We've written before about the dangers of trusting online reviews but one of Canada's biggest companies landed in the middle of an online review scandal of their own this week — albeit accidentally.
The CBC's Sophia Harris reported this week that several Bell Canada workers have been caught giving glowing reviews to the company's new MyBell app.
It seems Bell workers were going online and giving five-star reviews to the app, using superlative praise to describe an app that effectively lets users log in to check their account balances and help them pay.
"Just words that you do not say in real life," was how Scott Stratten, the president of UnMarketing described it.
The company fessed up but says employees were merely acting "overzealously" of their own will, and not being compelled to do what they did. Regardless, the whole story is another excellent reminder that when it comes to the murky world of online reviews, consumers should always be skeptical.
BlackBerry's cash back deal
A customer fills his gas tank at a station in Jakarta. The price of oil has plummeted in recent weeks, and that's driving down prices for things like gasoline all over the world. (Darren Whiteside/Reuters)
If telling customers how great your product is doesn't work, it seems logical that paying them hundreds of dollars will. That's exactly what BlackBerry tried this week, with an offer of up to $600 to anyone who brings in an old iPhone to switch to one of the company's Passports or other models.
It was a bold move designed to get attention, and it did just that. It's a sure fire way to gain new customers, but at least one expert we talked to this week said the move smacked of desperation, equating the move to a bribe by the company.
Another analyst said the move may pay off in the long run, as they take a short-term hit to cash flow in exchange for having more customers than they do now, in three or four years' time.
How low can oil go?
Without a doubt, our biggest story this week was oil. We've reported extensively on the cratering oil price for several weeks now, as the price of a barrel has plunged from $105 US as recently as July to under $70 today.
This week, the big news event was an OPEC meeting that experts said was the best hope to stem the tide. If OPEC, a cartel that makes about 40 per cent of the oil on Earth, would agree to turn off the taps a little, that would be enough to drive prices higher.
But that didn't happen. OPEC didn't change their production quotas one iota. And the Saudis, who control OPEC, seem happy to let the price of oil crater for now because they hope that'll be enough to drive new competitors in the U.S. out of business.
Canada has a lot at stake in this old-fashioned Mexican — er, Saudi — standoff, as governments in Ottawa and many provinces depend on oil money to meet their budget promises. And most of those calculations were assuming an oil price closer to $90 per barrel, not $60.
Certainly a story worth paying attention to, as it's not going away any time soon. (The same can't be said of OPEC itself, the CBC's Peter Armstrong wrote this week.)
The rich are getting richer
Income inequality is another story that we have covered extensively in recent months, and there was a development this week as one of Canada's biggest banks said the problem isn't getting any better.
The gap between rich and poor is indeed getting worse, TD said this week, which is reason for concern no matter which end of the socioeconomic spectrum you're on. But the good news, the bank says, is it's not too late to fix things — or at least take steps in that direction.
Governments investing in things like skills training, education, child care and productivity can help bridge the gap and make the pie bigger for all. Because as TD economist Craig Alexander told us this week, "elevated levels of inequality is not just bad for individuals, it's bad for your economy and your society."
Milka-cola?
On the lighter side, a story this week that Coca-Cola was going to start making its own milk was one of our most-read stories this week. An executive at the company told an investor conference this week that Coke is going in on a joint venture with some progressive dairy farmers for something called Fairlife — a type of milk that the company says has more protein than regular milk, but much less fat and sugar.
"We'll charge twice as much for it as the milk [we're] used to buying in a jug," Sandy Douglas said, later adding he's confident the product is going to "rain money" one day.
Regardless of price, reaction to the news has been all over the map, with some people saying the health benefits appeal to them — but others getting a little sour over the idea of some sort of Franken-milk.
Other stuff
Those were some of our most read stories of the week. Be sure to check out our website often for more, and don't forget to follow us on Twitter here.
In the meantime, here's some more of our popular stuff from the past 7 days that you may have missed.
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