Reviewing Content Instead of the App
You pissed off people by somewhat breaking your app, and they’re leaving angry reviews. How can you salvage your reputation? Apple just found one incredibly effective way — get listeners to submit better reviews by interrupting their podcast experience with an in-app prompt to submit a rating.
That’s how the Apple Podcasts app went from a publicly embarrassing 1.8-star score all the way to 4.6 stars in a little over a month without any actual fixes, as developer and App Store watchdog Kosta Eleftheriou points out.
[…]
But do those people actually love Apple Podcasts? Because if you really look at the reviews, it seems like some funny business is going on. There are new, positive reviews, but they aren’t reviews of the Apple Podcasts app at all — they’re reviews of podcasts themselves.
The top review in the App Store right now starts out with “Best Podcast Ever!”, with the reviewer lauding the podcast they had been listening to at the time the review prompt popped up.
The rest of the reviews are a mix of one star comments about the design of the Podcasts app and positive reviews for podcast content.
[…]
Looking at the reviews of third-party podcast apps, the majority of the ratings are for the apps themselves, and customers do not seem to be accidentally offering reviews for podcast content as is happening with the Podcasts app.
people reviewing content is unfortunate, it’s maybe a UI problem, but I know it happens in other apps too (eg. Yelp)
Previously:
Update (2022-02-04): Sean Hollister (tweet):
But in the nearly three months since I helped point this out at The Verge and brought it directly to Apple’s attention, the only thing that’s changed is Apple Podcasts’ rating has gone up from 4.7 to 4.9 — and each of its five little gray star marks is now completely filled in, for a five-star rating overall.
The app hasn’t received any updates during this time, by the way. Every bit of newfound goodwill is people suddenly submitting reviews for podcasts instead of reviews for the app.
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I think a lot of people just don't spend any of their attention on what shell is performing their task.
Which browser are you using?
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> Looking at the reviews of third-party podcast apps, the majority of the ratings are for the apps themselves, and customers do not seem to be accidentally offering reviews for podcast content as is happening with the Podcasts app.
This kind of makes sense, as understanding the distinction between podcasts and podcast apps is kind of a prerequisite for seeking out a 3rd party podcast player in the first place.
