My Experience and Advice About Review Stream

I have been unemployed for six weeks now, I have been trying my best to keep my head above water. I did not qualify for unemployment benefits and I have bills piling up.

I have been doing a lot of writing over the last six weeks. I had been writing daily for websites like shared reviews, associated content, helium and review stream.

I don't mind admitting that I only wrote for review stream because they are willing to purchase nearly any review. You can write low grade reviews and they will purchase them, sure its only forty cents a review, but it adds up. In six weeks I earned about $115 from review stream. I had about six reviews sell for $2 each and the rest were worth forty cents each. Granted they were pulp, low quality reviews.

I determined that I would put forth an effort that was the equivalent to forty cents pay. When I considered my compensation and efforts, I was happy with this company. You get what you pay for right?

I went as far as to write a few decent pieces about how review stream was not such a bad place to write for. I began writing there in 2007, and I will acknowledge that I was paid several times. I had no complaints until the end of 2008, beginning of 2009.

I have referred quite a few writers to review stream, I was earning a little money every day from their efforts, sure 2 cents a review doesn't amount to squat, but when you have 6 friends writing three or more reviews a day it helps out a lot.

When I inquired about my account balance on the site, it said an email was sent with the balance. I checked my email... Nothing from review stream. I repeated this process five times, and when I still had not received an email the next night, I emailed review stream. They sent a reply saying my balance was 30 some dollars, and I had to switch to a yahoo account to receive such information. I replied asking if my balance would carry over to the new address, they said no it would not.

So, I am supposed to give up over thirty dollars to receive an email... No, that's okay. I wrote a ton of reviews for that money! I just started keeping track, so I would know when I could request my payment. When I knew I had sixty dollars in my account, I waited four days so all of my work would be credited. I emailed them asking for payment. I received a reply saying I only had a $48 balance... Hmm. Twelve dollars short at forty cents a review equals over thirty reviews missing. They were not rejected and in fact, had been published. I found this out by searching the reviews on AOL.

Well, I need the money, and I know if you ask questions or offer suggestions the guys at review stream go on the defensive and get rude with you. I needed the gig, so I just shut up and kept on writing reviews.

Well, to get to the point, one morning I see I have a message from review stream. Curious I read it first. They were questioning me! I had published a review in 2007, then had another experience that differed dramatically, so I wrote another review in 2009. They accused me of lying, demanded an explanation, and then went on to threaten me that if I did not immediately explain myself I would face a lifetime ban on review stream.

I composed a polite and honest response, I explained that my experiences were both true, and over time things had obviously changed with the product I reviewed two times in the span of 2007- 2009. I wanted to share my experience, and I was not lying. I did not want to jeopardize my standings with the site. I wished the person who had rudely messaged me to have a good day, and to let me know if they needed anything else. That evening I got another message. It said "We paid you the $57 from your account, we will not purchase reviews from you again, the ones that haven't posted to your account will be deleted..."

OK, fine whatever. If I cannot change my opinion and give others the information then fine. However, the reviews that were supposedly going to be deleted were in fact published, and not paid for. Forty reviews in all were stolen from me by review stream. I tried to civilly address the matter with review stream, but they went off the deep end, as is their custom.

I have researched this a bit, others have had issues with this site also. I am not the only one. I was lucky, most people end up being banned when they reach around the forty dollar balance the first time. Review Stream will end up stealing your work. They set the payout so high that most people get discouraged and quit writing. They get your work for free that way, they allow a select few people to actually receive payment so they will spread the word that review stream is legitimate and does pay. Then they will grow tired of paying you, and they will get rude with you. Eventually you will be banned, as I was.

In my research I ran across several blogs with postings about review stream, sure enough they guys at review stream had also found these blogs and left rude and uncalled for comments. They will go as far as to post messages on their site about their writers, and encourage everyone else to read the slander they get off on. I know some people who have had money taken out of their accounts for no reason at all. They claim every thing can be reviewed and every review can be paid. This is not the case, if you publish an unconventional review, they will publish it, then take money away from your earnings.

My advice to you, is just avoid this site. You will write hundreds of reviews to earn fifty dollars, you will give up lifetime rights to your work for forty cents a review. Don't sell yourself short or invite the headache into your life. Review Stream sucks, they are scammers, and quite rude also.