the claim that they post their own fake reviews?

Ignore it? Don't give it any weight? Prove that your products and service are beyond bought reviews?

Going full on Amy's Bakery wasn't the right path to say the least.
 
If the seller didn't like the review, they could have tried to fix it with the customer first.
If that didn't work, they had proof to go to Amazon with in an attempt to get the negative review taken down and the reviewer blocked from further reviewing their products.
Things didn't have to get this far gone, but too often companies threaten legal action first, deal with the consequences later.
Its a sad and sick world where the leeches, err, lawyers, get to destroy everything in a court of law at the drop of a hat.

Anker is another small company that sells sell exclusively through Amazon for laptop batteries and chargers, PC mice and keyboards, cellphone batteries and Bluetooth accessories. Honestly they've had the best customer service I've ever had to deal with. Yes, they ask for you to review their products to get their scores up, but every time I've bought something from them they've bent over backwards to make sure I was happy with what I've purchased so I'm thrilled to give them their 5 stars for quality products.
Yes, I post more Anker reviews than for any other company I've bought from, and maybe if this Lawless guy saw some of my posts he'd say mine were bought and paid for by Anker, but truth be told they've won me over with quality goods, great prices and excellent customer service where if I need something and I can get it from them, I'll buy it there first because they're a great company to deal with.
If Mediabridge had a program for loyalty and retention like Anker did where they actively encouraged buyers to review their products to get their stars up so people would look to them as a great value buy, I understand why they would go out of their way to protect their name. I however disagree with their tactics in dealing with him.
 
Yeah, I think they have damaged their placement in the Amazon marketplace. They might have the best $49.99 router on the market but their name is not Asus, Dlink, etc. so they need that 4.5 star rating and that position to encourage people to buy their product before they make a name recognition purchase from someone else. That's why they sent the letter to the guy in the first place,to protect their position/rating. If you actually think the #1 position & 4.5 star rating doesn't matter for them you don't know how that marketplace works.

Damaged just their Amazon placement? I believe MediaLink has gone beyond Amazon and has now damaged their image on every site their sell and support their products.

Think about this,,, You have a MediaLink product that is of a design or version that is truly questionable. Perhaps in the normal course of dealing with support you call out MediaLink on their own support site? It happens all the time on other sites where the support staff is having a bad day.

But now you as a consumer find that MediaLink has a possible perception of being suit prone and/or vengeful against a customer who had a questionable product or support experience.

Think new customers would want to put themselves in the position of the existing customer and reviewer who was threatened? Think they want to deal with a company who might threaten you if you went beyond reviewing their products to review their customer service as well?

By bringing out the lawyers ans social media people to pursue and respond to such a relatively mundane review, MediaLink has tended to indicate many aspects of their company are questionable.

I certainly would not want to risk a purchase of their products going forward. Especially given the multiple choices I have in their market segment.
 
Gotta love reading those articles.

"All of this is due to misinformation which was blown out of proportion by individuals on a social media site who acted first, before questioning whether the information they had was accurate or not," representatives of the company said in a statement. "This is the reality of this situation. Remember that there is a human aspect to this story."

No you idiots, you lost your license to sell through Amazon because you THREATENED TO SUE A NEGATIVE REVIEW of a paying customer. I only hope a judge sees it that way.
Let us not forget Amazon threatened to revoke EA's license with the whole Sim City mess and made sure people that preordered that PoS got refunds.
As much as some of their shipping policies tick me off, Amazon is a consumer first business and really go to bat for us when it matters most.
 
Shill reviews and up bids. Ahh...like the good old ebay days.

It is very difficult for anyone to find hard evidence of such doing. There is rarely hard evidence. The individual must decide for himself based on the behavioural patterns observed.

World is gray, not black and white as those demanding evidence from the man perceives.
 
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