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In Reply to: RE: Stereophile Has New Art Direction. posted by russ69 on December 16, 2011 at 21:55:09
I think it's important to visually seperate content from ad space in order to avoid confusion.
All in all, though, that ad was 25 carat gold.
Follow Ups:
...someone's attention.
LOL!
The piece could have been just as easily been written by Tellig, there was so little "reviewing" to it.
In a "Follow-up" later in the same issue, a different reviewer disussed the Audience power conditioner with the Teflon cap upgrade and also spoke in superlatives.
Where were the comparisons?
If you follow the link on the front page of Shunyata's website to the promotional "interview" at Audio Beat, you will find the same 'review' we saw in Stereophile this month....only in the linked article, the Analog Corner 'review' is given by the manufacturer instead of by the Stereophile author.
Was this simply a case of synchronicity?
The review in Stereophile also started off with a very agenda driven tone....promoting a technology or product was the premise of the review. It smacked of a personal agenda, to me.
Puff pieces are fine, if identified, a la Sam Tellig as being part of how he was charmed by the owner of the Opera factory and Venice is a city of artists, blah blah blah, or something like that, but hitting the reader with a stick right from the start trying to pre-validate a product is a bit much.
The 'review' basically used the manufacturer's pre-existing statements and simply "unquoted them;" offering them up as though they were the result of some sort of journalistic "investigation" on the author's part - it didn't strike me as a review, really.
Then, basically acting as though a promotional piece disguised as a review was the result of any personal investigation, independent research (which should appear, at least a little teeny bit, as though the author had considered some things for himself,) or at all objective struck me as though not much independent thinking went into that piece.
Add together the Shunyata website's front page "Interview" from "Audio Beat," the manufacturer's thoughts being presented as the reviewer's, the oddly defensive/hostile preamble, the images that appear on the Shunyata website and in the Audio Beat "article" and in the Sterophile column, and you have a column that was obviously unoriginal.
If Audio Beat had gone to press before Stereophile with their material, then they should go after Stereophile for plagiarism!
The "interviewer" from the Audio Beat piece basically cut and pasted a previous "interview," mashed it together with some promotional literature and images from Shunyata, and then presented it as an original column for Stereophile.
Think of any late late night infomercial format and you will have predicted the format of this month's Analog Corner "review," sans the faux applause and gasps from the faux studio audience. It crossed into parody for me.
The author in question will now think I don't love him, but I do. I read his work every month, and also enjoy his other reviews. (Except for the cables that don't conduct signal, the love of the broken CD player, and the misunderstanding of 'magentized' vinyl notwithstanding, but I digress.) My not worshipping this month's column has garnered me an invitation to quit reading him at all and te author adroitly tried to turn the criticism into an indictment of reviewing as a whole - this not the case.
It's because of my high regard of the author that I felt let down by this month's seemingly phoned in review.
Look, you've done nothing here but prove what a poor reader you are.
I did not review the Triton for The Audio Beat. PERIOD.
Nor is what I wrote there taken from their website. Were that the case I wouldn't have shlepped to across the country for a day and a half visit. I just would have copied stuff from their website.
I went to visit them. I wanted to see what kind of company they ran and see the DTCD actually operating. I wanted a cogent explanation from the designer. I wanted to gauge his sincerity face to face and I got all of that.
Fortunately most of the responses I've gotten have been extremely positive both for the factory tour and for the Stereophile column where I did actually review the Triton and compare it to previous Shunyata conditioners.
The Audio Beat piece was a factory visit story very much like a hundred or so you can find in magazines and online. So why you feel the need to heap sh..t on me for doing such a story is something you'll have to reconcile with yourself. I really don't care about your "reasoning."
Every review in Stereophile or any audio magazine is a combination of telling the manufacturer's story as they see fit with (hopefully) caveats that let readers know this is the manufacturer's claim and not the writer's conclusion, and then an assessment of the product's performance, sonically, and in the case of Stereophile in terms of measurements.
So this B.S. about my story being some kind of "advertisement" really pisses me off. It's nothing of the sort.
In this case, the company has made claims and attempted to back them up with measurements. If you don't understand them or don't agree with the, well that's fine.
As far as I'm concerned this is a very important story because finally there are measurements to back up claims about power cords and conditioners.
As famed designer John Curl once said:
First they deny there are any differences.
Then when with measurements you can prove there are differences, they say "well those measurements can't possibly make an audible difference."
Then they say, they thought of them first.
So you can make snide comments about these stories being "advertisements" but they are not. I suspect that real issue here is that proof is being thrown in your face about power cable and conditioner differences and you really don't like hearing about it because it goes against your long held belief system.
If I didn't already like the product or "believe" in such things, then why would I have noticed the similarity between your piece and Shunyata's own material, Sherlock.
You can cut the dumbass digression into the realm of golden ear bullshit hearing what us rabble can't, thank you. How did you even come up with that? Knee jerk cut and paste to misdirect attention from the topic?
Power generation, conditioning, proper grounding - all great. Not thinking a review was original is not an indictment of the product....but nice try.
"Belief system. " Good one. Nothing at all to do with the initial criticism, though.
nt
My only quibble is that aside from making an asswipe comment, you provide no backing for your assertion that it's an "infomercial." Please clarify because on that basis every review is an "infomercial." And if that's what you think, don't bother reading what I write.
You forgot "Delivery" in yer description of the acronym DTCD.
RE: "The grid's goal is to maintain 117V..."
That's an odd number. The current standard is 120V, +/- 5%. It has gone up over time; most of us recall the old 110VAC nominal level. IIRC, there was also an intermediate 115V level.
The statements below would have been easier to accept if JA had done independent measurements to back them up (but that may not be possible). That in no way means that you did not hear meaningful improvements with the Triton. Most of us are smart enough to know we have to audition a power conditioner before buying. Anyway, here are issues:
1. You have full reviews placed in the main body of the magazine, yet this is plopped in Analog Corner and takes the entire column.
2. As mentioned, no independent verification by JA or otherwise. Perhaps this is impossible (?).
3. "...ringing...is now imperceptible, essentially disappearing..." Defining imperceptible and essentially is difficult. You could be way below what matters, or way above. The Weiss DAC202 reviewed in the same issue has superb measurements, but the review makes clear it is not perfect sonically. One may not guarantee the other (and again, I am not suggesting the Triton does not sound great).
4. "The Triton doesn't limit current and can handle the biggest amps in the world..." I don't know, but you mention voltage drops, though it may be irrelevant. What are the biggest amplifiers in the world? Do you mean most powerful? How do you know that? I suppose this is a direct comment on the MBLs. Perhaps your kWs as well.
5. "Filtering ...doesn't leave any kind of residue, sonic or measured." How can this be supported?
I suppose it would be nice if JA could measure these things somehow. Maybe that isn't possible. Despite any points I make above, you are clearly hearing a superior conditioner compared to prior Shunyatas. I find this provocative, and if truly superior it is a bargain relative to the $10K Audience (though that does have four more outlets).
Please understand this is not a personal attack. I am trying to point out the sort of language that readers are cautious about accepting. But at the end of the day, your last sentence tells the reader to listen for himself. And that is wise advice indeed. You can only point the way.
Thanks, Steve
Ouch. My only "quibble", which seems to be the word of the week, was that I thought using a $3500 Shunyata power cord on the $4200 tube amp was a bit silly, and added nothing to the review. I would have used a cord commensurate with the the cost of the amp.
Otherwise, I am quibbleless.
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