I've been thinking a lot about how we all likely desire something a little different from reviews. Radical footage, technical details, honest assessments, critical feedback, average Joe reports. There's a wide spectrum of information that can be included.

Personally, I lean hard on technical elements. Shapes, dimensions, setup details. Leaning on the numbers at the start strips away the marketing hype and gives me something objective to solidify my thought on. I also put a lot of value in review duration. Ideally 500 miles (800km) for any comprehensive review. 1000 miles (1600km) is even better as I think longer reviews reveal durability, as well as the little quirks and nuanced tricks that can only be found with time on foil in a variety of conditions.

I put less value in ride footage. I want to know the riders dims and style but beyond that I rarely see meaningful changes in ride footage from one video to the next of the same foiler.

I'm curious where others land. What makes a review truly valuable to you, and what is just noise?

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BWalnut said..
I've been thinking a lot about how we all likely desire something a little different from reviews. Radical footage, technical details, honest assessments, critical feedback, average Joe reports. There's a wide spectrum of information that can be included.

Personally, I lean hard on technical elements. Shapes, dimensions, setup details. Leaning on the numbers at the start strips away the marketing hype and gives me something objective to solidify my thought on. I also put a lot of value in review duration. Ideally 500 miles (800km) for any comprehensive review. 1000 miles (1600km) is even better as I think longer reviews reveal durability, as well as the little quirks and nuanced tricks that can only be found with time on foil in a variety of conditions.

I put less value in ride footage. I want to know the riders dims and style but beyond that I rarely see meaningful changes in ride footage from one video to the next of the same foiler.

I'm curious where others land. What makes a review truly valuable to you, and what is just noise?

I'm similar to you, like facts. Real world experience of good and bad. less use of "awesome" " transforming" " best ever" " game changer"
there are always things that can be improved and not minor things like colour ( unless a PW).

Comparing to other products in same ball park, see how they stack up. transparency, what is the hidden hand giving.

A 'perfect' review for me specifically, would be one that totally validates my purchases, or would have you rubbish any gear that I don't have (or can't afford)

You've always provided balanced reviews Brian, so keep it up!

Similar interests to you...and I would add providing ample context, including reviewer's experience, skill level, location...you guys in the gorge live in a different world than most of us

I buy whatever Dwight says.

specs of the product,Rider level,rider weight, conditions. How it feels ans how it compared to similar products.
What to like and what not to like.
riding footage can help to get a clue about how the tester findings are relevant to me.


For example: I,m 51 y old,188x98kg and riding in slow but steep wind generated waves with plenty of current. 6-7km current in the same direction as the wind is quite normall here.
An review of a 55kg tester in the prime of here life rider in clean long period pacific swell is fun to watch but has an value of absolute zero to me.

Besides that: every presentation gets better when done in a (bit tiny) bikini.
So can,t wait for your next vid Brian

A bit cold to wear bikinis (today was 2 degrees celsius, water about 5), but what would be great for reviews is to have a couple of people testing it and sharing their opinion.
Fully agree with Jeroensurf about the value of 60kg hyperskilled teamriders sharing their stoke about their sponsor newest toy (for average joe's like myself). I used to like Kitechino and Tucker (mackiteboarding) for their reviews.

While I don't get much from all the on water footage, esp. with his typical camera view, I think MeonAsh on Wing Tips does a nice job on most of the main things I'm looking for and I find myself giving his input more weight than most...

...hmmm...a poll for favorite reviewer?

WingTips, Tucker, Hydrofoil gav and Gleiten TV

a great review

I would also like to see some disclosure about conflicts of interest. Is the reviewer a team rider or ambassador, and was a price discount involved? I read Amazon reviews but completely ignore those where the reviewer received a free product. When I do an Amazon review I note that I paid full price and received no compensation for the reivew. I agree about video ride reviews, especially when the rider does not disclose weight, height, skill level, and other equipment used on the ride--often not much value. And most importantly, get to the point. Don't waste my time stretching your video to sell more ads. If you want to see perhaps the greatest video reviewer on the planet, check out Project Farm on youtube. He should be the model for a review of any product.

The more I think about it though, the clearer it is that while all the features discussed (specs, rider characteristics, conditions, etc.) are valuable, without insightful and compelling analysis/evaluation, it just isn't worth it...and if you DO have the analysis/evaluation, you can get away with not ticking all the boxes that have been listed...

Average riders in accurately described, average conditions.
A 60kg expert in glass smooth offshore talking about low end is meaningless.

I would like to ad that I would like to know what the relation is of the tester with the brand.
Are you sponsored, do you get your gear cheap or for free. Did they offer it to you for a good review. I always wonder how people can test gear that is not yet available.
So basacilly is the tester independent.

A proper product review should be:

1. A balanced mix of video/images and written analysis. Most YouTube reviews lack clear on-screen summaries, such as concise overlays highlighting key pros and cons.

2- An objective comparison with competitors. Too much of today's "politically correct" media avoids direct, unbiased benchmarking against alternative products.

3- A transparent discussion about pricing. Value for money is a crucial part of any serious review and shouldn't be overlooked.

4- Short and to the point.

Good stuff!

Does this list sum it up? I agree with pretty much everything folks said. Added a few comments in there:
- Rider details.
- Location and setting.
- Technical notes.
- Insight.
- Spare the hype.
* I think this is critical for credibility. If each product is the ultimate everything I lose faith in the reviewer.
- Comparisons.
- I want more of this too.
- Critical feedback.
- Balanced video, image, written content.
- Disclosures.
* I think I'm good about mentioning this when I do reviews, but I also have this statement on my site: www.wouzel.com/ambassadorship I get asked about this all the time.
- Pro/con summaries.
- Average Joes in average conditions commentary.
* Working on one right now with comments from riders around the world which is fun. I'd like to keep doing this in the future. I'd also like to do collaborative reviews with people in the future.
- Too small bikinis.

What else?

Less talking head. Short and sharp to the point with commentary laid over relevant images and graphics.

I appreciate the effort you're putting into reviewing gear. That said, for a truly solid review, it'd be great to see comparisons across a broader range of setups, not just AFS, Fone, and Code. The key to building trust is full transparency on any conflicts of interest, like compensation, discounts, or brand affiliations. It's pretty obvious on forums like this who's tied to a particular brand, and that can make reviews feel more like biased opinions than objective insights. Unless you're comparing against other products from the same brand or have hands-on experience riding their stuff, the value drops off quickly.

As marc5 mentioned, the gold standard for reliability is something like Project Farm: rigorous, quantitative testing with hard numbers, not just subjective "feel" assessments. For masts, that means measuring bend curves, torsional stiffness, Young's modulus, and so on-real data we can all reference. The best independent testing I've seen was from GlissAttitude back in the day, where manufacturers paid for it... until the results hit the public and showed that many high-end, pricey brands didn't stack up. They pulled the plug after that. The last one I recall was on Foil Cedrus, which was solid on the mast itself-nobody really dives into extras like connection points, long-term wear, and durability in these tests, not even GlissAttitude. Wings are even trickier-they're inherently subjective based on your riding style, local conditions, weight, and preferences.

My advice? Keep it concise. Nothing kills interest faster than a lengthy, flowery rant that's clearly slanted. Just my two cents, but maybe you could pivot to something fresh and fun, like becoming the foiling equivalent of The Smoking Tire or Doug DeMuro-borrowing gear from the community, testing it out, and dishing out creative rankings or "Byran Scores" for entertainment value. Most reviews out there fall flat anyway. From lurking in all those FB foiling groups, it's eye-opening how connections play out: who's repping a brand, who got burned by a bad experience, who's scoring shop discounts, or who's just clueless about maintenance.

Identify the performance objectives of the equipment and then assess against those.

Nearly all reviews are missing very important criteria in their assessment either by ignorance or intention. Its a very rare skill to be able to pinpoint the objectives, while having the capability to understand how the equipment is performing in these areas and finally be able to articulate the result in a way that makes the review useful to many people.

I would like to give an example of a good independent reviewer who has access to a wide range of foiling gear from competing brands.

Ultimately the reviewer must somehow have established credibility to be capable of the above while being independent and fair.

At least when you ask someone you know for advice you likely already know if the credibility and capability is there.

How hard would it be for us all to collab on a review template? Something that anyone could use to plug in their experiences and create a re-usable form that we all recognize so that we can all contribute similar info on reviews?

I made such thing in the past for windsurfgear while helping a brand to develop and mag with testing gear mag.Somehow it didnt work because the format made people feel limited in there write-ups,While sitting down and interviewing I could easily fill he form or them and they agreed on the conclussions, but in the way they organized the info in there brain made the form limiting in getting it out. (also in different versions).

Every review should have three negatives, they are there but never revealed

I wouldnt say negative but say what it is for and whats not. Thats a targeted design and not perse negative.

As long as all the rider and location details are disclosed clearly a "room for improvement" section is nice. It's gotta be clarified with the why to be valid.