In your opinion, has the democratising impact of the internet on perfumery been a net-positive or a net-negative?

[slpfrsly]

Interested to hear your thoughts.

 

[hednic]

Can only speak for myself, and for me, the impact has been a net-positve one.

 

[Mudassir]

Besides employee productivity gains for corporations, I'd be lost to find net-positives with information overload and devaluing efforts that the boom has afforded in any area of life. I live in the present, so would indulge in it to a certain extent, but that doesn't equate to value.

 

[Ken_Russell]

From a personal viewpoint alone, a net positive, both due to the sheer size and quality of information but also of newer, more diverse, more easily available purchasing/testing/swapping/sampling etc. options become more beneficially democratized on an increased scale and level.

 

[FiveoaksBouquet]

I chose net negative but only regarding the state of perfumery. I think I liked the industry better when it was asleep and perfume was a personal matter of no particular general interest or attention, including not of interest to greedy multinationals or zealous regulators.

That said, a very positive aspect for me has been the exchange possible with like-minded enthusiasts and new and wonderful friends and acquaintances met on the internet through perfume.

There has been loss on the perfume side and.gain on the human side but that doesn’t equate to “neutral” because I feel strongly and anything but neutral about both aspects.

 

[mr. reasonable]

From a personal viewpoint alone, a net positive, both due to the sheer size and quality of information but also of newer, more diverse, more easily available purchasing/testing/swapping/sampling etc. options become more beneficially democratized on an increased scale and level

Pretty much my thoughts. I have been able to pick up all sorts of things not available in HK and Basenotes has always been a good source of info on stuff - informed comments and reviews. Also a degree of competition is healthy - I can get Lutens, L'Artisan, Guerlain, Malle and others (not necessarily the whole range) on Strawberrynet at discounted prices from local retail + 20% off for local HK delivery. Not complaining

I suppose the increased awareness via the net has helped spawn a lot of opportunistic 'board room brands' but it doesn't take long to see what's what on that score . . .

 

[Diamondflame]

The fact that we’re gathered here sharing notes and opinions on a hobby we enjoy speaks volumes. It’s not all hunky dory of course (what is?) but it’s still a net positive for me. Back in the 1980s you only got to test or buy whatever’s on display in the stores.

 

[L'Aventurier]

The Internet has given a voice to anyone who wants one. There are definitely some negatives: Internet trolls, bigots and Influencer-led (fake) hype trains sponsored by big money. Sometimes the Internet can destroy people and things, especially with Cancel Culture, for better or worse.

But overall, the plethora of information, and misinformation, is better than none. Perfume reviewers are getting better at describing scents (they can usually pick out big molecules like calone, oakmoss, iso e super, ambrox, cashmeran and white musk) and I've gotten to the point where I can shape a really good idea of perfume by reading 10-20 reviews on BN or Fragrantica.

That wasn't possible 10 years ago. I used to find it exhausting to try and figure out what a fragrance smells like from it's often misleading note pyramid.

When you have the chance to read and hear about hundreds of different perfume lover's opinions, you have more to work with in coming to your own conclusions. But you have to give everyone a voice, otherwise it becomes an echo chamber.

 

[Paddington]

Net neutral,
Houses that would never leave the confines of there only country finding people with the same interests and access to the whole world and stuff thought long gone.

downsides are Echo chambers, fragrant conspiracy theories, misinformation ,subjective opinions being taken as facts etc all of these reinforced cause ull eventually find enough people who toot the same flute.

and crazies fuck me there a lot of crazies u wouldn't see without the internet

 

[_Nicolas_]

The noses I'm guided by most are all reviewers on Basenotes, so very positive in the sense of a trustworthy evaluation of fragrances. But in terms of impact on perfumery, it has been quite negative in terms of creating a sort of obsession based on mass-appeal about what notes or fragrances are good. So now the whole thing is becoming a huge argumentum ad populum IMO, which is of course fallacious: "Well, how can so many people possibly be wrong?"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argumentum_ad_populum

 

[slpfrsly]

After sampling a fragrance recently, I think that 95% of the reviews I read prior to smelling it were actively misleading in that they didn't/couldn't analyse the actual scent and instead analysed and reinforced the idea of it (partly the given 'notes', partly the branding). I wonder if the govt-enforced shutdowns has played a part in this, attracting more novices to perfume who are more likely to simply repeat what other people have already said as a means of fitting in rather than standing out (particularly in a 'bad' way), but I doubt it's the only reason. Whatever it is, I think the groupthink of reviewing is fundamentally a net negative. This is something that's come up over the last few weeks, starting with chat about Luca Turin, and I'm convinced the democratised 'free to review' system of fragrantica (and, sadly, even basenotes, particularly with more recent reviews) is a net negative to both the average customer and the perfume enthusiast who wants to gain an impression of the fragrance prior to smelling it. The analysis requires some sort of exclusivity to avoid the dual pitfalls of oversocialised groupthink and commercial shilling that makes up the bulk of most reviews. This is why Turin deserves credit, as he does sidestep those problems.

 

[Rodolfo]

I'm convinced the democratised 'free to review' system of fragrantica (and, sadly, even basenotes, particularly with more recent reviews) is a net negative to both the average customer and the perfume enthusiast who wants to gain an impression of the fragrance prior to smelling it. The analysis requires some sort of exclusivity to avoid the dual pitfalls of oversocialised groupthink and commercial shilling that makes up the bulk of most reviews.

Very interesting. If it were up to you, what would you change about it to reduce so much negativity?

This is why Turin deserves credit, as he does sidestep those problems.

Excuse me, but how Turin avoids these problems? I didn't quite catch it. Could you briefly explain it to me please?

 

[Mark_Trail]

My 2 cents say net-positive

-Mark

 

[slpfrsly]

Very interesting. If it were up to you, what would you change about it to reduce so much negativity?

Good question. Hard to know how given the direction of culture/commerce and the internet. But basically, focus on what would be the right way to do things: informative analysis married to competence of both communication and understanding/interpreting perfume (and/or the chemistry of perfume). It almost certainly requires something more exclusive than the collectivised social credit system of online reviewing (on fragrantica, your reviews can be deleted if enough people vote it down for wrongthink - this is the tyranny of the majority in action) that provides no direct benefit to the reviewer. A better way of doing things is unlikely to beat the neurochemical stimulation gained from engaging with youtube or fragrantica, but it would produce superior information, which would be the point. Blogs do this fairly well (Kafkaesque stands out as the best IMO) but are a remnant of the old internet/suffer from lack of visibility and are also prone to falling in to the pitfalls of groupthink (particularly newer blogs, which inceidentally are better at exploiting SEO to be visible on google etc, despite the paucity of the content). Ultimately this is a result that is far downstream of much bigger problems tbf. I would not start here or limit myself to trying to improve fragrance reviewing if I were to change something. This is just a symptom of something else, and it's been ushered in under the guise of things like consumerism.

Excuse me, but how Turin avoids these problems? I didn't quite catch it. Could you briefly explain it to me please?

He's neither shilling for a brand, like Jeremy Fragrance or Demi or the rest of the youtube influencers, nor is he trying to win friends and influence people for neurochemical feelies and validation, like many online reviewers do on sites like fragrantica. He provides a model for what good reviewing could/should look like, undercutting the 'received wisdom' that is picked up from marketing and advertising by describing the basic, raw process of perfumery and its aromachemicals. Importantly, he achieves this due to the customers who buy his books (via publisher), as opposed to receiving advertising payment that would incentivise him to review certain brands (or perform in a certain way to attract more views). His analysis also precedes the internet, so he has credibility that his interest is divorced from the current millieu where people congregate to review perfumes (primarily fragrantica and youtube). Given his professional background, all of this means he can give competent, honest, informative reviews of perfume that avoid the two main problems discussed i.e. video influencers and freely written reviews.

 

[Bonnette]

The Internet has given a voice to anyone who wants one. There are definitely some negatives: Internet trolls, bigots and Influencer-led (fake) hype trains sponsored by big money. Sometimes the Internet can destroy people and things, especially with Cancel Culture, for better or worse.

But overall, the plethora of information, and misinformation, is better than none. Perfume reviewers are getting better at describing scents (they can usually pick out big molecules like calone, oakmoss, iso e super, ambrox, cashmeran and white musk) and I've gotten to the point where I can shape a really good idea of perfume by reading 10-20 reviews on BN or Fragrantica.

That wasn't possible 10 years ago. I used to find it exhausting to try and figure out what a fragrance smells like from it's often misleading note pyramid.

When you have the chance to read and hear about hundreds of different perfume lover's opinions, you have more to work with in coming to your own conclusions. But you have to give everyone a voice, otherwise it becomes an echo chamber.

This, in every respect. I spend hours reading reviews on Basenotes and favorite perfume blogs, and then comparison shopping for fragrances I wouldn't have even known existed years ago. The most obscure vintages are traceable online, in addition to heads-up about new perfumes (and updates about houses). I don't mind wading through some polluted streams to get to the full body of water.

 

[the_good_life]

Net-positive. Not just on a personal level - because I might have never gotten into perfume without basenotes, and thus never involved in olfactory culture or teaching sensory studies at university etc. pp.

I also think the internet saved perfumery, since it clearly provides the infrastructural backbone for the kind of small scale artisan outfits which are now at the forefront of creative perfumery (here I fully agree with Turin/Sanchez position in their intro to the last guide). Mass and "niche" perfumery would have died their death at the hands of turbo-consumerism and profit maximization with or without the internet.

Expert communities, such as basenotes and various blogs have enriched perfume discourse, perhaps even created it, even if the internet is unquestionably full of marketing bots these days that simply replicate engineered PR. As in all other fields, the good stuff is there for those willing / able to discern it.

 

[sugarbear]

Super Positive. So many great perfumers have emerged from the internet.

 

[Pippin06]

A net-positive for me as well.

 

[slpfrsly]

I also think the internet saved perfumery, since it clearly provides the infrastructural backbone for the kind of small scale artisan outfits which are now at the forefront of creative perfumery (here I fully agree with Turin/Sanchez position in their intro to the last guide). Mass and "niche" perfumery would have died their death at the hands of turbo-consumerism and profit maximization with or without the internet.

Interesting point. I'd like to hear more on this. How do you think it would have gone without the internet? What do you think niche would be without it/beholden to commercialism?

 

[Rodolfo]

After sampling a fragrance recently, I think that 95% of the reviews I read prior to smelling it were actively misleading in that they didn't/couldn't analyse the actual scent and instead analysed and reinforced the idea of it (partly the given 'notes', partly the branding). I wonder if the govt-enforced shutdowns has played a part in this, attracting more novices to perfume who are more likely to simply repeat what other people have already said as a means of fitting in rather than standing out (particularly in a 'bad' way), but I doubt it's the only reason. Whatever it is, I think the groupthink of reviewing is fundamentally a net negative. This is something that's come up over the last few weeks, starting with chat about Luca Turin, and I'm convinced the democratised 'free to review' system of fragrantica (and, sadly, even basenotes, particularly with more recent reviews) is a net negative to both the average customer and the perfume enthusiast who wants to gain an impression of the fragrance prior to smelling it. The analysis requires some sort of exclusivity to avoid the dual pitfalls of oversocialised groupthink and commercial shilling that makes up the bulk of most reviews. This is why Turin deserves credit, as he does sidestep those problems.

It seems to me a very bold and inelegant comment. The people who write reviews on internet are people just like you and me, and mentioning that 95% of the reviews of a fragrance that you have read are misleading means calling most of them a bunch of deceitful or fakers, whether this is intentional or the product of "ignorance" or the influence of "groupthink".

What happens is that behind all theory there is practice, and to show us all here the reasons why you believe that you should show us the reviews of that fragrance (or the link where they can be read), also attaching your own review. This way you can show us these 95% of misleading reviews, the 5% that are not and yours, and discuss about it.
If not, some will think that what you are doing is only reinforcing a preconceived idea that you now have, fresh, latent and powerful, about how negative and misleading online perfume reviews are, which is curiously the same thing that you are criticizing in that 95% of people who follow the preconceived ideas of the brand or the notes of a perfume to the letter.

On the other hand I guess that 5% is anecdotal since you only associate it with a specific fragrance. However it gives me the feeling that the belief you hold is general, and that by default most of the reviews on internet you think they are misleading.
Since it was you who mentioned percentages, I ask you: in general terms, what percentage of average reviews do you consider negative or misleading for example in Basenotes? More than 50%? 90%?

If you consider that these types of reviews are misleading because they do not focus to "analyzing the real aroma" and focus only on partially regurgitating the notes and comments of the brand, then you are inferring that the notes of a perfume or the information that we can find of it coming from the brand is mostly a pack of lies, which doesn't say much about the industry itself, by the way.
I am not going to discuss this. But I see a parallel between the perfumes that come out on the market and the reviews that are published on the web: they proliferate more and more and are of very very variable quality and density. I think it's great! We may not have any decision-making capacity in relation to which perfumes are launched on the market and which ones disappear, but at least we have the ability to choose between what is available, which is something. And seems to me to be something positive. I think Winston Churchill said: “Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others.”

Good question. Hard to know how given the direction of culture/commerce and the internet. But basically, focus on what would be the right way to do things: informative analysis married to competence of both communication and understanding/interpreting perfume (and/or the chemistry of perfume). It almost certainly requires something more exclusive than the collectivised social credit system of online reviewing (on fragrantica, your reviews can be deleted if enough people vote it down for wrongthink - this is the tyranny of the majority in action) that provides no direct benefit to the reviewer. A better way of doing things is unlikely to beat the neurochemical stimulation gained from engaging with youtube or fragrantica, but it would produce superior information, which would be the point. Blogs do this fairly well (Kafkaesque stands out as the best IMO) but are a remnant of the old internet/suffer from lack of visibility and are also prone to falling in to the pitfalls of groupthink (particularly newer blogs, which inceidentally are better at exploiting SEO to be visible on google etc, despite the paucity of the content). Ultimately this is a result that is far downstream of much bigger problems tbf. I would not start here or limit myself to trying to improve fragrance reviewing if I were to change something. This is just a symptom of something else, and it's been ushered in under the guise of things like consumerism.


He's neither shilling for a brand, like Jeremy Fragrance or Demi or the rest of the youtube influencers, nor is he trying to win friends and influence people for neurochemical feelies and validation, like many online reviewers do on sites like fragrantica. He provides a model for what good reviewing could/should look like, undercutting the 'received wisdom' that is picked up from marketing and advertising by describing the basic, raw process of perfumery and its aromachemicals. Importantly, he achieves this due to the customers who buy his books (via publisher), as opposed to receiving advertising payment that would incentivise him to review certain brands (or perform in a certain way to attract more views). His analysis also precedes the internet, so he has credibility that his interest is divorced from the current millieu where people congregate to review perfumes (primarily fragrantica and youtube). Given his professional background, all of this means he can give competent, honest, informative reviews of perfume that avoid the two main problems discussed i.e. video influencers and freely written reviews.

Let's look at some examples of Turin's capabilities as a perfume reviewer.

Or des Indes (Maître Parfumeur et Gantier) ★ ★ ★ classic oriental
MPG does Shalimar. Get Shalimar. LT

Where is the perfume analysis capacity here? Information about notes, accords, colors, volume...? Longevity, sillage? Any historical data or useful information? If this review, instead of being signed by Luca Turin and appearing in a book had been signed by Tuca Lurín and published in Basenotes, what would readers think of it?

In return, a review of zztopp (Basenotes, Feb 19, 2007):

Notes:bergamot, lavender, geranium, oppoponax, sandalwood, amber, vanillaOr Des Indes (ODI or "Gold of India") is a suprising title for a fragrance. What is MPG trying to recreate here? The smell of gold after it has been transported through the harsh streets of Calcutta? Or is it ridiculing the fact that India is the largest consumer of gold despite the fact that 75% of the population lives below the poverty line? Whatever the reason, lets go onto the review!ODI opens with an orangey yet tart combination of bergamot and lavender before unraveling into a pungent, bitter and sweet aroma. Oppoponax is the main star here, and it displays its supposed spiritual cleansing and demon vanquishing powers with full force. Unfortunately, this phase doesnt last as long as I wanted it to, but the sensual comforting drydown of sandalwood and amber with that trademark metallic twinge present in so many MPG drydowns provides a fitting finish to a smooth and rich display of fragrance notes. I dont find it to be overly powdery, and it can easily be classified unisex.Or Des Indes smells nothing like gold - dont let the name scare you away. It doesnt smell chemical-ly like a lot of bling bling. It does however smell like the meditative temples of India. It is comforting, relaxing, and soothing. I would have liked more oppoponax, but I guess MPG can go for gold next time.

Another example

Original Vetiver (Creed) ★ unoriginal woody
Deserves some sort of prize for managing to make whatever vetiver it
contains almost imperceptible.
LT

Where is the perfume analysis capacity here? Information about notes, accords, colors, volume...? Longevity, sillage? Any historical data or useful information? If this review, instead of being signed by Luca Turin and appearing in a book had been signed by Tuca Lurín and published in Basenotes, what would readers think of it?

In return, a review of Varanis Ridari (Basenotes, Jul 16, 2019)

Creed Original Vetiver (2004) is indeed an original take on vetiver, but unfortunately not really that much of an original fragrance. What you effectively get here is a fresh, soapy, eau de cologne style bolstered with the green grassy demeanor of Haitian vetiver, rather than a vetiver-focused scent. As noted by myself and likely others, stronger eau de toilette and eau de parfum interpretations of the classic neroli eau de cologne style seemed to have been all the rage among perfume houses in the late 90's through mid 2000's, most of such examples being niche or luxury in nature. Original Vetiver received most of its intial negative press as a replacement for the well-loved Creed Vétiver (1948?), which itself was a more-direct vetiver scent, but over time Original Vetiver has proven its merits.

The opening of Original Vetiver is a hit of dry bergamot and orange with that vetiver note right out front, grassy and fresh. The vetiver soon steps behind the curtain after this initial showing, letting a clean soapy iris and light orange blossom set up the heart. The vetiver comes and goes through an exceptional French-milled savon accord that will appeal greatly to fans of soapy fragrances or iris/orris lovers in general, meaning wearers of Paco Rabanne Pour Homme (1973) or Penhaligon's Castile (1998) should take note. There is a bit of dirtiness in the base thanks to ginger, musk, and that salty/earthy warmth of ambergris Creed loves, but this interplay is slight. I don't get any sandalwood like some breakdowns suggest, but there is a touch of oakmoss and some kind of woody aroma which is probably synthetic but works well in the overall mix. Sillage is moderate but longevity is appreciable, as I've come to expect from Creed. Wear this anytime, as something this clean and versatile is to me a true generalist scent for nearly anyone.

This stuff won't turn heads like Aventus (2010) and doesn't scream masculinity like Bois du Portugal (1987), but for fans of Creed's fresher offerings like Green Irish Tweed (1985) or Royal Water (1997), this is a good addition. Of course, a bottle of Mugler Cologne (2001) will get you in roughly the same shape minus the vetiver for a whole lot less, but you won't find this specific combination of values anywhere else without really digging, so it's worth seeking out if the price happens to be right. One thing's for sure, Original Vetiver actually delivers what it promises, unlike Original Santal (2005) and all of its unrepentant cynicism. MSRP is of course nuts, but as one of the lesser-hyped and least-discussed modern Creeds out there, Original Vetiver comes up at good discount prices more than some of their heavier hitters in the market. Thumbs up!

Another example here

Bright Crystal (Versace) ★ nasty floral
Hideously screechy. LT

Where is the perfume analysis capacity here? Information about notes, accords, colors, volume...? Longevity, sillage? Any historical data or useful information? If this review, instead of being signed by Luca Turin and appearing in a book had been signed by Tuca Lurín and published in Basenotes, what would readers think of it?

In return, a review of Kain (Basenotes Jun 2, 2014)

A pleasant and charming feminine fragrance which is mostly on the generic and common road but it's a good one.
The opening is semi fresh citrusy and fruity scent mixed with some floral and some sweetness in the background.
The citrus in the opening isn't very bright and so fresh like summer fragrances. it's just there, right behind the fruity scent to give it a fresh aroma. you can easily smell the freshness of the citrus.
The fruity smell which is the main note of the fragrance in the beginning, smell fresh because of the yuzu note and it almost smell like peach, but when you take a look at note breakdown you will see it's pomegranate that smell really close to peach.
I believe there is pepper note in this fragrance which is not in the note breakdown but I've smelt it.
It's not that strong, it's just there to give the scent just a small kick!
In the dry down the citrusy scent in gone and floral and sweetness come in front and push the fruity note in the background.
The mid and the base are almost the same and there is no big difference between them.
The mid and base note is very common to the nose. The simple sweet floral scent is a very common in women fragrances and this one has it too.
Both projection and longevity is really good. no problem at all.

Etc
Etc

In my country it is often said: "unos se llevan la fama y otros cardan la lana", which would come to mean (simplifying) "some do all the work and others take the credit."

 

[imm0rtelle]

If you consider that these types of reviews are misleading because they do not focus to "analyzing the real aroma" and focus only on partially regurgitating the notes and comments of the brand, then you are inferring that the notes of a perfume or the information that we can find of it coming from the brand is mostly a pack of lies, which doesn't say much about the industry itself, by the way.

The marketing team is definitely trying to influence the perception of the brand's fragrances with very targeted notes. I always laugh a bit when reviewers think there are only 3 notes in a fragrance because the brand only lists 1 note for the top, middle, and base.

Fragrances are largely composed of aromachemicals, and most consumers have zero clue what the aroma chemicals smell like, so the marketing team uses some creative interpretation which may mislead the consumer into smelling phantom notes.

Ashley is a classically trained perfumer from ISIPCA, and currently works as an apprentice perfumer at Givaudan.

 

[Rodolfo]

The marketing team is definitely trying to influence the perception of the brand's fragrances with very targeted notes. I always laugh a bit when reviewers think there are only 3 notes in a fragrance because the brand only lists 1 note for the top, middle, and base.

Fragrances are largely composed of aromachemicals, and most consumers have zero clue what the aroma chemicals smell like, so the marketing team uses some creative interpretation which may mislead the consumer into smelling phantom notes.

Yes that's how it is. As I said before I am not going to discuss that because it is a common tactic of the big brands that can lead to mislead or "olfactory pareidolias". However I suppose that some brands will be more "imaginative" than others when it comes to selling the image of a perfume. But in any case I prefer not to discuss these issues, after all we are in a free market and customers also have the last word when buying a perfume or not, after all we are in a free market that in many ways seems to involve very effective highly misleading or ambiguous marketing tactics for upstart or uninformed customers.

 

[the_good_life]

By the way, does anybody here have evidence that perfume reviews have any noticeable effect on perfume sales in the mass market? I would wager they have zero. While bloggers - for a while - and perhaps some influencers may have (had) an impact on the standing of small scale producers working in the 500 bottle range, not even 5000 basenotes reviews on the vile nature of dior sauvage would have any impact on aspirational young consumers bathing in oceans of that swill (sorry to all fans). Basenotes, parfumo etc. are hobbyist communities and as a cultural historian I would point out that many perfume reviews on a site like (German) parfumo.de are a means of creative self-actualization (like fan fiction) that have nothing to do with a review in the conventional sense. In fact, we could start a whole thread on the various genres of reviews. Which does not contradict the fact that the industry will try to use perfume sites as a marketing platform as part of their social media strategy.

 

[the_good_life]

Interesting point. I'd like to hear more on this. How do you think it would have gone without the internet? What do you think niche would be without it/beholden to commercialism?

My thesis on niche is that it evolved in the mid-70s as a response to the accelerating expansion and democratization of mainstream perfumery and the simultaneous social processes of individualization creating numerous milieus, rather than broad classes, and it catered to various financially potent of these new milieus that were seeking new means of cultural distinction through consumption. That formed the basis of early Creed (a pioneer in that respect), L'Artisan Parfumeur and later Lutens and all the others. They've been gobbled up by industry giants and now cover the spectrum ranging from "masstige" to "oligarch fodder" for the new plutocracy with lots of money and no refined taste (nouveau riche, like late 19th century American robber barons or wealthy Chinese and Russians today). Cultural elites have moved on to artisan perfumers like pioneer DSH, Slumberhouse and whatnot. Internet was never key to niche in the way that it is to the latter, it worked through high end department stores, glossy magazines and traditional luxury marketing strategies (Creed were great at this kind of word-of-mouth PR, name-dropping and journalistic hackwork).

 

[slpfrsly]

It seems to me a very bold and inelegant comment. The people who write reviews on internet are people just like you and me, and mentioning that 95% of the reviews of a fragrance that you have read are misleading means calling most of them a bunch of deceitful or fakers, whether this is intentional or the product of "ignorance" or the influence of "groupthink".

I don't think it's particularly bold, it's just an honest assessment. A lot of people are not comfortable with honestly held beliefs in the present day, for a variety of reasons, not least the culture of postmodernity and a general apathetic acceptance of the notion that nothing is real. To have conviction seems alien and also 'problematic' to some people, particularly those who embraced a life of ironic detachment. It's understandable why this would be the case. Frankly, I've encountered this throughout my life and cannot see it changing any time soon. What you see as bold I see as normal and innate. You may think it's inelegant but dishonest pandering and fawning is far more inelegant in my opinion and I encounter this regularly. It seems like it is now a common part of modern life, a downstream consequence of the change of culture and who shapes it. I feel it partly stems from the pervasive normalisation of branding and advertising, to the point it becomes normal to overstate/understate things in the course of meeting a material objective. As a result, just being honest and matter of fact can feel disorienting if you're not used to it. To mind mind, however, telling the truth should just be a very basic standard in life and that's what I have done. If you dislike what I say, disliking it on the grounds of what you perceive as inelegance doesn't hold much stock unfortunately - not least because I don't think you have quite grasped what I am saying. You misunderstand that I am describing a phenomenon (online reviewing) which is unhelpful in misleading people, as well as socially and culturally relevant to how people interact with computational technology. Is it inelegant to point this out? Certainly, no more inelegant than to claim someone is inelegant for being bold! What I have said is fair and as far as I can tell absolutely true. It is relevant to this thread, which is asking whether sharing and 'consuming' information in a particular way is a net negative or not. You've chosen to interpret my point about a fragrance (for clarity, D&G Light Blue Forever) having mostly misleading reviews as an accusation of deceitfulness on the part of the people writing the reviews. But this is not the case. I did not say that. You are accusing me of claiming something I did not claim. Groupthink is something quite different and eliding the phenomenon with intentional and knowing dishonesty is not a fair or accurate thing to do.

What happens is that behind all theory there is practice, and to show us all here the reasons why you believe that you should show us the reviews of that fragrance (or the link where they can be read), also attaching your own review. This way you can show us these 95% of misleading reviews, the 5% that are not and yours, and discuss about it.
If not, some will think that what you are doing is only reinforcing a preconceived idea that you now have, fresh, latent and powerful, about how negative and misleading online perfume reviews are, which is curiously the same thing that you are criticizing in that 95% of people who follow the preconceived ideas of the brand or the notes of a perfume to the letter.

I wrote hundreds of lengthy reviews on fragrantica before my account was deleted. I have not said what I have from a position of ignorance. I have said before but I will repeat for you that almost no-one was reviewing fragrances on that platform like I was - for good and bad. I tried to write reviews in a way that was informative and useful to people reading, knowing what was important to communicate (and what wasn't). I would regularly receive private messages from users on that site thanking me for a review I wrote for one reason or another (often for practical reasons i.e. understanding a fragrance, or convincing them to buy/not to buy a fragrance). Having spent a few years doing this, engaging with the various platforms, and using them to direct my own search for fragrance samples, it became obvious to me that there was a problem with the reviews on fragrantica and youtube in particular and I have recently put some thoughts down about that elsewhere. I have done this for the simple fact that misleading reviews and the 'social' side of online OPINION-giving is not cost free. It costs people time and money. Any other motivation you are ascribing to me is fanciful. Feel free to read what I wrote about oversocialised reviewing and respond to its points if you like, instead of what you're doing here. The rest of your comment is not really relevant, it's a straw effigy that you're mistaking for my motivation.

On the other hand I guess that 5% is anecdotal since you only associate it with a specific fragrance. However it gives me the feeling that the belief you hold is general, and that by default most of the reviews on internet you think they are misleading.
Since it was you who mentioned percentages, I ask you: in general terms, what percentage of average reviews do you consider negative or misleading for example in Basenotes? More than 50%? 90%?

I see this as a distraction. Why would I need to provide these figures for you? A single review by a single reviewer can contain both useful and misleading information. In fact, that's often the case with many reviews. You're asking me to quantify something (the percentage of 'average reviews' written on the internet that are misleading) fully aware that to give a numerical answer would be extremely time consuming to do. Or would you be satisfied with a best guess? In any case, what would this change? Would you accept such a figure if I provided it? You seem to have an issue with the idea that 95% of reviews on fragrantica for a certain fragrance were misleading, without even knowing the fragrance I was referring to. I think this is little more than an attempt to trip me up: "see, you can't provide the numbers, therefore what you are saying is not factualy, empirically true. It is not THE SCIENCE so it cannot be THE OPINION" and so on. I don't like that, I don't like being invited to play these sort of games. Not having statistics to back me up does not invalidate my assessment in the slightest.

If you consider that these types of reviews are misleading because they do not focus to "analyzing the real aroma" and focus only on partially regurgitating the notes and comments of the brand, then you are inferring that the notes of a perfume or the information that we can find of it coming from the brand is mostly a pack of lies, which doesn't say much about the industry itself, by the way.
I am not going to discuss this. But I see a parallel between the perfumes that come out on the market and the reviews that are published on the web: they proliferate more and more and are of very very variable quality and density. I think it's great! We may not have any decision-making capacity in relation to which perfumes are launched on the market and which ones disappear, but at least we have the ability to choose between what is available, which is something. And seems to me to be something positive. I think Winston Churchill said: “Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others.”

No, this is wrong. I have not inferred that notes are "a pack of lies". I also wonder if you have gone off the deep end because you have simply misunderstood what I have written. There is a hyperlink in your first reply which leads to a translation website and you have mixed up infer with imply. I can only assume you are not a native English speaker? Obviously that's not a problem but as you are ascribing thoughts and opinions to me that I do not have, it might be good to clarify with me what I mean rather than building a strawman of my opinions instead.

Whatever the case may be, you should have sought clarification for what I mean rather than leaping head first in to this type of comment. The fact remains that the vast majority of reviews do not review the aroma in any great detail; to my mind, they also fail to explain various facets of the fragrance that would be informative as per my expectations. Some reviews may manage to achieve some of these things, but it is usually only the bloggers (and only the best ones at that) who manage to meet all these things on a regular basis. Given there are some people who write reviews for years and years on fragrantica and basenotes and still fail to meet what I would think are fairly basic standards, that reinforces my assessment that the value of an anonymous online reviewer (an 'average' one, even) is limited at best given the resulting negative consequences. I will repeat again: I have gone in to detail why this is in another thread and if you want to respond to the points made there, feel free to do so. You can disagree, that's absolutely fine. I disagree that the increasing number of mediocre and samey fragrances is a good thing. I think it's a fundamental sign of decline - again, some (seemingly most) people disagree with this, at least on this website. That's not a problem, if people choose to discuss this or respond to me then I'll have a discussion with them. I have absolutely no problem - zero, none - with someone disagreeing or holding an alternative view. What I don't understand is this need to try to shut people down if they have a different opinion, but it's something I'm running in to more and more on here. It's not cricket. The political quote is irrelevant and also far from true. Britain was (and still is) a constitutional monarchy and parliamentary democracy during Churchill's life. There are many things to say about that, and about Churchill himself, but as this sort of thing is off topic for this forum I won't continue down that road.

Let's look at some examples of Turin's capabilities as a perfume reviewer.

Or des Indes (Maître Parfumeur et Gantier) ★ ★ ★ classic oriental
MPG does Shalimar. Get Shalimar. LT

Where is the perfume analysis capacity here? Information about notes, accords, colors, volume...? Longevity, sillage? Any historical data or useful information? If this review, instead of being signed by Luca Turin and appearing in a book had been signed by Tuca Lurín and published in Basenotes, what would readers think of it?

In return, a review of zztopp (Basenotes, Feb 19, 2007):

Notes:bergamot, lavender, geranium, oppoponax, sandalwood, amber, vanillaOr Des Indes (ODI or "Gold of India") is a suprising title for a fragrance. What is MPG trying to recreate here? The smell of gold after it has been transported through the harsh streets of Calcutta? Or is it ridiculing the fact that India is the largest consumer of gold despite the fact that 75% of the population lives below the poverty line? Whatever the reason, lets go onto the review!ODI opens with an orangey yet tart combination of bergamot and lavender before unraveling into a pungent, bitter and sweet aroma. Oppoponax is the main star here, and it displays its supposed spiritual cleansing and demon vanquishing powers with full force. Unfortunately, this phase doesnt last as long as I wanted it to, but the sensual comforting drydown of sandalwood and amber with that trademark metallic twinge present in so many MPG drydowns provides a fitting finish to a smooth and rich display of fragrance notes. I dont find it to be overly powdery, and it can easily be classified unisex.Or Des Indes smells nothing like gold - dont let the name scare you away. It doesnt smell chemical-ly like a lot of bling bling. It does however smell like the meditative temples of India. It is comforting, relaxing, and soothing. I would have liked more oppoponax, but I guess MPG can go for gold next time.

The medium is the message. I have touched on this elsewhere, and how a written book is a moment in time that achieves one thing, and an online review that can be redacted over time is another. Once again, I am going to suggest you go to the thread where I give my thoughts on Turin relative to forum reviews. That way you will know what I actually think.

As for this sort of thing ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ do you consider this a fair comparison between the 'average' review from both Turin and internet fora? Have you chosen the strongest examples you could find from both basenotes and Turin? Regardless, Turin manages to do something in 3 words that zztopp (with no ill feeling towards him/her) does not do: he compares it to another fragrance. Importantly, Turin compares it to a fragrance in a way that implies something about the audience for his book (that they will know Shalimar; thus they are already fairly well versed in perfumery, and that this is a short, coherent way of conveying a fundamental facet of a fragrance relative to space on the page). So, Turin is clearly not laying claim to a universal audience, nor trying to emphatically evaluate the fragrance in every way. He is specific and obviously, deliberately limited in his analysis of certain fragrances. However, Turin does somehing that zztop (agian, with all due respect) does not. When I said above that most reviews fail to meet at least some of the various standards that I tried to meet when writing reviews, and would like to read when reading a review by someone else, one of those things was comparing it (usefully, accurately) to other fragrances. It can convey a fundamental essence of the scent, or perhaps it shares aromachemicals or accords, or maybe there is a more conceptual link between them. There are many reasons for comparing one fragrance to another and it can also go a long way to communicating 'what' the fragrance is to the reader. Unintentionally, you have helped to prove my point. Turin is by no means authoratative, nor the final word or the first resource one would go to to read about fragrance. But in 3 words he has done something that another review didn't in a whole paragraph. Consider this.

Turin has immense value and I won't repeat why that is. Instead, I invite you to show me a forum review that manages to provide the sort of information Turin did in his Secret of Scent video series (I highly recommend it for anyone who hasn't watched it - I also highly recommend paying him for it, as this is the kind of exclusivity I believe offers an alternative to the problem of oversocialised and socially-incentivised online reviewing).

I have no skin in the game here and am by no means a Turin 'fanatic' but I'll share the link to pay to watch the rest of the series for anyone who wishes to do so: https://vimeo.com/ondemand/297742

Another example

Original Vetiver (Creed) ★ unoriginal woody
Deserves some sort of prize for managing to make whatever vetiver it
contains almost imperceptible.
LT

Where is the perfume analysis capacity here? Information about notes, accords, colors, volume...? Longevity, sillage? Any historical data or useful information? If this review, instead of being signed by Luca Turin and appearing in a book had been signed by Tuca Lurín and published in Basenotes, what would readers think of it?

In return, a review of Varanis Ridari (Basenotes, Jul 16, 2019)

Creed Original Vetiver (2004) is indeed an original take on vetiver, but unfortunately not really that much of an original fragrance. What you effectively get here is a fresh, soapy, eau de cologne style bolstered with the green grassy demeanor of Haitian vetiver, rather than a vetiver-focused scent. As noted by myself and likely others, stronger eau de toilette and eau de parfum interpretations of the classic neroli eau de cologne style seemed to have been all the rage among perfume houses in the late 90's through mid 2000's, most of such examples being niche or luxury in nature. Original Vetiver received most of its intial negative press as a replacement for the well-loved Creed Vétiver (1948?), which itself was a more-direct vetiver scent, but over time Original Vetiver has proven its merits.

The opening of Original Vetiver is a hit of dry bergamot and orange with that vetiver note right out front, grassy and fresh. The vetiver soon steps behind the curtain after this initial showing, letting a clean soapy iris and light orange blossom set up the heart. The vetiver comes and goes through an exceptional French-milled savon accord that will appeal greatly to fans of soapy fragrances or iris/orris lovers in general, meaning wearers of Paco Rabanne Pour Homme (1973) or Penhaligon's Castile (1998) should take note. There is a bit of dirtiness in the base thanks to ginger, musk, and that salty/earthy warmth of ambergris Creed loves, but this interplay is slight. I don't get any sandalwood like some breakdowns suggest, but there is a touch of oakmoss and some kind of woody aroma which is probably synthetic but works well in the overall mix. Sillage is moderate but longevity is appreciable, as I've come to expect from Creed. Wear this anytime, as something this clean and versatile is to me a true generalist scent for nearly anyone.

This stuff won't turn heads like Aventus (2010) and doesn't scream masculinity like Bois du Portugal (1987), but for fans of Creed's fresher offerings like Green Irish Tweed (1985) or Royal Water (1997), this is a good addition. Of course, a bottle of Mugler Cologne (2001) will get you in roughly the same shape minus the vetiver for a whole lot less, but you won't find this specific combination of values anywhere else without really digging, so it's worth seeking out if the price happens to be right. One thing's for sure, Original Vetiver actually delivers what it promises, unlike Original Santal (2005) and all of its unrepentant cynicism. MSRP is of course nuts, but as one of the lesser-hyped and least-discussed modern Creeds out there, Original Vetiver comes up at good discount prices more than some of their heavier hitters in the market. Thumbs up!

Another example here

Bright Crystal (Versace) ★ nasty floral
Hideously screechy. LT

Where is the perfume analysis capacity here? Information about notes, accords, colors, volume...? Longevity, sillage? Any historical data or useful information? If this review, instead of being signed by Luca Turin and appearing in a book had been signed by Tuca Lurín and published in Basenotes, what would readers think of it?

In return, a review of Kain (Basenotes Jun 2, 2014)

A pleasant and charming feminine fragrance which is mostly on the generic and common road but it's a good one.
The opening is semi fresh citrusy and fruity scent mixed with some floral and some sweetness in the background.
The citrus in the opening isn't very bright and so fresh like summer fragrances. it's just there, right behind the fruity scent to give it a fresh aroma. you can easily smell the freshness of the citrus.
The fruity smell which is the main note of the fragrance in the beginning, smell fresh because of the yuzu note and it almost smell like peach, but when you take a look at note breakdown you will see it's pomegranate that smell really close to peach.
I believe there is pepper note in this fragrance which is not in the note breakdown but I've smelt it.
It's not that strong, it's just there to give the scent just a small kick!
In the dry down the citrusy scent in gone and floral and sweetness come in front and push the fruity note in the background.
The mid and the base are almost the same and there is no big difference between them.
The mid and base note is very common to the nose. The simple sweet floral scent is a very common in women fragrances and this one has it too.
Both projection and longevity is really good. no problem at all.

I see similar and additional issues in the above reviews but I will not pick them apart. For what it's worth, both reviews are decent. I'm not trying to belittle them, or suggest there is nothing positive about this manner of sharing information. When making these sort of discursive topics, I have deliberately avoided referring to specific reviews, posters, or posts for the simple fact that to do so could be misinterpreted as deliberately targeting someone. However, if you go line by line through those reviews, there are things to query, or perceive as lacking, and pieces of information that are simply incorrect. The point remains about Turin and your decision not to steelman his analysis of perfumery.

This, again, is one of the problems with online reviewing: what is the consequence for getting things wrong? What is the consequence for posting incorrect or misleading information? It is deferred from the writer(s) of the review(s) and the cost is paid by the person who takes the review(s) at face value: again, as I said earlier, in time and money. By taking the review at face value and trusting the information within it. It is not a cost free exercise, and this is why I started this thread. When you weigh up the costs and the benefits, what comes out on top?

You may think you are simply defending online reviewers, which may seem a noble thing to do. But in doing so, and ascribing motivations to me that I do not harbour instead of clarifying what I actually think or have posted elsewhere, you are also avoiding the negative consequences that come from this democratised and collectivised sharing and engagement with information. I hope this post has cleared this up. It should now be much easier to have a discussion about the actual thread topic if you wish to do so i.e. whether all of this has been a net positive or a net negative.

 

[Rodolfo]

I don't think it's particularly bold, it's just an honest assessment. A lot of people are not comfortable with honestly held beliefs in the present day, for a variety of reasons, not least the culture of postmodernity and a general apathetic acceptance of the notion that nothing is real. To have conviction seems alien and also 'problematic' to some people, particularly those who embraced a life of ironic detachment. It's understandable why this would be the case. Frankly, I've encountered this throughout my life and cannot see it changing any time soon. What you see as bold I see as normal and innate. You may think it's inelegant but dishonest pandering and fawning is far more inelegant in my opinion and I encounter this regularly. It seems like it is now a common part of modern life, a downstream consequence of the change of culture and who shapes it. I feel it partly stems from the pervasive normalisation of branding and advertising, to the point it becomes normal to overstate/understate things in the course of meeting a material objective. As a result, just being honest and matter of fact can feel disorienting if you're not used to it. To mind mind, however, telling the truth should just be a very basic standard in life and that's what I have done. If you dislike what I say, disliking it on the grounds of what you perceive as inelegance doesn't hold much stock unfortunately - not least because I don't think you have quite grasped what I am saying. You misunderstand that I am describing a phenomenon (online reviewing) which is unhelpful in misleading people, as well as socially and culturally relevant to how people interact with computational technology. Is it inelegant to point this out? Certainly, no more inelegant than to claim someone is inelegant for being bold! What I have said is fair and as far as I can tell absolutely true. It is relevant to this thread, which is asking whether sharing and 'consuming' information in a particular way is a net negative or not. You've chosen to interpret my point about a fragrance (for clarity, D&G Light Blue Forever) having mostly misleading reviews as an accusation of deceitfulness on the part of the people writing the reviews. But this is not the case. I did not say that. You are accusing me of claiming something I did not claim. Groupthink is something quite different and eliding the phenomenon with intentional and knowing dishonesty is not a fair or accurate thing to do.


I wrote hundreds of lengthy reviews on fragrantica before my account was deleted. I have not said what I have from a position of ignorance. I have said before but I will repeat for you that almost no-one was reviewing fragrances on that platform like I was - for good and bad. I tried to write reviews in a way that was informative and useful to people reading, knowing what was important to communicate (and what wasn't). I would regularly receive private messages from users on that site thanking me for a review I wrote for one reason or another (often for practical reasons i.e. understanding a fragrance, or convincing them to buy/not to buy a fragrance). Having spent a few years doing this, engaging with the various platforms, and using them to direct my own search for fragrance samples, it became obvious to me that there was a problem with the reviews on fragrantica and youtube in particular and I have recently put some thoughts down about that elsewhere. I have done this for the simple fact that misleading reviews and the 'social' side of online OPINION-giving is not cost free. It costs people time and money. Any other motivation you are ascribing to me is fanciful. Feel free to read what I wrote about oversocialised reviewing and respond to its points if you like, instead of what you're doing here. The rest of your comment is not really relevant, it's a straw effigy that you're mistaking for my motivation.


I see this as a distraction. Why would I need to provide these figures for you? A single review by a single reviewer can contain both useful and misleading information. In fact, that's often the case with many reviews. You're asking me to quantify something (the percentage of 'average reviews' written on the internet that are misleading) fully aware that to give a numerical answer would be extremely time consuming to do. Or would you be satisfied with a best guess? In any case, what would this change? Would you accept such a figure if I provided it? You seem to have an issue with the idea that 95% of reviews on fragrantica for a certain fragrance were misleading, without even knowing the fragrance I was referring to. I think this is little more than an attempt to trip me up: "see, you can't provide the numbers, therefore what you are saying is not factualy, empirically true. It is not THE SCIENCE so it cannot be THE OPINION" and so on. I don't like that, I don't like being invited to play these sort of games. Not having statistics to back me up does not invalidate my assessment in the slightest.


No, this is wrong. I have not inferred that notes are "a pack of lies". I also wonder if you have gone off the deep end because you have simply misunderstood what I have written. There is a hyperlink in your first reply which leads to a translation website and you have mixed up infer with imply. I can only assume you are not a native English speaker? Obviously that's not a problem but as you are ascribing thoughts and opinions to me that I do not have, it might be good to clarify with me what I mean rather than building a strawman of my opinions instead.

Whatever the case may be, you should have sought clarification for what I mean rather than leaping head first in to this type of comment. The fact remains that the vast majority of reviews do not review the aroma in any great detail; to my mind, they also fail to explain various facets of the fragrance that would be informative as per my expectations. Some reviews may manage to achieve some of these things, but it is usually only the bloggers (and only the best ones at that) who manage to meet all these things on a regular basis. Given there are some people who write reviews for years and years on fragrantica and basenotes and still fail to meet what I would think are fairly basic standards, that reinforces my assessment that the value of an anonymous online reviewer (an 'average' one, even) is limited at best given the resulting negative consequences. I will repeat again: I have gone in to detail why this is in another thread and if you want to respond to the points made there, feel free to do so. You can disagree, that's absolutely fine. I disagree that the increasing number of mediocre and samey fragrances is a good thing. I think it's a fundamental sign of decline - again, some (seemingly most) people disagree with this, at least on this website. That's not a problem, if people choose to discuss this or respond to me then I'll have a discussion with them. I have absolutely no problem - zero, none - with someone disagreeing or holding an alternative view. What I don't understand is this need to try to shut people down if they have a different opinion, but it's something I'm running in to more and more on here. It's not cricket. The political quote is irrelevant and also far from true. Britain was (and still is) a constitutional monarchy and parliamentary democracy during Churchill's life. There are many things to say about that, and about Churchill himself, but as this sort of thing is off topic for this forum I won't continue down that road.


The medium is the message. I have touched on this elsewhere, and how a written book is a moment in time that achieves one thing, and an online review that can be redacted over time is another. Once again, I am going to suggest you go to the thread where I give my thoughts on Turin relative to forum reviews. That way you will know what I actually think.

As for this sort of thing ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ do you consider this a fair comparison between the 'average' review from both Turin and internet fora? Have you chosen the strongest examples you could find from both basenotes and Turin? Regardless, Turin manages to do something in 3 words that zztopp (with no ill feeling towards him/her) does not do: he compares it to another fragrance. Importantly, Turin compares it to a fragrance in a way that implies something about the audience for his book (that they will know Shalimar; thus they are already fairly well versed in perfumery, and that this is a short, coherent way of conveying a fundamental facet of a fragrance relative to space on the page). So, Turin is clearly not laying claim to a universal audience, nor trying to emphatically evaluate the fragrance in every way. He is specific and obviously, deliberately limited in his analysis of certain fragrances. However, Turin does somehing that zztop (agian, with all due respect) does not. When I said above that most reviews fail to meet at least some of the various standards that I tried to meet when writing reviews, and would like to read when reading a review by someone else, one of those things was comparing it (usefully, accurately) to other fragrances. It can convey a fundamental essence of the scent, or perhaps it shares aromachemicals or accords, or maybe there is a more conceptual link between them. There are many reasons for comparing one fragrance to another and it can also go a long way to communicating 'what' the fragrance is to the reader. Unintentionally, you have helped to prove my point. Turin is by no means authoratative, nor the final word or the first resource one would go to to read about fragrance. But in 3 words he has done something that another review didn't in a whole paragraph. Consider this.

Turin has immense value and I won't repeat why that is. Instead, I invite you to show me a forum review that manages to provide the sort of information Turin did in his Secret of Scent video series (I highly recommend it for anyone who hasn't watched it - I also highly recommend paying him for it, as this is the kind of exclusivity I believe offers an alternative to the problem of oversocialised and socially-incentivised online reviewing).

I have no skin in the game here and am by no means a Turin 'fanatic' but I'll share the link to pay to watch the rest of the series for anyone who wishes to do so: https://vimeo.com/ondemand/297742


I see similar and additional issues in the above reviews but I will not pick them apart. For what it's worth, both reviews are decent. I'm not trying to belittle them, or suggest there is nothing positive about this manner of sharing information. When making these sort of discursive topics, I have deliberately avoided referring to specific reviews, posters, or posts for the simple fact that to do so could be misinterpreted as deliberately targeting someone. However, if you go line by line through those reviews, there are things to query, or perceive as lacking, and pieces of information that are simply incorrect. The point remains about Turin and your decision not to steelman his analysis of perfumery.

This, again, is one of the problems with online reviewing: what is the consequence for getting things wrong? What is the consequence for posting incorrect or misleading information? It is deferred from the writer(s) of the review(s) and the cost is paid by the person who takes the review(s) at face value: again, as I said earlier, in time and money. By taking the review at face value and trusting the information within it. It is not a cost free exercise, and this is why I started this thread. When you weigh up the costs and the benefits, what comes out on top?

You may think you are simply defending online reviewers, which may seem a noble thing to do. But in doing so, and ascribing motivations to me that I do not harbour instead of clarifying what I actually think or have posted elsewhere, you are also avoiding the negative consequences that come from this democratised and collectivised sharing and engagement with information. I hope this post has cleared this up. It should now be much easier to have a discussion about the actual thread topic if you wish to do so i.e. whether all of this has been a net positive or a net negative.

Oddly enough, there are a lot of honest people around here. You're not the only one, and you don't need to stress how honest you are because I already count on it. What happens is your opinion is one more opinion, like mine, which I respect. I never said that I didn't like your comment. It seems to me an inelegant comment because you are mentioning some reviews that are not an autonomous entity, they do not appear on the internet by spontaneous combustion, they come from different people like you and me. So you are alluding to all those people and criticizing their reviews without them even being able to defend themselves. And that strikes me as very inelegant.

And I do not consider this to be an interpretation, you have said it:

"I think that 95% of the reviews I read prior to smelling it were actively misleading in that they didn't/couldn't analyze the actual scent and instead analyzed and reinforced the idea of it (partly the given 'notes', partly I wonder if the govt-enforced shutdowns have played a part in this, attracting more novices to perfume who are more likely to simply repeat what other people have already said as a means of fitting in rather than standing out (particularly in a 'bad' way".

If you write that 95% of the reviews are misleading and that they are not dedicated to analyzing the fragrance itself, you are implicitly calling the owners of those reviews fakers OR ignorant OR highly suggestible people.
And if I were part of those 95% of people (percentage given by you) I would not feel good, so to speak, and I would kindly ask you to explain to me and to others what are the reasons why you have come to that belief, and what better way to do it than publishing these reviews here highlighting that 95% of misleading reviews, that 5% of not misleading reviews and your review.
If you don't and you also consider this suggestion as a "distraction maneuver"? Well, the facts speak for themselves.

Don't change things up. You were the first to use percentages here, so talk it over with yourself. What is very easy to do online is throw the stone and hide the hand. Be bold and courageous and illustrate your point of view, your words, with the example that you mentioned with the 95% of misleading reviews that you mentioned: enlighten us. Perhaps ignorant people like me will learn something and you can point out the misleading points that each Light Blue review has.

Why do not you do it? Distraction maneuver, the rest of your comment is not really relevant, etc.. claptrap!! Be consistent with your words and expose what you have to expose to prove your cause, at least out of respect for the people you've mentioned.

The 95% of reviews are misleading = they didn't/couldn't analyze the actual scent
The 95% of reviews = instead, they analyzed and reinforced the idea of if (given notes/branding)

Is this what you say, right? So, would it be fair to say that given notes and branding ideas are basically a misleading concept? It is a simple question. Yes or no. If not, please explain it to me because I don't understand.

On the other hand, I also believe that Turin has immense value. I don't dispute that. It has an incalculable value, especially for the ability it has had to reach the public. But his reviews, as reviews, are nothing special. In terms of analysis, information, historical details, extension, etc... these are reviews that many people here at Basenotes could write, and many of them could improve.
That I have implicitly chosen a few examples to strengthen my point of view? Of course, I'm not an idiot. But it was because I could. The reviews of Varanis Ridari in Basenotes for example, are uniform and homogeneous. He uses the same tools to build each review, which Turin does not. He cares. Dispatch in 5 words a review of a perfume with 3 stars is really a comfort for the reviewer and a quasi enigma for the reader/buyer.

This is the point of view I wanted to show. Many of the Turin reviews are post-it notes. There is never any mention of the longevity of a fragrance, its sillage, its development. I don't know if it's true but it seems that some of his reviews are made by smelling a paper strip. In Basenotes there are people who make reviews after wearing a fragrance for weeks and under very different situations. Regardless of the content of the reviews, I find that approach more reliable.

Medium is different and online reviews cannot be compared with those of a book since the former have a longer gestation period? Yes, it surely is. However, in the Turin book I find reviews of 5-6 paragraphs as well. Why didn't he do the same with all the reviews to the delight of the readers? Time, right? Time is money. I understand. However, in this way it gives the feeling that the reviewer has favorite perfumes beforehand and focuses on these and not on the others.

Whether you like it or not, we have a certain level of freedom of expression. That means that illustrious thinkers like you, as well as ignorant upstarts or idiots, can express themselves freely, while respecting people and the forms of decorum. Which sometimes has negative consequences? Of course. That is the cost of such a privilege. But in my opinion, the positive repercussions are more.

Every morning I read 7 different newspapers. And man, there are times when I read the same story in different newspapers and it seems like a different story!

 

[slpfrsly]

Why do not you do it? Distraction maneuver, the rest of your comment is not really relevant, etc.. claptrap!! Be consistent with your words and expose what you have to expose to prove your cause, at least out of respect for the people you've mentioned.

This is where I stopped reading your comment. You're making things up and arguing with yourself. I told you 4 times to read what I actually said if you wanted to know what I think instead of making your own version up and belittling it. I'm not entertaining this sort of missive if you're just going to write insults and not read what I've written.

 

[slpfrsly]

My thesis on niche is that it evolved in the mid-70s as a response to the accelerating expansion and democratization of mainstream perfumery and the simultaneous social processes of individualization creating numerous milieus, rather than broad classes, and it catered to various financially potent of these new milieus that were seeking new means of cultural distinction through consumption. That formed the basis of early Creed (a pioneer in that respect), L'Artisan Parfumeur and later Lutens and all the others. They've been gobbled up by industry giants and now cover the spectrum ranging from "masstige" to "oligarch fodder" for the new plutocracy with lots of money and no refined taste (nouveau riche, like late 19th century American robber barons or wealthy Chinese and Russians today). Cultural elites have moved on to artisan perfumers like pioneer DSH, Slumberhouse and whatnot. Internet was never key to niche in the way that it is to the latter, it worked through high end department stores, glossy magazines and traditional luxury marketing strategies (Creed were great at this kind of word-of-mouth PR, name-dropping and journalistic hackwork).

Interesting that you think the 70s was the start of niche. It's the 90s to my mind that really got the ball rolling with Lutens, Villoresi, Profumum Roma etc. that forced the likes of Chanel and Dior to respond with their own high end lines. But I suppose the likes of Goutal and L'Artisan were there first, even if the 80s seemed to be about designer branding in a big way. I wonder if you might be making a mistake with Slumberhouse et al. I don't think they are the new 'it' houses and are not like-for-like replacements for niche perfume. They trade on that idea in some sense but, particularly the more recent ones (particularly those that come after Tauer) are a little late to the party given what is also being sold by both niche and designer brands. I don't think they're socially, culturally, economically elitist, nor do they aspire to be in quite the same way that those first niche brands were aiming for something aspirational. In fact, I don't think perfume is elitist at all anymore, but that would be confusing things too much. The likes of Slumberhouse and Tauer are a bit like the Grateful Dead or Ramones; their fans think they're the best, but that's about it. They have a cult following, based on how they brand themselves and offer a particular kind of alternative, but they don't really have much gravitas or appeal outside of that fanbase. The same would go for the oud trend and Ensar, Areej de Dore etc. Of course they have their fans, and their fans think their fragrances are superior to just about everything else. But Gwyneth Paltrow's Goop is much closer to what 'cultural elites' - or, those aspiring to that kind of status - buy because of all the psycho-social-cultural attachments to the product. I also think it's the Byredos, Le Labos, Diptyques of this world that are the brands that appeals to the contemporary socialite (consider the similar branding for all three). And that's because of how they smell. Slumberhouse, Ensar etc - they're not 'elite' perfumes on the basis that they're often not pleasant/easy to wear. But that's getting away from the point. I agree that the indie and artisanal perfumers could not exist without the internet, that is fair. I don't think they would have a customer base without it. It's a good point. I think the discussion then would move on to analysing the perfumes themselves. For me, taking the fragrances as fragrances rather than conceptual products, I don't believe the artisanal brands are better than the niche houses that preceded them.

By the way, does anybody here have evidence that perfume reviews have any noticeable effect on perfume sales in the mass market? I would wager they have zero. While bloggers - for a while - and perhaps some influencers may have (had) an impact on the standing of small scale producers working in the 500 bottle range, not even 5000 basenotes reviews on the vile nature of dior sauvage would have any impact on aspirational young consumers bathing in oceans of that swill (sorry to all fans). Basenotes, parfumo etc. are hobbyist communities and as a cultural historian I would point out that many perfume reviews on a site like (German) parfumo.de are a means of creative self-actualization (like fan fiction) that have nothing to do with a review in the conventional sense. In fact, we could start a whole thread on the various genres of reviews. Which does not contradict the fact that the industry will try to use perfume sites as a marketing platform as part of their social media strategy.

I'm sure it wouldn't be to hard to track but you'd probably need data analysis to do so. The fact fragrantica posts a visual graphic for page clicks on its individual review pages is interesting. One obvious example would be Jeremy Fragrance and Individuel. I remember watching a video a while ago claiming that Jeremy saved it from discontinuation; whether that's true or not, it's not beyond the realm of possibility. It would be interesting to hear something respond to your question with something substantial. I do the internet plays a role - in fact, an important one. Basenotes may not, but I think fragrantica is important. Particularly the reviews and voting. Youtube and Instagram are becoming increasingly important as well. I think there's a distinction between the various platforms; the ones that are more commercially-important are likely going to contain the less specific, less detailed, less enthusiast-led content. The ones on the fringes - like this site, and the others you mention - are, at least in theory, going to be 'better' (and therefore less influential) in comparison.

 

[imm0rtelle]

I wonder if you might be making a mistake with Slumberhouse et al. I don't think they are the new 'it' houses and are not like-for-like replacements for niche perfume. They trade on that idea in some sense but, particularly the more recent ones (particularly those that come after Tauer) are a little late to the party given what is also being sold by both niche and designer brands. I don't think they're socially, culturally, economically elitist, nor do they aspire to be in quite the same way that those first niche brands were aiming for something aspirational. In fact, I don't think perfume is elitist at all anymore, but that would be confusing things too much. The likes of Slumberhouse and Tauer are a bit like the Grateful Dead or Ramones; their fans think they're the best, but that's about it. They have a cult following, based on how they brand themselves and offer a particular kind of alternative, but they don't really have much gravitas or appeal outside of that fanbase. The same would go for the oud trend and Ensar, Areej de Dore etc. Of course they have their fans, and their fans think their fragrances are superior to just about everything else. But Gwyneth Paltrow's Goop is much closer to what 'cultural elites' - or, those aspiring to that kind of status - buy because of all the psycho-social-cultural attachments to the product. I also think it's the Byredos, Le Labos, Diptyques of this world that are the brands that appeals to the contemporary socialite (consider the similar branding for all three). And that's because of how they smell. Slumberhouse, Ensar etc - they're not 'elite' perfumes on the basis that they're often not pleasant/easy to wear.

This is exactly what my gut instincts are telling me, despite not being in the cultural elites class.

 

[slpfrsly]

As this thread has long been dormant, I thought I would share what I think was the original purpose of starting it. Or at least, share the thoughts I can recall as they related to this topic a year or so ago, with whatever insights I've picked up since then as well.

My overwhelming sense was (is) that the loss of visible and reliable authority, and the move towards a democratised or socialised system of opinion-forming, is an overall net negative to both perfumery and the new or prospective fragrance enthusiast.

Democratised reviewing has value primarily in the bulk of opinions; some sort of aggregation of the best contributions can result in something worthy. But this collection of opinions - like any massed crowd - can be redirected by an organised and disciplined leader or influencing force. Think of Jeremy and his memetic power: his phrase "bad boy leather jacket" to describe CH Prive Men was significant to the point you can search for these terms on review sites and see them reiterated by numerous people in their own reviews, even if they are unaware of Jeremy's role in the association.

Professional, 'mainstream' criticism (A.A. Gill, Roger Ebert as examples) has a purpose but only insofar as it is limited: by unique or privileged access to the craft or field, the competence and understanding of the reviewer, and the critic's dedication to honesty over malice/incentive. The modern influencer is unrestricted from these concerns, and is free to shill and grift without complaint from the watching or reading audience if/when the information they receive is misleading or unhelpful. The influencer is never expected, nor can be called upon, to produce high quality or even useful criticism. The bar is so much lower for the influencer than the critic, resulting in a race to the bottom to become a prominent source of information to 'influence' an audience. This has seen Jeremy Fragrance go from engaging, utilitarian reviewer to algorithm-baiting clown; we also have several women who are more than willing to perform a sort of softcore promo girl act to an audience of (primarily) bug-eyed male viewers in order to gain some of the clout and revenue available to the most prominent 'influencers' as well.

The result is that the mass pool of discussion is not only devoid of informed, experienced guidance, but is actively misled by shysters. In its place, for those who are not competing to become a notorious influencer (where there is clearly the kind of money that one could use as their primary income available), we have discussions that meander around different platforms without ever really producing a high quality, immediate or easily accesible set of resources for the newcomer (or indeed the enthusiast). There's lots and lots of content but none of it is particularly useful or immediately comprehensible to the newcomer. And where quality does exist, it has to be considered not just in relation to the dregs of the influencer world, but what a professional critic would/could produce. That is something I'd be willing to flesh out/listen to other opinions on, as I think it's interesting - not least because we have a few examples, like Luca Turin, to use in any evaluation of the best amateur discussion/reviewing/criticism versus a professional.

The online forum - and I don't just mean messageboards, I mean the whole the whole fragrance 'community' in the widest sense; from youtube, to instagram, to review sites, blogs etc - is ultimately hosting all sorts of people doing all sorts of things that are actively distracting and/or misleading for the newly interested enthusiast. That's not to say that's all they're doing, of course. But the following all exist on platforms where, naturally, the newcomer would come for info and/or guidance - and therefore could be misled, denied either incisive commentary or critique, as well as some sort of mentorship or guidance as you might expect. There are people who want to show off their collection, people who post trite commentary that doesn't really help but could confuse (reformulation and discontinuation chat especially!), people flexing with images of their bottles/collection, people using fragrance as a means for other things (enterting an existing hobby/area of interest for social reasons), people who are shilling something, people who want to journal or vlog for an audience, people who want to use it is a vehicle for luxury beliefs, status signalling...the list goes on. None of these are particularly useful or welcoming to the newcomer who wants info of fragrance as opposed to joining in with the virtual social community. It may be a stretch to say that this is a cause for the decline in fragrances from designers and established houses at the top end of the market, but these forums are absolutely responsible for the abundance of new releases - dross, a lot of them - as it's not hard to see how the number of people buying lots of fragrances increases as their use of and exposure to these online spaces increases.

As such, I think the internet produces more negatives than positives. All of this "content" gets in the way, they are hurdles to traverse, rather than help. The sheer quantity of info is good only so far as it allows people to contribute even more information - through discussion, reviewing, influencing etc - and be "part of it all". But for those not contributing - for someone simply wanting to receive useful, to the point, reliable, credible advice, information, and direction - it's impossible to say that the sheer bulk of information is anything but a net negative. To get to 'the good stuff', to find the rare reviewer or voice who is consistently accurate, disinterested, and knowledgeable, takes time and effort that was never previously an issue for the magazine or newspaper reader. The expectation (the necessity) to do the legwork yourself, to hurdle over the guff, to find something that isn't the lowest common denominator or appealing to the median customer (or, related, the target demographic of the influencer/site e.g. the cork-sniffing midwit who can be flattered in to a purchase with florid pretensions of associated glamour or refinement rather than promises of dropped panties), is something that is not only time consuming but also far from guaranteed to lead to something that 'works'. Like people getting lost in the woods who end up retracing their steps over and over rather than charting a course to safety, it's entirely feasible (and observable) that some users will simply get 'stuck' in the system (what I call The Carousel) without ever satisfying what motivated them to approach perfumery in the first place.

And that's because what people are often searching for is not catered to by most online spaces. The internet of social media - the internet as it has existed since the late 2000s - wants to keep people locked in, rather than give them precisely what they're looking for and sending them on their way. Consider the issue basenotes has with attracting/keeping users - this is a bitter irony, as it contains the most useful information and a good collection of the best amateur enthusiasts and perfumers you could find online, but because it is not designed to be part and parcel of this format of trapping people in to consuming content like youtube or facebook or reddit or instagram, the site isn't as profitable as its more-strategic competitors. The painful reality is that the highest quality version of the online forum (basenotes) results in less commercial success than its qualitatively inferior competitors; the higher standard leads to less financial success, in what can only be described as a horrible, twisted inversion of the way things ought to work. There should be a premium to higher quality that is reflected in higher costs/income - but such is the nature of the internet and elitist concerns in the present day, that doesn't translate well to fragrance or a fragrance forum.

I also think that the idea of deference to a collective group encourages learned helplessness and almost guarantees a tragedy of the commons type situation for the would-be enthusiast. In a large community, there's an illusion of there being a great deal of support and therefore guidance - more is de facto better - when in fact it encourages a potential customer to defer to the hive mind and/or the influencer at the point when they would be best placed to strike out for themselves and trust their own innate instincts (this smells good; that smells bad) before bothering to 'learn' anything more substantial. At the same time, the info they receive is necessarily inferior to what you might hope to receive from an authoratative source, simply because there is no standard or limitation stopping someone posting shite.

I'm thinking about the basic mechanics of trying to learn more, develop an understanding, or simply find better fragrances. Where would you go? Youtube, Reddit, Fragrantica, here...where else? Blogs perhaps? On basically all of those sites, you're going to come across problems with receiving what you're looking for because of the existing usership and/or the incentives of the platforms to guide you/information in certain directions. If someone wants to troll by suggesting Spongebob Patrick or, if they want to be even snider, upvote Halston's Z-14 as similar to 1 Million? There's nothing really stopping them. Fancy posting your own favourite fragrances/whatever you just bought and are overhyped about in response to every request thread? Again, there's nothing stopping that from happening, however unhelpful or self-indulgent this may be. There's no standard because there's no responsibility; the purpose for most online media is, in one form or another, 'content' - and content has been freed up from even the middling standards of quality that went in to forming mass media information before the C21st. And here lies the limitations of democratised, easily accessible internet sites; ostensibly 'freed up' from the limits of the pre-internet world, what has been lost in terms of the limited access to contribute to, say, the New York Times, has been replaced by a new set of limitations. The limits of the forum(s) is, in one way or another, the need or incentive to cater to a community rather than the newcomer. Repetition - the same thing, over and over, consumed and regurgitated by the same set of people - is monetarily beneficial. The quality of the information is, at best, irrelevant; in some sense, it is actively beneficial to mislead or underwhelm someone, as it keeps them coming back, keeps them clicking, keeps the ad revenue (etc) rolling in.

The knock on effect of this is that brands and perfumers are now hostage to a new form of criticism - that of the roiling mass, directed by influencers who are there for the sake of financial profit, status, and attention. The desire, or even the need, to create something that will gain traction in this new(ish) paradigm sees fragrances produced in order to appeal to a mass man. The development of these products gets more efficient over time, so the 'everyman' concept that led to Chanel's Allure Homme in the 90s gets stripped to the barest, most gratifying components of mass appeal by the time you get to Dior Sauvage: a loud, chemical, woman-pleasing, beastmode projector that sells like the baker could only dream he sold his hot cakes (one every three seconds!!!).

Naturally, this means not only creating scents that will appeal to the median nose but also designing products (bottle, price, marketing) to succeed in a market shaped by influencers and democratised critique. And what does that mean? Fragrances optimised for mass concerns. Even the reaction to this - the real oud trend, the artisanal indie perfumer - exist within the same world and are beholden to the same dynamics and incentives, just in a different form.

To anyone the above doesn't cater to, then it the internet has, in my opinion, quite obviously been a net negative.

 

[slpfrsly]

And just a final thought in addition to the above.

Take suggestions as an example. Looking for suggestions, giving suggestions.

I can think of at least two examples where I politely informed another user on a fragrance website that their suggestions were not relevant or helpful, which resulted in them having an emotional meltdown and posting (cringe, yes, but also) a written diatribe of projected insults. And by no means am I the only one who has experienced this; I have witnessed several users do something similar towards (especially new) users, with limited recourse or incentive to desist. Imagine going in to a shop to buy something and getting an earful from the unhinged proprietor or assistant? Ok, perhaps there are some parts of the world where it's not out of the question(!), but for the most part this isn't something one should expect or tolerate. Yet it can happen if you venture in to the online sphere. However awful some of the legacy media is/was, it's hard to say that cultural criticism and reviewing is the most obvious place for shaping the consciousness of the reader or manufacturing consent; at worst you get an heavy dose of vulgar snark with little to no useful criticism, the kind that Vice made their signature in the 2010s. As obnoxious as the media is now, a large reason for that has been the internet, and the amplification and acceleration of luxury beliefs. The media didn't doxx or harangue or abuse the average citizen 20 years ago as frequently and as gleefully as it does now. And the newspaper or beauty mag critic didn't encourage voracious consumption of sludge; at the very least, they were there to curate and cut through the noise and the abundance of the mass-produced and mediocre. What's happened, it seems to me, is that we've lost the selectivity of the critic as everything moved online, and there's nothing that's filled its place (yet), as even the stand-ins for critics or curators encourage a form of consumption that is neither selective nor restrained.

Now compare the newspaper or magazine reader to the online forum user, where you run the risk of having a volatile user (or ten) unleash a diatribe of bilge, directed at you personally, if they take issue with the specific parameters of a request (or anything else, frankly, as this is neither polite nor particularly well-adjusted behaviour, and therefore isn't caused, there is no 'reason' behind the abuse other than the instability of the abuser). If you start making youtube videos, then you run the risk of the same but even worse - of being harrassed and trolled by anonymous accounts, your contributions 'downvoted' out of spite which impacts the channel's reach (to interested watchers/users) and monetisation, picked out as a lightning rod for the thunderous spite of people who you would never dream of associating with in your normal life. Being on the internet is like exposing yourself to the horror of the worst parts of public transport and/or the public square, just without the immediate physical threat (which emboldens some people to become far more aggressive and insulting than they otherwise would be); everyone who cannot skirt above the public forum, or who chooses to frequent these places for whatever reason, are beset by the whims and maladies of a small portion of people who will ruin it for everyone else. Democratising a space without a rigid and at least somewhat elitist set of standards simply enables insanity - and although that is thankfully quite rare (moreso with perfume than most parts of the internet, I would suggest), and mostly something that exists on a few small corners of a few specific websites and platforms, for this to even be a possibility let alone a practical inevitability when contributing/engaging with information and perfumery online is, frankly, an ironclad case in favour of the net negative. To think that critical cultural information was once distributed via newspaper or magazine, which you could enjoy at your own leisure on a Sunday afternoon; now you can have someone stalking you and calling you a c**t at literally any time of day or night, direct to your phone, for literally no reason at all.

This point feeds back to the (evergreen) thread about perfumery being dead. It's pretty obvious that people arguing against the premise are, time and time again, defending/justifying the improvements in commerce - the ease and ability to buy fragrances online, the sheer quantity of scents that one can try/buy, the internet's enabling of The Carousel and collecting/trading - before and above anything pertaining to perfumery (the materials, the fragrances) itself. No doubt because it is much harder to make the case for the latter. Anyway, I think there's a similar thing going on here with people being upbeat and/or tolerant towards the internet as a whole. It's hard to argue against how much enjoyment or validation there is for existing enthusiasts within a designated online space, but this is a social or virtual celebration first and foremost. I believe that it is great for a lot of people who want to do some or all of the aforementioned - show off, socialise, broadcast etc - but for everyone else who wants to find a resource for information and/or guidance it is alienating and inferior to what existed even 20 years ago. And that's because there's so much nonsense, so much misdirection and incentivised 'influencing', at not just the first port of call (the top results on google or youtube) but also the next few stops after that as well.

The fact that the quality of fragrances, particularly those made by designers, seems to have declined over the last 20 years (the period the internet has developed in to what it is now) is worthy of consideration in relation to the internet as well. It's not just the info itself that is the issue, it's also the fragrances!

Edit: Adding some more thoughts on the subject of suggestions.

A recent thread brought up the matter of suggestions. My opinion in relation to this topic is some members - who, again, within the social side of the fragcomm are operating on the basis of time/effort/money expended on a certain area, and have a certain amount of online 'cred' that goes with that that is independent of the utility of info as it can be distributed to newcomers/other enthusiasts - can be a net negative on the basis that their claimed assessments about a fragrance elide personal preference with objective evaluation. In other words, there is an attempt to talk as an impartial, disinterested critic - with the gravitas and skill that goes with that - but, in a very literal sense, this isn't actually happening and when sight of this is lost you end up with suggestions to defer over what is, ultimately, an incredibly personal and immediate sensory matter of preference. It's an understandable aim but, ultimately, is part of another phenomenon - which is the process of socialising opinions, which is something I've mentioned before. If a new user asks a question about how good a certain type of fragrance is, and they receive a suggestion for a fragrance that a number of people agree is the best - if they come to try it and find that it is not to their liking, and in fact inferior to what they hoped for/expected/already own, the assumption would be that they are wrong. Not that the advice was 'wrong', in that it was limited to the personal preference of the ones suggesting it (and the social sensitivities of those who partake in supporting a suggestion on certain grounds) - but that the beginner must be wrong, because they are a beginner and thus not properly experienced. Yet in this instance, the experience is not with fragrances, but with online social platforms and how information is posted/shared on them. Once again, this is another iteration of the influencer phenomenon - where new users are subject to the preferences of existing members, rather than a professional class of critics, with an established and reviewed canon of works.

Copying this is, and adding some more thoughts:
There's always going to be subjective preference that comes in to play with any fragrance suggestion. Any declaration on here about one fragrance being "the best" is little more than the personal preference of an amateur enthusiast - it shouldn't be taken as hard fact, nor should one member be deemed an authoratative source that invites deference from newer or less active members.

What's more, taking this sort of advice at face value could be less helpful than receiving no suggestions at all - particularly with regard to personal investments of time and money. So I'd push back against this and say it's better for any inquisitive OP to use suggestions as a springboard for their own personal discovery. Having, say, 5-10 different fragrances with the relevant notes/in this category to sample is likely to be more fruitful for the OP than simply trusting an individual assertion about one fragrance as being "the best". Because you really can't evaluate fragrances like that; what is declared as "the best" is actually "my favourite", which is something quite different.

For all the relativising chat that occurs with regard to other topics, this is one area where it's actually applicable! Personal preference is very relevant here and means deference to anyone else, rather than using suggestions as a jumping off point for self-discovery/your own personal analysis, is not the best option.

In the absence of a more thorough and responsible form of guidance (instead of what we have, which is a bunch of amateur enthusiasts judging from the position of consumers) the best thing for anyone who's interested enough to start a thread asking for suggestions to do is simply try a range of fragrances - based on recomendations from a few different disinterested sources - and find out what they like for themselves. Speaking from experience, the (limited) role suggestions play is to filter out the dross that exists on the market by dismissing potential samples/blind buys of markedly inferior fragrances which would otherwise be a drain on time and money. Suggestions from other people are not that good at providing the (much more nuanced) role of selecting or ranking the good, great, and 'best' within any given category. In other words, suggestion threads are good for telling you what to avoid, rather than providing a suggestion for what's going to be your favourite fragrance. In every thread where the latter is attempted you get posters just recommending their favourite fragrances, irrespective of how suitable it may be to the initial request. Which might be fine, as there's some likely overlap that means this type of suggestion works every once in a while - but it's also limited, and by no means (ironically!) the best thing for any OP to do. I'd suggest more agency/less deference on the part of an OP instead.

Ultimately, finding a favourite or trying to find the most accomplished type of fragrance is down to the individual member to work out; any black and white assertion about one fragrance being absolutely better than another or "the best" suggests the opposite of understanding, how to evalute fragrances, and the limitations of the reddit-style "ranked review" mindset. What you're getting with these sorts of claims is just personal preference - which is fine, but given how immediate perfume is, how swift the learning curve is to go from a novice to knowing more than enough to evaluate without seeking the opinion of other people, it's really not necessary to defer to anyone else. And in fact, rather than saving time/money by avoiding the process of trying a range of suggestions for yourself, this kind of social deference can backfire and see someone waste time and money if they put credulity in the apparent authority of a claim that states "this fragrance is the best" - the implication being you should just buy "the best" fragrance as suggested and be done with it. Ironically, this is the mindset a lot of men have when they end up with Sauvage because they simply want to know "what's popular" and "what works well with women" - rather than taking the time to select one out of, say, 5-10 different suggestions, it's deference to the suggester for the sake of saving yourself the trouble of trying a few different fragrances.

To be interested enough in the relatively nuanced matter of specific subcategories of men's fragrances, and to sign up to a fragrance website to discuss that matter, suggests a willingness to invest slightly more time/effort in a search than the average Sauvage shopper. Therefore, it follows that anyone in this position would be misguided to simply defer to the recommendations of one or even a few members - far better would be to use the suggestions as a springboard for individual understanding, which fairly quickly leads to the realisation that there is no "best" fragrance, either overall or broken down by note, category etc. This is not something that can have a definitive evaluation on qualitative grounds - performance/price can be, but not how 'good' or pleasant something is. This is where fragrance falls short of art, yet again. And because it is easy and immediate and not as in need of a depth of understanding like music or literature, self-discovery after a brief introductory period is the most advisable strategy for the newcomer to undertake. Better that than deference to the existing social dynamic of a particular part of the fragcomm.

Otherwise we've got the influencer model, where strength of conviction and willingness to assert your opinion in the most definitive manner becomes the barometer for who to trust and what to buy. And that's no bueno.

 

[RPLens]

Positive, but I have learned to only trust my own nose.

I don't take anyone seriously who says Percival is a clone of Fierce.
I own both and the difference is huge, they are not even close.
Please stop smelling something on a strip of paper and judging a fragrance based on that alone.

 

[Swoleiosis]

Neutral. I've would have been happy with my Polo, Fierce, Sauvage, D&G ph lineup. Learning about niche, artisan, and foreign market fragrances gets me products that are more perfectly in line with my tastes, but the benefit of that probably doesn't fit the costs and time spent.

 

[RPLens]

I wonder if the govt-enforced shutdowns has played a part in this, attracting more novices to perfume who are more likely to simply repeat what other people have already said as a means of fitting in rather than standing out (particularly in a 'bad' way), but I doubt it's the only reason.

It's hard to describe how much damage the lockdowns have caused, and most of the people don't even realize it.
A myriad of mental problems, increased anxiety and depression.
More domestic violence.
More divorces.

Demi Rawling is an alcoholic.

Jus de Rose is also crying on camera about her sugar addiction.

Not to mention Jeremy Fragrance.

So we will see an increase of highly psychotic reviews, where people are writing reviews without fully wearing the fragrance.

 

[slpfrsly]

It's hard to describe how much damage the lockdowns have caused, and most of the people don't even realize it.
A myriad of mental problems, increased anxiety and depression.
More domestic violence.
More divorces.

Demi Rawling is an alcoholic.

Jus de Rose is also crying on camera about her sugar addiction.

Not to mention Jeremy Fragrance.

So we will see an increase of highly psychotic reviews, where people are writing reviews without fully wearing the fragrance.

I think that's a subject that deserves its own separate thread tbh.

 

[Hugh V.]

I suppose it's been a positive. Now, there are more avenues to discover and purchase fragrances, whereas, pre-internet I only knew about fragrances from the Macy's counter, or, if I was lucky, to find a perfume shop in a mall.

With the internet, I found out about things like Pascal Morabito Or Black, the Al-Rehab brand, Open Black, etc. And pre-internet, I considered having maybe 1 or 2 fragrances to last me several years. In the internet era, it's now like a "hobby" or collecting habit. I would think that without the internet, fragrance sales would be lower than whatever they are now.

I don't know if it's a net-positive for society though. I love this site, and there's a lot of cool people here. But I don't think it really did me much good to spend so much time and money on "collecting" fragrances.

 

[RPLens]

I think that's a subject that deserves its own separate thread tbh.

I'm not sure this forum is the right place to do that discussion.
And the sh** slinging will be extreme, the deniers will go berserk.
People have been subjected to psychological violence for 2 years, and the so called "invisible enemy" was staring them in the eyes all along.

If you want to start that discussion anyway, please let me know.
But it won't take long before a moderator closes it I think.

 

[enframing]

For me, net positive IRT perfume. I can find stuff I want, and sell stuff I don't want. I can and do read reviews here and elsewhere. For the industry as a whole, I dunno.

Flankers came about around the same time as the internet (Web 1.0), and really got going/became a thing around Web 2.0. Maybe these are related. I don't watch youtube videos about perfume, and I tried a coupe of podcasts about perfume and they just don't interested me. I'll read book after book about perfume though.

Also, without the internet we might not have such comedy as this:

https://www.plein.com/us/no-limits-perfume-90-ml/000--NOLIMITSEDP90_02.html

Dude was a lawyer and then sold luxury dog beds, now "$1,000,000,000,000" perfume. Incredible. One wonders if it's all performance art.

 

[slpfrsly]

I'm not sure this forum is the right place to do that discussion.
And the sh** slinging will be extreme, the deniers will go berserk.
People have been subjected to psychological violence for 2 years, and the so called "invisible enemy" was staring them in the eyes all along.

If you want to start that discussion anyway, please let me know.
But it won't take long before a moderator closes it I think.

I was referring to a discussion about people who collect fragrance having a history of addictive/self-destructive tendencies. Going deeper in to that area is probably worth a separate thread rather than taking place in this one, as things like alcoholism etc are sensitive subjects for a lot of people.

I agree that there's no point having a discussion about lockdown stuff, it's very much over and whatever interpretation people have come to is likely the one they're going to stick with long term.

 

[RPLens]

I was referring to a discussion about people who collect fragrance having a history of addictive/self-destructive tendencies. Going deeper in to that area is probably worth a separate thread rather than taking place in this one, as things like alcoholism etc are sensitive subjects for a lot of people.

I certainly see some issues with Youtube influencers.

But all in all, I find this hobby one of the best and most innocent hobbies you can imagine.
We are basically performing aromatherapy on ourselves.
We are lifting our mood.

You have people who are addicted to alcohol, a lot of people who are addicted to cigarettes and nicotine.
I grab a drink in the weekend but I don't smoke.
I've read an article recently about a guy who is collecting vases, and he seemed to be spending a lot of money on it.
More than I do on fragrances.

As long as people are not blind buying 500 euro fragrances, I don't really see a problem with this hobby.
I don't think we should compare ourselves with people who are physically addicted to certain substances.
I would read your findings about it, but I'm not sure the negativity is warranted when I look at other hobbies or real addictions.