I think the safeguard would be the fact that it's first, unethical, and second even if they're not ethical, they'd get caught eventually and both be banned. So, I can't see many taking such a big risk for such a small gain.<br>
<br>But, that's not necessarily saying one friend reviewing another's theme is immediately unethical considering most of these people actually know each other in real life and run in the same circles anyways. I'm sure friends have reviewed friends themes before without bias, in proper queue order and everything was just peachy.<br>
<br>But, if someone was caught displaying ridiculous favoritism I'm sure they'd get warning, then the ban-hammer and ousted here and elsewhere very quickly.<br><br>I should add things can fall through the cracks, because, as Otto and Chip have pointed out many times, the system kind of sucks and is out-dated. I've been first in queue or had my theme approved first, but see others get reviewed or pushed live before me even though they came after me all the time. I don't think it's a conspiracy, they're just different reviewers for different themes and first come, first serve I've learned is followed loosely. There's just a lot of different people with different skill sets volunteering and doing what they can in different areas.<br>
<br>When I first joined and was reviewing themes there were themes that I skipped in the queue because it seemed apparent that other reviewers knew theme more intimately and I thought the theme author would be better served by waiting for the more knowledgeable reviewer that had helped them all the times before.<br>
<br>Sometimes, some reviewers don't want to review a theme cause they're confused by it and sometimes reviewers will stick to certain themes exclusively just because they were the first to review it and followed it ever since, maybe they even have a rapport with the theme author, which is fine. I think massively popular themes that are updated at least once a day and have huge user-bases that are depending on those updates probably get a little extra attention.<br>
<br>I think all these things are fair and natural, but if it was totally egregious like a brand new submitted theme was reviewed even within a week as apposed to the current 2 month wait like everyone else, I think we'd all have a problem with that. Anyways, it's all volunteer-based so a little slack should always be given I think, no one is perfect. Anyways, are we just having a speculatory discussion or do you have more serious concerns?<br>