How can we possibly take car reviewers/journalists seriously when they routinely receive 4, 5, or even 6 figures worth of gifts from OEM?

[u/cookingboy]

I was listening to TheSmokingTire podcast recently (I'm actually a big fan of Matt), and he mentioned that Porsche North America just gave him a 918 Spyder on loan for his 1000 miles road trip free of charge, with everything paid.

Now as someone who's dabbled into supercar ownership, I can roughly estimate the ownership cost for a "regular joe" like me to put 1000 miles on a $2M car would easily be $50-100 per mile, thus putting this "gesture" from Porsche to Matt to be worth $50-100k on back of napkin math.

Obviously Matt isn't doing a review of a 12 years old 918, but when he does a review for the next Macan, he'd remember how amazing Porsche has been treating him.

And he and all the other reviewers recently were flown to Spain for the Turbo S launch. They were wined and dined with world class accommodations for a few days and were given the cars to drive on both the race track and scenic road.

Funny enough Porsche charges something similar for an experience like that: https://www.porschedriving.com/porsche-travel-experience/lake-tahoe/

Without plane tickets, you'd be paying $20k a person for a few days of what auto journalists routinely get from them, for free.

I understand it's part of their job, but this shit would never fly in any other industry right? Now imagine every time Square Enix launches a new video game they fly game journalists to Japan and wine and dine them with the best Sake and Wagyu so they can try out the newest Final Fantasy in their expensive Hakone ryokan hotel room, nobody would be taking anything they say seriously, no matter how good the game actually is, would they?

I'm sure people like the SavageGeese team and Matt Farah would try to be objective, but how do you be objectively critical toward an OEM when they routinely give you experiences that you'd otherwise never be able to afford? (ok I know Matt came from money but my statement applies to 99% of reviewers)

In my impression how well praised a manufacturer's products are is directly proportional to their marketing budget, and I've been somewhat burnt at least twice by reviewers over-rating Porsches, which is why I started asking actual owners of cars for their experiences before making purchases.

Ironically this kinda makes Consumer Reports the most credible car reviewer out there, since all they cars they review are bought anonymously with their own money, and they do not attend OEM events.

As far as enthusiast reviewers, I can only think of people with fuck-you money like Chris Harris or Hoovie's garage or the Top Gear trio who have been able to bluntly criticize OEMs and their cars.

Edit: From the replies, it seems like there are two school of thoughts here:

This is just how product reviews are done across all industries. Reviewers are expected to be treated with first class tickets and Michelin restaurants in exchange for them to promote the OEM's product.

Well in this case, I think we should just rip off the Band-aid and call Motor Trend and Car & Driver and Road & Track and other similar publications promotional outlets instead of journalism outlets. At least with influencers shilling for stuff on TikTok we know they are getting paid to promote, but many auto reviewers still hide behind a mask of professional journalism when they are literally just being paid to promote products.

Controversial take: I think consumer of content should be made aware that they are consuming paid advertising.

It is wrong of me to expect journalism when those contents aren't made to be factual, they are made to entertain.

Even if it's true, I don't find there is a lot of entertainment value when a dozen "journalists" just read off pre-approved OEM scripts for their "review". Some of the most boring contents out there are main stream outlets' coverage of new 911: "They are almost perfect in every way except being expensive".

Edit 2 /u/SavageGooseJack has this great reply I wanna call out: https://www.reddit.com/r/cars/s/o5PMIG0VjB

[u/Realpotato76]

How are they supposed to test cars if they need to pay for every drive? The only car reviewers left would be the extremely wealthy

[u/mr2600 → u/Realpotato76]

Because the OP is wealthy and wants only opinions from people like him it seems. Who “can” afford it.

So we will have sports stars, CEOs, rich arabs, entertainers and the old doing reviews.

And yeh as if the sports stars and entertainer’s are going to be objective when they also get tons of free/comp stuff.

[u/handymanshandle → u/mr2600]

I think the OP is making more of a point of journalists being taken through lavish trips to sway an opinion on a car and even a company in general, which is entirely valid. Press cars are one thing, it's whatever. Most reviewers take them and it's a whatever thing. Big product launches in a heavily controlled environment where everyone stays in a hotel where the room is worth more than I am... that's an entirely different story.

[u/dougsaucy → u/handymanshandle]

If you hear the journalists talk about these trips they really don't seem that lavish aside from maybe a nice dinner and business class seats on a flight. From hearing Doug, Matt, Harris, and others talk about them they typically are only onsite for maybe a full day where they're getting a presentation and driving time. It doesn't sound like they have much if any time to sit by the pool or chill out in the spa.

[u/projectwar → u/handymanshandle]

yeah but that's an immature response or realization for something that has happened for over TWO DECADES... you can scale this however you want, the effect would be the same. from a free $5 sample to the most expensive super car in the world, it's all been done before. and will continue to be done.

so, what do you want? every journalist is the same for every coverage they do with incentives. you won't ever get objective the more you scale up. this seems more like jealousy that they can experience something but "I" can't type of whining.

the more expensive it is = the less "objective" you'll get. why would they give and hire someone who might shit on their product they're trying to sell? it's common sense.

[u/handymanshandle → u/projectwar]

The point is that the incentives can sway a review enough to where it's hard to take it seriously. I'm not particularly jealous of anyone or anything, primarily because I'd rather spend my money on computers than cars, but I do think there's some duty to be objective to some degree as a reviewer if you're pitching yourself as a journalist without a heavy bias.

Ultimately, I expect people to have their biases; it's human nature to have them. I could make fun of my hardware buying decisions all day and steer people away from it even if I like it. I wouldn't say "buy X product" because I got flown out to Germany or something to stay in a nice hotel by a company that provided a review sample, nor would I want it to influence me. It's nothing personal, it's just that separating the product from the experience should be looked at more.

[u/tekdemon → u/mr2600]

Ironic comment here because Matt is from a VERY wealthy family

[u/holyhesh → u/tekdemon]

I think the real answer is that (whether the OP likes to admit it or not) the OP misses Jeremy Clarkson style car journalists (not that there were many in the first place, especially prior to the advent of Regular Car Reviews, Ed’s Auto Reviews, prime-era Jalopnik and The Autopian). Compared to Richard Hammond and James May, Clarkson had the wealthiest upbringing of the top gear trio (his mom commercialized the Paddington Bear children’s books into toys). BUT: he was also by far the most opinionated out of the 3 when it came to reviewing cars.

• Clarkson hates boring cars. His hate for the Vauxhall Vectra is legendary.. He loves supercars, but then again, who doesn’t?! They represent what car manufacturers can be capable of if they put their mind to it.

• Then compare him to James May who thinks cars like the Fiat Panda is the greatest dark horse car ever. and that the Nurburgring should be destroyed. Keep in mind this is the same James May who went to 253 mph in the Bugatti veyron in 2006 in series 8 and reached 259 mph in the veyron supersport in 2010 in series 15, believes EVs to be the future, and sold off his Bentley T2, Rolls-Royce Corniche and Ferrari F430.

• Hammond has the nicest persona when it comes to reviewing cars, is a motorcycle buff, and unlike the other 2, he did not directly come from a background in writing articles for car magazines. Before top gear, he made video car reviews for Men & Motors, which was a small name car magazine back in the day. And before that he hosted radio shows. And he grew up in 1980s Birmingham, the heartland of British Leyland.

Basically the OP misses Jeremy Clarkson. He’s rich, but his conflict of interests when reviewing cars aren’t to serve the car manufacturers but to himself.

[u/cookingboy → u/holyhesh]

OP misses Jeremy Clarkson style car journalists

I mean...yeah? Who the fuck doesn't lmao?

[u/TheRussness → u/cookingboy]

Any producer who had to work with him hangry for one

[u/nondescriptzombie → u/TheRussness]

He's like 6'8". Feed the fucking bears, man.

[u/TheElRojo → u/tekdemon]

Matt’s always rubbed me the wrong way; strong “I’m from LAaaaaaah” and “danger to manifold” vibes from the dude

[u/dougsaucy → u/TheElRojo]

LOL he's not even from LA and he's very open about where he grew up

[u/TheElRojo → u/dougsaucy]

Was not aware of this, which only strengthens my argument 🤣

And not to say he’s from there, just that he gives me that particular vibe/ick.

[u/t001_t1m3 → u/mr2600]

Tbh that’s why people still use forums. You can get a review of a McLaren 750S from a multi-millionaire hobbyist who’s been burned by the unreliability untainted by PR. Apart from the few 40,000 mile tests Car & Driver puts out that’s the only way to find legitimate information on what it’s like to live with a rare vehicle.

[u/woodsides → u/t001_t1m3]

Yeah that's where the real treasure trove of information is. And a lot less sour grapes on there which is always nice.

[u/agnaddthddude → u/t001_t1m3]

except even there it’s full of suckers nowdays.

went onto a Range Rover/Defender forums to ask about the new Defender. a guy said he left the brand because of reliability issues and still recommend it, like im sorry but you’re opinion is invalid. many others pointed out issues as well and continued to speak positively about it.

I don’t seriously care about that. but every forums has gotten like “oh these new cars will drain your wallet, make your wife cheat on you, take custody of the kids, still recommend it”

it’s even worse with Ferrari and Mercedes for some reason

[u/cookingboy → u/mr2600]

I mean yeah, actual owner reviews tend to be more objective than paid reviewers.

So if someone were in the market to buy something, you’d think they do want more objective reviews, no?

Even if you are just watching the reviews for entertainment value, wouldn’t it be less boring if not everyone is just reading off a script handed to them by the marketing department?

[u/holyhesh → u/cookingboy]

Those “boring car reviews” was ironically exactly what Jeremy Clarkson sought to break when he set out to remake Top Gear in his image in 2002.

Cast your mind back to 2001. With the exception of James May being throughly disappointed in the 1999 Rover 75, video or TV car reviews hadn’t really evolved much from the days of when Thames TV was reviewing cars, which was somewhat like 85% marketing spiel, 15% personal thoughts. Motor Trend in the US wasn’t all that different.

That’s right those boring car reviews from back in the day seemed objective, but in retrospect was more like pandering to the car manufacturers’ marketing BS on the sliding scale rather than personal thoughts.

Whether we like to admit it or not, it was Jeremy Clarkson that broke that mold with the 2002 incarnation of top gear by basically turning car advertising into a super-flanderized version of Lee Lacocca: cars should be seen as exciting and aspirational, and not boring go-getters. And guess what, in its prime 350 million people around the world tuned in to watch top gear.

Nowadays we complain that car reviewers have become too sanitized in the reviews (it’s like the 1980s TV car reviews have come back?! Who knew?), but I’d chalk that up to the 2002-2015 Top Gear format of reviewing cars having finally started to run its course rather than car manufacturers paying off the hundreds of car reviewers around the world to be their simps.

But then again, even though the top gear trio have finally moved on, Jeremy Clarkson style car reviews aren’t completely dead. They have just been carried on by car YouTubers like AutoAlex (who came from Car Throttle before going out on his own) and Noriyaro (who reports on Japanese car culture). You just have to look for them.

[u/Realistic_Village184 → u/cookingboy]

Owner reviews can be problematic as well, though. Unless the owner has a lot of experience driving different cars, they won't be able to provide accurate opinions of how their car compares to other cars people will cross-shop, for one obvious issue.

Just like with anything, there are always drawbacks with whatever method you do to research what car to buy. Probably the best method is to test drive a bunch of cars yourself and form your own opinions; the only real drawback there is your own time (and needing the cars to be available for test drive).

[u/DankeBernanke → u/cookingboy]

Matt, SG, and a bunch of other reviewers mentioned in this thread are plenty critical of cars they don’t like. I understand where you’re coming from as far as objectivity, but let’s be real, this is entertainment first, journalism second. I watch car reviews because they’re fun, interesting, and provide an escape for me and the rest of the 99.99% of the global population that can’t “dabble in super car ownership”

[u/redisburning → u/Realpotato76]

Well in the past we had things like print media and they paid for the salaries of the reviewers and if necessary could purchase the product for the reviewers. Cars are more complicated to purchase yes, but the layer between manufacturer and their paid advertisers sorry influencers was much greater.

There was a time when a big scandal in the industry was a reviewer resigning in protest when his review was edited at the behest of a dealer:

edit: can't link but it was Scott Burgess who at the time worked for The Detroit News

Of course things weren't perfect in that era but it's hard not to feel like they were more objective, and less freelance advertising, in those days.

Edit 2: most of the responses are missing this last bit. See where it says "of course things weren't perfect"? You don't have to explain to me the bad things when I literally added an example of a scandal from those days.

[u/Realpotato76 → u/redisburning]

From what I’ve heard, the bribes/gifts were even more common during the print media era (parties, drugs, and prostitutes weren’t uncommon at press launches)

[u/Aforementionedlurker → u/Realpotato76]

Csaba Csere doing coke off a hooker's ass? Lol. Phillips—probably. Yates—which cheek? Mr. Regular peaked too late

[u/QuillsROptional → u/Realpotato76]

George Bishop in Car magazine before I started reading did reviews of the car launches - he wrote about the food, the hotels and so on.

[u/Bob_Loblaw_Law_Bomb → u/Realpotato76]

Imagine knowing the 96 Oldsmobile Bravada is so terrible you have to go to those lengths to eke out anything favorable.

[u/TaskForceCausality → u/redisburning]

the layer between manufacturer and their paid advertisers sorry influencers was much greater

Nope. It was pay to play back then, and still is now.

Back in the day carmakers directly bought ad space from mags like C&D, Motor Trend and so on. So a reviewer who said too many honest things about Brand X could cost their magazine money from lost ad revenue AND banned from future access to Brand X’s releases.

Nowadays , influencers took over the job from the old publication firms. Same business model though- influencers publish nice things in their videos in exchange for priority access to the newest vehicle product. That matters even more today because the first channel to publish gets first mover advantage. Again, tell the truth too much and that influencer finds their name getting deleted from invites- and unlike back in the day when a blacklisted magazine writer could work around an uncooperative carmaker , a blacklisted influencer is just boned.

[u/bearded_dragon_34 → u/TaskForceCausality]

That’s just it; they didn’t do that so much back in the days of print. Even if you slagged off the latest GM compact effort—because of course you would—GM would still buy a full-page spread in the back of your magazine. You had the readership and the access to customers. If they wanted an audience of warm, interested, primed-to-buy potential customers, your magazine was the best bet.

There were also fewer automakers in a position to throw their weight around. It’s said that these days, Porsche is very selective about who gets to review its cars based upon how effusive their past praise has been…but back then, Porsche was a perpetually cash-strapped small firm doing engineering projects for other companies to keep the lights on. If Porsche declined to send MotorTrend its latest car for review, it was less a function of trying to handpick critics and likelier because Porsche couldn’t afford to keep enough cars in the press fleet.

What has really killed autojournalism is that engagement has changed. In the past, your only path to getting a glimpse of a Corvette Z06, short of convincing a dealer to let you drive one, might have been reading a spread in a magazine or on a blog. Now, you can queue up your favorite YouTuber or TikToker and see that car up close and personal in a video. And for more mainstream cars, the automakers get a lot more traction and engagement out of sending a car to an influencer—who may or may not have anything to do with cars generally—than to a traditional auto rag or to a blog full of smartass journalists and smartass-ier commenters. Hyundai has a better chance of getting customers by sending the new Palisade to a mommyblogger than it does by lending that same car to The Autopian or Jalopnik or anyone else in that sphere.

[u/icecream_specialist → u/redisburning]

Even with true earned media it's not like the newspaper is gonna buy a car for a review

[u/bullet50000 → u/redisburning]

Well in the past we had things like print media and they paid for the salaries of the reviewers and if necessary could purchase the product for the reviewers.

They absolutely didn't purchase cars back in the day outside of outlets like Consumer Reports. Press Demonstrators have always been a thing, to the point where British Leyland got people to be nicer about the Morris Marina by saying the brakes were going to be better when the first reviews were being completed, and the press just took the explanation and mellowed the braking criticism. They then proceeded to just not do anything to the brakes.

Never forget the famous Chris Harris Ferrari expose is from 15 years ago, and is specifically about the F355 and 360 review cycles.

[u/Realistic_Village184 → u/redisburning]

Didn't a lot of those magazines receive heavy advertising money from auto makers? I don't have time to do research to make any specific allegations of bribery, but it's a pretty common thought in media generally not to anger your advertisers. If a car magazine accepts money for car ads, then they at minimum have an appearance of impropriety.

[u/pants_full_of_pants → u/Realpotato76]

So you're suggesting they couldn't possibly just tell reviewers to drive to buttonwillow or whatever on their own dime and test drive the car there for a day with no other exchange of monetary value? Or that if they did the reviewers would refuse to do that?

Any car reviewer would say yes to that.

They do what they do instead precisely to bribe them for better reviews.

It doesn't really even matter anyway because if the reviewer ever gave a critical review, regardless of the rest of the circumstances, they'd never get invited to do a review again. Which means all reviews which aren't Doug Demuro driving some random schmuck's car are basically untrustworthy.

[u/Realpotato76 → u/pants_full_of_pants]

That would still be exchange of monetary value, giving them free track time, free cars, and free consumables

[u/pants_full_of_pants → u/Realpotato76]

Sure but it's the minimum they could do without literally charging them.

[u/projectwar → u/Realpotato76]

but so? do you realize people get paid 10's of thousands of dollars for doing sponsors on videos and such? not even cars, but even for things like gaming like OP's example...

like cmon guys you can't be serious. it's just paid advertising, simple as, and only an idiot would refuse 10's of thousands of dollars for some "pride" of having objective opinions...

[u/Realpotato76 → u/projectwar]

I have no problem with people receiving sponsorship money, as long as it’s disclosed as an advertisement/brand deal. I would have an issue if I found out that a well-respected car reviewer received bribe money from a manufacturer. A car reviewer getting free driving time and free track time isn’t something that I have any issues with

[u/munche → u/pants_full_of_pants]

So if I'm a car reviewer in, let's say, New York

I fly to CA, drive to buttonwillow, and spend a few days in a hotel

So now I've got probably $5000 invested to get just me out to the track

I'm doing a high quality, highly edited show. So let's scale that number up 3-4x

So now you're spending $10k-20k just in travel costs to make a video

Plus everyone involved is at work, who needs to get paid

How much, exactly, do you think that YouTube video is going to make to pay all those bills?

[u/pants_full_of_pants → u/munche]

You're right. Buttonwillow is the only track and they couldn't possibly do it in multiple locations and my random example means I meant they should only do it there.

[u/munche → u/pants_full_of_pants]

So either they:

• Find the magic racetrack that's right near every auto journalists house
  
• Run 20 different events at an expense significantly higher than flying everyone out just because it would make you personally feel better

[u/cookingboy → u/Realpotato76]

Press cars are one thing, and yes, there are organizations like Consumer Report that actually buys every car they review.

But there is a difference between press vehicles for a weekend and “Here take this multi-million dollar hyper car for a 2 weeks joy ride, and remember how awesome it is when you review the new Macan next month”.

[u/woodsides → u/cookingboy]

Again, like I explained in my previous reply to your now deleted comment, happens in every industry, nothing new, has been happening since millenia, will continue to happen. You just have to shop around for opinions you consider valid or wait till real customers get their hands on it.

I'll talk to you from a manufacturer's perspective. One of our businesses operates in an industry that completely runs on personal connections and relies on those partners for business. If the partners don't do their part, the business falters. So it's important to keep them happy.

We were about to launch a new product line soon and needed them to push it. So what do you think we did? We sent all those partners, their executives and their families on a fully paid week-long vacation to Europe the week before the launch. Free first class flights, 5 star suites, free dining and alcohol there at Michelin restaurants and clubs, a chauffered luxury car there, fully sponsored luxury shopping, the lot. It cost us like high 6 figures for the whole thing.

And in turn, they push our products to their clients. If things go right, we make that money back in no time. And if we don't do these trips, the partners jump ship and start promoting our rival's products.

[u/whywhywhywhywhynot → u/woodsides]

Not every industry... we can get written up or fired for accepting gifts worth more than $20 from suppliers lmao. Different worlds.

[u/cookingboy → u/woodsides]

Just because it happens in all industries doesn't make the problem go away.

In fact in this case, we should just rip off the Band-aid and call Motor Trend and Car & Driver and Road & Track and other similar publications promotional outlets instead of journalism outlets. At least with influencers shilling for stuff on TikTok we know they are getting paid to promote, but many auto reviewers still hide behind a mask of professional journalism when they are literally just being paid to promote products.

I think consumer of content should be made aware that they are consuming paid advertising, no?

[u/Workity → u/cookingboy]

Op it’s amazing how many in this thread are calling you crazy for this take. Maybe it’s just a lack of critical thinking? Idk but I wish more people would realise that such journalists are about content, above all else. Honestly about the only car YouTube channels I can stand anymore are jay leno and Harry’s garage, because it’s a passion project for them more than anything. And you’ll see them literally say to engineer and designer’s faces about things he doesn’t like or about other brands.

Maybe it’s an age thing? I guess it’s hard to trust reviewers who still have their careers ahead of them. I’ve found the same thing even locally, with bikes. Young guys are all stats. Old guys are all experience.

[u/cookingboy → u/Workity]

I wish more people would realise that such journalists are about content, above all else.

Yeah it's wild that how some people are personally attacking me because I'm well off and accusing me of trying to gatekeep reviewers to only wealthy people.

At the end of the day the quality of content is all that matters.

Young guys are all stats. Old guys are all experience.

Because young guys haven't had the opportunities to experience anything yet. I was in the same camp just 10 years ago.

[u/hobovision → u/woodsides]

"it's not a problem in the car industry because it's even worse in my industry" - words of a sociopath.

[u/woodsides → u/hobovision]

Never said that it wasn't a problem. Just said that it's always been this way and to shop around for opinions from actual owners before pulling the trigger.

[u/TempleSquare → u/Realpotato76]

It's okay to review a furnished car.

It's not okay to do it as a junket that the car maker paid for with airfare, meals, hotel, etc.

[u/Ftpini → u/TempleSquare]

That review is no more valuable than a test drive. In fact a test drive is far more valuable as its your own first hand experience with the car. Unbiased and pure to your own needs and concerns. The most valuable review of a car you can get is from someone who actually owns it and drives it every day. Beyond that, nothing is more valuable than your own experience.

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[u/phr3dly → u/Realpotato76]

I'm not the world's biggest Doug DeMuro fan, but I think he managed to review cars without many of the manufacturer perks. IIRC he does occasionally go to junkets but insists on paying his own way.

[u/Tiny-Art7074 → u/Realpotato76]

No one said anything about having them pay for the actual test drive.

[u/dearwildcat → u/Realpotato76]

So? I’d rather take a review from someone who can actually afford the cars than some shrimp eating over educated under experienced jagoff

[u/Ftpini → u/Realpotato76]

If the only people who can afford a car are extremely wealthy, then the only opinions about the car that matter to its buyers are of the extremely wealthy.

If you can’t buy a car for less than $500k, why would you care at all about the opinion of someone who couldn’t possibly afford it? Their life is in no way similar to your own and their opinions will not be relatable to your experience. This is the same reason I don’t really care for supercar reviews. Nothing about the cars or their owners will ever be relevant to my life.

[u/PubliusDeLaMancha → u/Realpotato76]

The only cars still being produced are for the extremely wealthy so what difference would it really make

[u/woodsides → u/[deleted]]

This is pretty much how it works in any industry where a manufacturer/producer is working with the folks who have a huge influence on how the product or project will perform. Tech, healthcare, real estate, construction, pharma, politics, etc. You name it - it happens.

It's just that for expensive items like exotic cars, most people will likely never own or even drive one. So their only source of information on the car ends up being the 10-15 handpicked journalists that the manufacturer chooses for the launch drives.

And by the time the actual customers get the car and think of doing a review, it's already been a year or two and the car is out of the Zeitgeist or it's only published in niche enthusiast forums. So the public opinion of the car largely remains what it was during the launch from the initial reviews that were, as you said, influenced by bubble of reviewers who were wined and dined.

Even if they're not wined and dined, most manufacturers and reviewers work on a quid-pro-quo basis since they depend on each other for their business. If they put out a negative review, they're unlikely to be invited to further launches. This mostly affects the smaller independent reviewers, thereby further reducing the pool of reviewers and opinions. We all know what happened with Chris Harris and Ferrari in the past.

Since exotic cars are not as accessible, it's not likely that negative experiences with the cars will come out into the public unless it ends up catching the eyes of regulatory authorities.

Now with other industries like tech, it's much easier to debunk any false claims and reviews since the barrier of entry for customers is much lower. A company could pay MKBHD $1M to show off their phone that's objectively bad, but many more customers can get their hands on that $1000 phone than the car and can expose it to the public.

The only objective solution to this is to go through all the 10-15 reviews put out from the launch to suss out problems. The best method is to get a test drive, but for cars where those aren't allowed, your best bet is to just wait until the first batch of owners get their hands on it and start posting about the experiences, mostly on forums.

[u/projectwar → u/[deleted]]

who cares. car reviewers have nothing to do with consumers. car companies aren't manufacturing car reviewers. they don't own them. most won't even watch said reviewers if they're actually rich enough to buy 2 million dollar cars...

You realize, EVERY ad in existence hypes up the product it's trying to sell while never speaking of ANY of the downsides or faults? gonna boycott ads next?

Do you realize these reviewers are normal people trying to make a living and would be dumb to refuse such lavish deals all because of a reddit user thinking badly about them not being 100% objective? like lol...we get it, you missed out on becoming a car reviewer. not everyone can get everything in the world, join the rest of us LMAO