Pitchfork Is Beta Testing User Reviews and Comments As It Approaches 30 (theverge.com)
(Wednesday October 22, 2025 @11:30PM (BeauHD)
from the midlife-crisis-mode dept.)
- Reference: 0179852636
- News link: https://tech.slashdot.org/story/25/10/22/2030236/pitchfork-is-beta-testing-user-reviews-and-comments-as-it-approaches-30
- Source link: https://www.theverge.com/news/804749/pitchfork-is-beta-testing-user-reviews-and-comments-as-it-approaches-30
As it nears its 30th anniversary, Pitchfork is [1]testing user reviews and comments in a major shift from its long-standing critic-only model. The site will now let readers rate albums and leave comments, combining those into an aggregated "reader score" alongside the official Pitchfork score. The Verge reports:
> Pitchfork has historically been a one-sided affair. While it ran the occasional [2]reader poll , there was no way for readers to directly voice their opinion on the site. If you thought that [3]Jet's Shine On deserved better than a 0.0 (first off, you're wrong), there was no way to let the author know other than shouting into the void of this new thing at the time called Twitter. Now the site is [4]considering letting users comment directly on reviews and give albums scores of their own. And then those scores will be averaged up into a single reader score for each album.
[1] https://www.theverge.com/news/804749/pitchfork-is-beta-testing-user-reviews-and-comments-as-it-approaches-30
[2] https://pitchfork.com/features/lists-and-guides/2024-readers-poll-results/
[3] https://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/9464-shine-on/
[4] https://pitchfork.com/news/were-testing-comments-and-reader-scores-on-album-reviews/
> Pitchfork has historically been a one-sided affair. While it ran the occasional [2]reader poll , there was no way for readers to directly voice their opinion on the site. If you thought that [3]Jet's Shine On deserved better than a 0.0 (first off, you're wrong), there was no way to let the author know other than shouting into the void of this new thing at the time called Twitter. Now the site is [4]considering letting users comment directly on reviews and give albums scores of their own. And then those scores will be averaged up into a single reader score for each album.
[1] https://www.theverge.com/news/804749/pitchfork-is-beta-testing-user-reviews-and-comments-as-it-approaches-30
[2] https://pitchfork.com/features/lists-and-guides/2024-readers-poll-results/
[3] https://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/9464-shine-on/
[4] https://pitchfork.com/news/were-testing-comments-and-reader-scores-on-album-reviews/
Never heard of the site, but... (Score:2)
by KNicolson ( 147698 )
...I clicked through to read that review. There was no review, but there were two YouTube videos, the first was someone talking about favourite bass lines, the second a chimpanzee peeing into his own mouth, which I suppose could be a metaphor for what user reviews are going to do to the site.
Re: (Score:2)
by registrations_suck ( 1075251 )
Inver heard of "Pitchfork" before today either.
What the fuck have they been doing for THIRTY YEARS??!
Enshittification (Score:2)
As a longtime reader, I remember their heyday 20 years ago when they had all kind of regular columns, in-depth analysis, correspondents embedding themselves in scenes and at shows.
Slowly the content began to get crappier in various ways, until about a year ago Conde Nast fired everyone but a couple of reviewers. And so the site only publishes a handful of reviews a week, and all the rest of the content is reposts from newswire-type sources and TMZ.
Now it seems they've just given up on producing content in