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RTINGS.com is now a Paywalled Service

Good fucking riddance then. I dont buy devices every month to have a need to pay for a service. I get that they can't sustain stuff, but this is the worst way to do it.

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Grildon Tundy said:
It'd be nice if this keeps them from succumbing to payola (i.e., getting paid to give certain products certain ratings), but for some reason I doubt it.
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Is this a known thing or just an assumption based on them rating a product higher or lower than you would like? Because if true this would potentially destroy their whole service.
 
I don't really mind them charging for the service.

It seems weird to me that anyone would pay for this more than like once every few years if you are looking to buy a new TV or similar product.

But if it's actually profitable then I guess good on them.
 
It should be noted that not everything is paywalled:
While much of RTINGS.com remains free, our full test results and in-depth product analysis are now available only to members. We'll continue to iterate on what that looks like over time as we refine the model across different product categories.
Click to expand...
This likely means that you will still see the full score for a tv, but not all the sub-scores that factor into it.
 
poppabk said:
Is this a known thing or just an assumption based on them rating a product higher or lower than you would like? Because if true this would potentially destroy their whole service.
Click to expand...
An assumption, but not based on them rating a product higher/lower that I can point to. I don't really get invested in toy wars like that.

It's based on them apparently needing cashflow (changing to this model), human (or more like "corporate") nature, and precedents like Gamespot, Sitejabber, LendEDU, and any number of Amazon sellers who get caught paying for positive reviews.
 
that's annoying.

sadly they are the only decent PC Monitor review site.
like most PC Monitor reciews (including Monitors Unboxed) completely ignore VRR compatibility in their reviews.

they'll just list "oh it's HDMI 2.0" but don't clarify if it has HDMI Forum VRR Support, which many higher class HDMI 2.0 monitors have, but not all of them.

Rtings have a super easy console compatibility list in their reviews where they test HDMI VRR compatibility on the PS5. 1440p monitors especially are usually HDMI 2.0, but can support HDMI VRR, but don't fully advertise it anywhere because apparently it's not worth mentioning lol.

and again, even "respected" YouTube channels like Monitors Unboxed completely ignore it (or at least they have every time I watched a review of theirs)
 
I think they're pricing way too high. Without looking into it I can assume they do what everyone else does and sets up a direct debit, so it's not like they're altruistically giving people the freedom to have a single month sub up front for their likely usage time.

Make it $2/month and you'll get more in the door. I'd wager than if they halved the fee they'd get more than double the subs. Make it $2 and people might not even notice/care about the impact on their funds and keep it running.

But $10? Many won't even consider it. I know I won't.
kevboard said:
that's annoying.

sadly they are the only decent PC Monitor review site.
like most PC Monitor reciews (including Monitors Unboxed) completely ignore VRR compatibility in their reviews.

they'll just list "oh it's HDMI 2.0" but don't clarify if it has HDMI Forum VRR Support, which many higher class HDMI 2.0 monitors have, but not all of them.

Rtings have a super easy console compatibility list in their reviews where they test HDMI VRR compatibility on the PS5. 1440p monitors especially are usually HDMI 2.0, but can support HDMI VRR, but don't fully advertise it anywhere because apparently it's not worth mentioning lol.

and again, even "respected" YouTube channels like Monitors Unboxed completely ignore it (or at least they have every time I watched a review of theirs)
Click to expand...
It's awful that you need a third party site to get a reliable technical specification for a product, but I don't doubt it. There are plenty of times when I've struggled to find reliable product information.

I've had a conversation with AOC's CS about a monitor that still advertised a feature only present in earlier production batches. I've also had confusion about a Sony TV's 120hz mode that wasn't in mine. I don't remember if that was a regional thing or wrong website description, but either way it was difficult to get accurate information.
 
Grildon Tundy said:
An assumption, but not based on them rating a product higher/lower that I can point to. I don't really get invested in toy wars like that.

It's based on them apparently needing cashflow (changing to this model), human (or more like "corporate") nature, and precedents like Gamespot, Sitejabber, LendEDU, and any number of Amazon sellers who get caught paying for positive reviews.
Click to expand...
We'll see, but their reasoning for doing this gives them a chance of staying independent. AI scraping their reviews and not referencing the source, fewer visits via Google, plus buying all the products themselves isn't cheap. As they say, they had a choice between this and monetisation models which doesn't align with independent reviews.

I hope it works for them to be honest.
 
Soodanim said:
I think they're pricing way too high. Without looking into it I can assume they do what everyone else does and sets up a direct debit, so it's not like they're altruistically giving people the freedom to have a single month sub up front for their likely usage time.

Make it $2/month and you'll get more in the door. I'd wager than if they halved the fee they'd get more than double the subs. Make it $2 and people might not even notice/care about the impact on their funds and keep it running.

But $10? Many won't even consider it. I know I won't.

It's awful that you need a third party site to get a reliable technical specification for a product, but I don't doubt it. There are plenty of times when I've struggled to find reliable product information.

I've had a conversation with AOC's CS about a monitor that still advertised a feature only present in earlier production batches. I've also had confusion about a Sony TV's 120hz mode that wasn't in mine. I don't remember if that was a regional thing or wrong website description, but either way it was difficult to get accurate information.
Click to expand...
I think pricing is more when you need something not something to be kept year on subbed
 
What a strange decision. But it seems like it's due to AI scrapping and search engine algorithms.
I see they have already implemented the change. So several parts of their articles are blurred out.

One thing I was not aware is that they review a lot more things besides TVs and monitors.

Here is their explanation in video.
 
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winjer said:
What a strange decision. But it seems like it's due to AI scrapping and search engine algorithms.
I see they have already implemented the change. So several parts of their articles are blurred out.

One thing I was not aware is that they review a lot more things besides TVs and monitors.

Here is their explanation in video.
Click to expand...

yeah they review software (vpns) and things like keyboard switches, mattresses, vacuums, toasters, microwaves, shoes. i get it. as they grew they wanted to expand but c'mon some of that is silly. maybe they should focus back on electronics/gaming/audio and more software (less expensive that buying physical things). ditch the whole home/kitchen product market outside of TVs. they must know what products people are visiting for. i've personally only ever used them for TV/monitor reviews
 
How else could they stop AI scraping the website though? Genuine question, if AI scraping is causing even more of a loss than ad blocking then it feels like a lot of websites will have to do something similar.
 
I think they are aware that this is an extreme move. If it fails, the site may disappear.

AI is taking all of the info from sites like this, re-writing it, and serving up their own referral links so they profit off of any sales and not the sites they can crib reviews from.

And if people aren't willing to be advertised to and/or pay for access, the web is kind of doomed. Dead internet theory and all that.

It's why letting these gen AI tools run rampant is completely nonsensical. They took the free but ad supported web, grabbed all the info they could, and now are helping kill off any original content that they would be able to pull in.
 
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Who else has done what they've done and have grown to the effectiveness of RTINGS? I think they deserve a little for what they have built.
 
YCoCg said:
How else could they stop AI scraping the website though? Genuine question, if AI scraping is causing even more of a loss than ad blocking then it feels like a lot of websites will have to do something similar.
Click to expand...

github.com

GitHub - TecharoHQ/anubis: Weighs the soul of incoming HTTP requests to stop AI crawlers

Weighs the soul of incoming HTTP requests to stop AI crawlers - TecharoHQ/anubis
github.com github.com

More stuff like this is being developed to fight against AI and these things will become the norm.
 
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Who do they think is going to pay for this? I'm pretty sure this is going to tank the site completely. If it's just to stop AI, why $10/month? Why not $.50/month?

I use RTings to find out quickly about specs / comparisons but I can't justify a another subscription just for that. I'll revert back AVS or youtube for user experience.
 
LOL, ain't no one going to pay for that shit. It was a convenient site, but asking for monthly subscription to access content most people only look at a couple of times a year at most is ridiculous.
 
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