I've seen this for <i>tons</i> of new products across cnet.
But the big guy does it too. MS hires loads of employees to express fanboyism for their products across the forums. Nvidia does the same thing, in fact one guy "rollo" was eventually found out on the Anandtech forums. Initially, he appeared to be the biggest Nvidia fanboy ever, until he was found out. I wish I was kidding about this, but this sorta thing is regular.
Funny thing is that on Amazon, for most new products, inevitably the first user review is almost always long, well written, very informative and completely positive.