I was in Indianapolis for a convention, wandering the streets with my good friend around lunchtime, when we found ourselves in front a brewpub. There were no lines – a rarity at this hour – and my stomach was making the rumbiles.

“Let’s grab a bite,” I said.

“Hang on,” said my friend, and he took out his smartphone.

“Who are you calling?”

“Nobody. I want to check the reviews.”

“Reviews?” I asked. “It’s a brewpub. It’ll have hamburgers and beer and cost around twenty bucks. There’s no line. Come on.”

He looked up. “But are they good hamburgers and beer?”

“We won’t know until we try them.”

“We will if we check the reviews.”

This is utterly, completely … alien behavior.

I understand that reviews drive a lot of consumer activity, but it’s never made sense to me. In the days before the internet made everyone a critic, we had a professional class to tell one what to watch, what to read, where to eat. I remember that they existed, but I can’t remember a single time I took their advice.

I’m not sure why. It may just be a contrarian streak, or a dislike of presumed authority, but mostly it’s because I know I like a lot of things other people don’t enjoy. For instance, it’s difficult to imagine anyone I trust giving a five-star rating to even the most remarkable plate of haggis. My favorite whiskies have been described by trusted friends as tasting like “a mouthful of wet dirt.” And I take comfort in the existence of a Never Mind the Bollocks cover album performed by bhangra musicians.

Aside from my own quirks, thanks to the internet things have spiraled completely out of control. Anyone with access to a public library’s internet connection and two working fingers can now take part in elevating or torpedoing anyone else’s endeavors.

My favorite to date? “Honestly one of the worst masses I have ever been to. Boring, uninspired, sloppy and irrelevant”—Marilisa A., reviewing Our Lady of Good Counsel Church in Manhattan.

Seriously, who decides what church to attend based on semi-anonymous reviews? Presumably the same kind of people who take the time to write them.

I’ve tried to fold reviews into my recent larger purchases –a car, for instance. But with these items, it always seems to come down to hooting tribalism around someone’s personal preferences wedded to a certainty that all OTHER preferences are the work of Bealzebub himself.

Now, that’s at the consumer level. At the creator level, it’s naturally a different story. I have to recognize that reviews are considered an important part of the buying process by many people. I don’t have to understand it, necessarily; but I do have to engage with it.

What I *can* understand is this: It’s always pleasant to hear your work praised, and it’s always useful to receive constructive criticism, and it’s always a pain in the ass to slog through the pointless and unconstructive criticism. One way to counterbalance the unconstructive criticism is to provide more positive or constructive reviews for your fellow workers, slogging away in the word / note / jeté mines.

To my mind, the best review isn’t one which seeks to influence others into purchasing (or refusing to purchase) some piece of work. Rather, it’s a means of letting the creator know their work was seen, that there was a connection made. It exchanges just a bit more of my time for their work, lets them inhabit my mind for few hours longer. I suppose, perhaps, that’s the point that many reviewers make. A tip of the hat to someone’s best efforts, whether it was fully appreciated or not.

For the record, I didn’t review the brewpub. But the burger was fine and the lager was lager.