Which social network?
The area where I struggle to find good products the most is photography. There are three tough problems I have with online reviews.
(1) Many reviewers do not know what they are talking about at all. They put the paper in upside down, post a photo of the resulting blotchy mess to BestBuy.com and then return it. There is always some fraction of online reviews you have to discount because the people don't know how how to use the gear, have unrealistic expectations or both.
(2) Some devices seem to have manufacturing problems that affect some but not all users. 10 years ago when I was a Canon shooter I thought this was true about many Sigma lenses for Canon bodies. Maybe 10% of people got a bad lens with an unreliable autofocus. It's hard to tell if these people got a bottom of the barrel lens or if they are bottom of the barrel shooters.
(3) Some things are just hard to know. After about six months of using an Epson EcoTank printer I found out that the ink noticeably in about six months. This fact was recorded on this website
http://wilhelm-research.com/
which I didn't consult because you usually don't think about lightfastness until it becomes a problem to you. Looking for my next printer I found that I couldn't count on any particular printer having been reviewed by them since they only run tests if somebody sponsors them. (The manufacturer if the results are good, a competitor if the results are bad. This particular ink is remarkably bad, but the refill ink from Staples fades in 3 weeks.)
My ordinary social network of family, friends, co-workers, etc. doesn't contain a lot of photographers so I don't care what these people think about photography gear. At photography forums I find people who have the gear in question and seem to be at my level of skill or greater and seem to value things the way I do. One person I trust in that way is worth a lot.
