I agree about Jamie Hughes,he’s gone from Maver to MAP to Matrix, but as for getting information off here it’s no different!! If you ask a question about a pole, you’ll get 50 different totally biased replies, every one who has brought a certain pole will swear blind it’s the best ?

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Could there be two ways of looking at that (pole choice as an example), info from anglers on here against that of the pros, but this could apply to any which xxxxxxxx should i buy query.
The pros of accepting the pros viewpoint:
They should know what a good pole is and isn't as they use them all week
They may have had input into the design, hence their knowledge in that design is invaluable
The againsts:
The are they being paid to say it possibility raises its head
The type of pole and price wise may come to a price value more than some our (on here) kit collections put together, so the average Jo market may be isn't always the intended one, leads nicely onto the pros of reviews on here...
The venues and the circumstances during which the item is featured can't sometimes be re-created by your average Jo, whether that be accessing the venue in the first place or having to make do with the place being rammed with other anglers (noticed how quiet some of the banks are on some of the venues featured at times)
The pros of peoples opinions on here:
Not sure it is always biased, as bias would infer there is some other reason behind suggesting gear. The gear is used by many and well tried in many cases and across a bigger slice of people, than 1 or may 2 associated with a company. So if a question goes out on here, you can usually see a theme develop and one may be two makes being suggested more than others. With Barbel rods for example, Korum and Fox are suggested quite a lot and by people on similar budgets (non pros anyway), who are fishing similar venues and with no reason other than the product does the job well for them, being behind any suggestion.
There is more chance of people on here being at the standard of each other than at the standard of the pros, so price bracket and value for money comes in within a more varying budget, but not top bracket money.
I can't really think of a negative for getting as many 'real' if you like opinions as possible. Like i say something comes out, the pros advertise it and then the market uses it, i like and value as many opinions as possible and i get your point about the possibility of the potential for a hundred different answers, just not sure on the bias bit being behind any suggestion made by your average Jo.
When thinking about buying something, if there were a hundred different answers, then great i could glean from that, that it doesn't matter which one i buy (usually the case with my standard of fishing anyway!). If however there were common themes coming out of the hundred responses, then great, a bit to go on to narrow it down.
Have read all of the posts so far and think there has been some great discussion to date, but i do reckon that bias can only stem from vested interest hence i picked up on this one.