I wonder who'd fund that, and how we'd ensure independence?

danbruc · on Feb 12, 2021

Here in Germany we have Stiftung Warentest [1] and it is financed by selling their reports as magazines and online. They also receive some government support from the consumer protection ministry. Not sure if there are any competitors, Stiftung Warentest is certainly by far the most well known one.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stiftung_Warentest

jakub_g · on Feb 12, 2021

There's a similar thing in France called "60 Millions de consommateurs":

https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=fr&tl=en&u=https:/...

which is great, but I think DE and FR are way ahead compared to other countries in that area.

Edit: also in UK there's "Which?":

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Which%3F

jfk13 · on Feb 12, 2021

Yes, I'm aware of Which? -- my parents used to get it when I was growing up.

It was only ever able to cover a tiny part of the market for a few selected things, though. (And of course only a small minority of people would ever see it.)

I'm not sure how well that would scale.