Amazon best seller item yet terrible reviews

[sp3sp2sp]

I need a new unlocked cell phone so I checked on amazon what other people buy. The number one selling phone is a Blu Vivio, yet it has 6 terrible reviews, for total of 2.5 stars. How does that phone end up as #1 selling unlocked cell phone?

 

[Bystander]

Google "P. T. Barnum."

 

[Vanadium 50]

If it's the best selling and there are only 6 reviews, that tells me that not many owners are writing reviews.

 

[berkeman]

What's an unlocked cell phone?

 

[Greg Bernhardt]

Or that whatever category the product is in has very few items.

 

[jtbell]

What's an unlocked cell phone?

A phone that allows you to change carriers by swapping the SIM card. When you buy a phone at a discount from a carrier, under a contract so that you're paying off the rest of the cost of the phone as part of your monthly bill, the carrier locks it so you have to stay with them. After you've paid off the phone, you can ask the carrier to unlock it. There are apparently variations depending on the carrier and which technology the phone uses.

This CNET article is kind of old, but I think most of the details are probably still valid.

I bought my iPhone in an unlocked version by paying full price at an Apple Store, because I wanted to use it under my wife's existing Consumer Cellular plan. CC uses the AT&T network which uses GSM technology, so I had to specify my phone as a GSM model. It came without a SIM card, which I had to buy from CC and then activate as part of my wife's plan. Actually I bought the card at a Sears store, which sells CC SIM cards.