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In Reply to: RE: One of the problems with ezines... posted by josh358 on February 24, 2012 at 14:11:31
I guess I don't even see the reason that so called firewall is really there - what's to stop the head of the advertising department from walking down the hall to the editor and saying "give this a good review or we lose advertising and if we lose advertising you're the one who will be out of a job since you make the most money."
So yeah you have one guy who does it all - or you have two guys who do it all - but the bottom line is still the money. If the advertising keeps the magazine or e-zine afloat then the advertising revenue department is the one in control - there is no real wall there. And if they throw the ole - journalism ethics thing at you - well that's a joke since ethics in journalism has been bankrupt for decades.
I found your comment about praising a competitor too highly really interesting - I never considered that that might in play. All I can say to that is wow.
Follow Ups:
> So it's not my world view - it's THE world we live in. Money talks.
But that doesn't mean everyone has to listen. I can only assume you are
inadvertently revealing your own worldview. Kind of a dumb thing for a
would-be reviewer to do, IMO.
> Obviously long term survival is more important than immediate profit - but l
> long term survival is still about money since it's money for longer. Japanese
> business model worked better because they looked at 40 years down the
> road not just the next quarter.
You appear to be saying that if being ethical results in a magazine having
better long-term prospects is still an example of money talking. With respect,
you are stretching too far to defend your position. The only people who
would escape your generalization would be St. Francis and Mother Teresa.
> Again I am not saying or implying - if I did I apologize - that you were doing
> anything wrong or that Stereophile was only interested in the dollar - my
> point was merely that simply by virtue of having more than one guy at the
> helm is not automatic proof that it has walls to ensure honesty and ethics.
No, but it is a better guarantor of ethical behavior than when the same
person both writes and/or edits the content and also sells the advertising.
John Atkinson
Editor, Stereophile
I agree that in theory more people running different departments is less likely to be unethical - but corporations are all BAD - and they are generally run by many many many people and yet the result is destroying the planet.
If you think it's a stretch that a company would forgo profits in the now to get more profits later then I am puzzled. Corporations are interested in long term financial health and will forgo making a bigger buck today if it could threaten overall profits long term.
Companies have absolutely no interest in being "green" they are only green because that is what the public demands and if they're not seen as green they could go out of business - so they market themselves to be green before their competition does so they will be seen as good guys - and thus will increase sales. It's still about profit not doing it because it's the right thing to do.
A little film to illustrate the point.
"corporations are all BAD"
This is, I think, an over-generalization. I'm not going to romanticize business -- I've seen enough of how it's practiced to know that there are plenty of corporate sharks out there. But there are good people, too, and companies that behave ethically. It depends entirely on who's in charge.
Well, seeing you've all had a good time discussing my magazine and business model, how about we set a few things straight?My good friend Analog Scott, like most other internet pundits, considers me a "dick" because I don't agree with his somewhat limited world view on high end audio. I think most people that spend any time on forums at all will agree that this is pretty common. You either agree with whatever falls out of someone's mouth, or you are labeled "a hater." It's not that I don't like criticism (actually I don't, but then, who does) but I would like criticism that is more intelligent and points out a way to actually improve what we are doing. We've received a bit of that over the years and it has helped tremendously. Besides, none of you will ever be more critical of TONEAudio than I am, so much as you might like to think you're taking a poke at me, I agonize over this way more than you could ever imagine.
I spend a bit of time, perhaps a little too much over at the Steve Hoffman forum, because along with the RMAF, it's pretty much the place we launched TONEAudio almost seven years ago. And to my discredit, perhaps I've gotten a bit too personal there. But hey we've all made a few mistakes.
But like those four or five guys on every forum (and you all know who they are) Scott is someone that goes out of his way to try and challenge everything I post on that forum because for whatever reason that must make him feel special at the end of the day. If that's truly what gets you through the night Scott, good for you. I've seen plenty of people here be equally rude to John Atkinson and I'm sure at some point it's equally annoying. I don't always agree with John, or Robert Harley, and even though I've taken a poke or two at him, on occasion, I've also praised Stereophile on numerous occasion both in my publishers letter and on our blog and Facebook page.
What Scott really failed to understand in my comment about the products returned, was that the mfrs. in question were very small, off the radar companies that I'm sure could never get a review in Stereophile or TAS and when I sent said products back, they said, "you don't even have to review the product, just run our advertising," which I refused to do, because I felt then and still feel now that accepting advertising from a company that I think makes lousy products is still a backhanded endorsement. Again, that's my policy, it doesn't need to be anyone else's.
The lesson here is really that you can't keep everyone happy all the time.
As for all the accusations about the publisher being the same guy selling the ads is well taken and it has been something that has troubled me for years. But, as TONEAudio grew very organically, we did what we had to do to get from point A to point B and do the best job we can. For a little history lesson, if you take a peek at the humble beginnings of TAS and Stereophile, if memory serves me correctly, for the first TEN years, neither of these guys even managed to publish an issue on time and on a consistent basis until they adopted an advertising based business model. So I think considering that we've gone from a six issue year, to an eight issue year and now a ten issue year is pretty impressive.
There's a good reason for that. We started as advertising professionals and my wife (our art director) and I both did our fair share of award winning photography and design for Fortune 500 companies. Stereophile and TAS at their beginnings were hobbyist magazines that have now evolved into successful business enterprises.
I also wrote "professionally" for about 15 print magazines in the photography space before I was hired by Robert Harley to work at TAS in 2004. I wrote six reviews for TAS and we parted company. Editor Wayne Garcia and I never got along and I knew that I would never get the chance to cover the gear I was interested in because that fell to Robert, Jonathan and HP. No gripe, just fact. I didn't want to review $1000 integrated amps for the rest of my life, so I moved on to start TONEAudio.
Unlike Scott and the other internet grumpies, rather than constantly sniping about what Stereophile or TAS are doing wrong, I started my own publication and did it my way. Stereophile and TAS aren't doing anything wrong, we are all different channels on the cable box. I still subscribe to both magazines and enjoy them both. I bought a lot of gear over the years based on their reviews.
Because TONEAudio was started as a business first, we made the conscious decision NOT to produce a print magazine. Even though we spent our entire lives in print production, as early adopters on the hardware and software side of the fence, we knew print was in decline. A number of my closest friends work at the largest advertising agencies in the world and even back in 2004, they all said the same thing, "how can we get out of print, now?"
As a long time enthusiast of print media, that's not the reason we chose to go PDF. I looked extensively at what Stereophile and TAS were charging for advertising and knew that starting a print publication would require two things I DIDN'T want: An investor (we had 1.5 million worth of venture capital that would have backed TONEAudio as a print publication) and we would have had to charge comparable ad rates to TAS and Stereophile, which meant we would have had to operate from a predatory position. I felt the high end audio industry really could not easily support another print magazine, and did not want to be a competitor to them in that way, I wanted to be an addition to the industry. I didn't want advertisers to choose between TAS, Stereophile, or us, I wanted to be another audience for them to reach.
I also wanted a bigger percentage of the magazine to be based on music, which is the reason why I have always owned a great hifi system.
We continue to spend a six figure sum (yes, I pay my writers, photographers and editor) on the music section of TONEAudio with no advertising support, because that's the way I wanted to produce the magazine, and judging from the circulation we enjoy and the enthusiastic feedback from our readers, we're on to something. Not having to print and ship 90,000 magazines every month frees up the $$ for other things.
While we started the magazine with a skeleton crew, today we employ three full time people and 20 freelancers. While I don't know what my competitors payroll is, I'd be willing to bet if we got together at the end of the day and compared 1099 forms, our numbers would probably be pretty close.
Which leads us to the last item on Scott's list, the separation of church and state. I have always envied John's sales staff, and the fact that he doesn't really have to deal with that side of the equation. Thankfully, as of Dec 1., 2011, I no longer have that problem. We have hired Christina Yuin, a seasoned industry veteran that helped HP sell ads a number of years ago, and she also worked for Primedia (Stereophile's former owner). That was like having a gigantic tumor removed and I must say that made this year's CES the best ever, because I didn't have to sit in a single meeting that was advertising related. While I'm glad I don't have to work that side of the fence, I hardly doubt it will change our editorial all that much. We will still continue to review gear that we find intriguing and send back the stuff we think isn't up to snuff.
That's my policy and I'm sticking to it.
Interestingly enough, Paul Messenger's publication, HiFi Critic (Which I think is excellent, by the way) does not accept advertising at all. Yet on a number of products that we've both reviewed, we've pretty much drawn the same conclusions on the sound of said pieces of gear, the Conrad Johnson ACT II/series 2 and the Premier 350, a perfect example of this. So, my question to the Scotts of the world, is that if we are so tainted by advertising dollars, how can this be?
As Paul has said on occasion, "hifi is in your blood," and I couldn't agree more. With the ubiquitous nature of the internet and message boards, if any of us in the media consistently wrote the trumped up reviews you all accuse us of, it wouldn't serve the manufacturers that advertise with us and it certainly wouldn't help you the reader and enthusiast.
I'm reminded by the viewing of the 500th episode of the Simpsons, where it says, "please take a minute to go outside, before you get on the internet to tell everyone how much this episode sucked."
So, in closing if you don't like TONEAudio, don't read it. No one is holding a gun to your head. It's just hifi. We aren't causing or curing cancer - the damn thing is free if you want to receive it that way. If you've learned something, found a few new good records to listen to, or even laughed at the cartoon, (and in case you haven't noticed, our cartoonist, Liza Donnelly has been a staffer at The New Yorker for over 20 years and is one of the world's most prominent female cartoonists) then we've done our job. Personally, I tell all of my readers and friends that they should read EVERYTHING before they start to shop for hifi and plunk down their hard earned cash on any of this stuff.
If you don't like me or you don't like our approach, I can live with that too.
But don't tell me what I've spent the last 7 years of my life producing is a piece of crap, because it isn't. For every one of the incredibly mean spirited people like Scott that I've met in the world of cyberspace, I pose two challenges: A - I'd love to see you talk that rudely to me directly to my face and B - I would love for you to submit to me what you do for a living, so that I could make equally snarky and dismissive comments about your work. I'm guessing you'd chicken out.
And if you want to know something about the magazine, the staff, how it's run or what my business model is, call me before you start spouting garbage on the internet. Anyone that knows me, knows that I am very transparent and will pretty much tell you anything you want to know. But that's the first rule of journalism, isn't it? Go to the source.
For anyone that's read all of this, I thank you for letting me vent.
Publisher, TONEAudio Magazine
Edits: 02/25/12
> > > > > > > > > > > > > > "I felt then and still feel now that accepting advertising from a company that I think makes lousy products is still a backhanded endorsement. Again, that's my policy, it doesn't need to be anyone else's. < < < < < < < < < < < < < < < < < < <"
I like that policy! There was a high end dealer in Vancouver that went out of business but before they did they began selling Bose. I overheard the sales people recommending them right out of the gate - this was their death rattle because they basically sold out to get the profit margin.
I think that what you put on your site represents you and if you advertise what you can say you support then that is a fine upstanding policy to have.
I believe you cleared this up quite well. I think I'll have a look at your site.
yes let's get a few things straight."My good friend Analog Scott, like most other internet pundits, considers me a "dick" because I don't agree with his somewhat limited world view on high end audio."
No, i think you are a dick because of your perosnality. You are rude and arogant and you start fights for no good reason. That makes you a dick IMO. There are any number of people out there that don't share my views on high end audio that are polite and considerate. Complete gentlemen. I don't think those people are dicks at all.
" It's not that I don't like criticism (actually I don't, but then, who does) but I would like criticism that is more intelligent and points out a way to actually improve what we are doing."Actually when you were given intelegent criticism on your review of AP's reissue of Cat Steven's Tea for the Tillerman you pretty much acted like a complete dick.
http://www.stevehoffman.tv/forums/showthread.php?t=260957&highlight=cat+stevens+tea+for+the+tillerman
"Scott is someone that goes out of his way to try and challenge everything I post on that forum because for whatever reason that must make him feel special at the end of the day."that is just complete bullshit. And of course when one makes up bullshit about other people they are being a dick.
"Unlike Scott and the other internet grumpies, rather than constantly sniping about what Stereophile or TAS are doing wrong, I started my own publication and did it my way."There you go again just makin shit up. Please show us where I constantly snip about what Stereophile or TAS are doing wrong. Again, One of the reasons I think you are a dick is becuase you make shit up like this.
"If you don't like me or you don't like our approach, I can live with that too. But don't tell me what I've spent the last 7 years of my life producing is a piece of crap, because it isn't."Is it not clear that when I say I think you are a dick that is an expression of dislike towards you? So you can live with that right? And do you understand that when I say I think you are a hack it is an opinion I have of your writing skills and is based on reading a review you wrote? Again, it is an opinion I get to have. Doesn't matter whether or not you agree with it.
"I pose two challenges: A - I'd love to see you talk that rudely to me directly to my face"Rest assured that if we met and you were as rude to me in person as you are on line I would treat you no differently in person as I do on line.
"B - I would love for you to submit to me what you do for a living, so that I could make equally snarky and dismissive comments about your work. I'm guessing you'd chicken out."You are guessing I'd chicken out? That's a laugh. You know who I am and you know what I do for a living. If you want, feel free to start a thread on either forum and make all the snarky and dismissive comments you like about my work. I could not care less. OTOH I will step in and correct any factual errors. And I will certainly correct you when you misrepresent my motives as you have done in your post. So go ahead snark away.
Edits: 02/26/12
After reading TonePub's and AnalogueScott's reply it's pretty apparent who came off looking reasonable and who really is the "dick", or more applicable, the whiny-ass.
Love the "I will step in and correct..."
Well, that's enough fun for one weekend.
I think the folks at AA have better things to do with their lives than read another bitch fest. I said my peace, I'm done.
Publisher, TONEAudio Magazine
"I think the folks at AA have better things to do with their lives than read another bitch fest."
You may be overstepping your purview. :^)
But why bring your fight on that forum over to Audioasylum? If you know he posts there why not keep it there.
His explanation on this particular individual matter sending the product back and not allowing the company to advertise on his site because that is in essence a form or "support" or "recommendation" is a wholly acceptable policy in my view.
And c'mon - reviewers typically tend to feel they're right that's probably why they became reviewers.
Unfortunately, for those of us with Lit degrees (or any degree where essay writing is a main focus) we are practically trained to write in a persuasive - "This is a fact" style - none of those "In My Opinion" styled sentences allowed.
And it doesn't bother me to be called a Dick.
cheers,
Richard George Austen (RGA) :-)
"And c'mon - reviewers typically tend to feel they're right that's probably why they became reviewers."
I think there's a lot to that--same with music reviewers. At least you show some self knowledge about it.
-----
"A fool and his money are soon parted." --- Thomas Tusser
"His explanation on this particular individual matter sending the product back and not allowing the company to advertise on his site because that is in essence a form or "support" or "recommendation" is a wholly acceptable policy in my view."
That is fine. Of course he is just now explaining that. But the question I asked here was about accepting products for review that have an attached promise of advertising. I asked that question because I thought it was a legitimate question to what sounded like a real world problem that any editor might face.
Clearly that question has sparked some discussion
agreed - if a review magazine only reviews because they are going to get money then there is a serious problem.
JA has had to defend those attacks as well and then has to put out statistics to show how many non advertisers get reviewed vs advertisers.
Those issues I'm sure will always be brought up if you accept advertising of any kind. But if you don't accept advertising then how do you make any money? I mean if I am going to quit my day job to do it full time I need to make a living - if I run a website I am going to need advertising - and a lot of it - to be able to run the e-zine or print magazine.
I think it's a reality - and if you're a one person outfit like the Tone fellow then you have to do it all - at least to get it started.
I don't think there is any way around it - at least for the first several years unless you become big.
UHF magazine is a print magazine and there are lots of companies out there that will not send them anything - Arcam for years refused to since they gave a product a bad review.
The problem though is that UHF loses Arcam but other big companies that know about UHF won't send them anything - which is why you never see Paradigm or B&W - their advice columns have poo pooed them in the past.
So companies would rather send their gear to more sure bet publications. The companies that send to UHF tend to be smaller outfits who need to take the chance because they don't have the dealer network required by big magazines like Stereophile.
On the flip side a good review could mean a bit more because of the fact that they rip stuff - then when they do like something the review stands out more. No one need read between the lines to figure out how much the reviewer "really" liked it.
Unfortunately it means they don't get a lot of products to review because many companies will just avoid those publications.
Why should a big successful company put send them equipment to review?
Whether they give negative reviews or not is a complete red herring unless they have a reliable means of evaluating equipment.
-----
"A fool and his money are soon parted." --- Thomas Tusser
"Why should a big successful company put send them equipment to review?"
Big successful companies do send them stuff. Hello Bryston. The truth is that review publications have reviewers who can generally get most anything they want. Manufacturers will always take another review - it's cheap marketing - the more the better. It may be UHF doesn't want them - judging by their comment sections B&W isn't reviewed because they don't like the sound of them. UHF, I believe, has also mentioned that they'd be happy to borrow speakers for review - thus not going through a dealer and reviewing products whether the manufacturer wants it reviewed or not. And they can certainly do that with a purchased loudspeaker.
And the e-zines get the big boys Dagogo recently review B&W and it doesn't get bigger than them in hi-fi speaker brands. And we're not a print magazine nor do we measure equipment (if that's what you mean by reliable - UHF does do that - even if just a little).
"His explanation on this particular individual matter sending the product back and not allowing the company to advertise on his site because that is in essence a form or "support" or "recommendation" is a wholly acceptable policy in my view."
I can't imagine why anyone would have an issue here. One would think Tone whatever magazine would be applauded for that policy.
Your last sentence is laughable.
> > > my point was merely that simply by virtue of having more than one guy at
> > > the helm is not automatic proof that it has walls to ensure honesty and
> > > ethics.
> >
> > No, but it is a better guarantor of ethical behavior than when the same
> > person both writes and/or edits the content and also sells the advertising.
>
> Your last sentence is laughable.
I don't see why? When the same person both writes and edits reviews and
sells advertising, then the conflict of interest is internal. His optimal behavior
as editor is in immediate conflict with his optimal behavior as as an ad
salesman. By contrast, at a traditional magazine with a "Chinese Wall"
between the editorial and advertising departments, the conflict between the
optimal behaviors is externalized, involves different people. Thus when the
editor has to make a decision that affects the advertising, while the publisher
or ad director may shout and curse at the editor, they don't outrank the editor
within the corporation and cannot force him to rescind that decision.
Do you really not comprehend the difference between these two situations?
I wrote about this in the article linked below. From that article: "A newspaper
can flout an advertiser...but if it alienates the buying public, it loses the one
indispensable asset of its existence."—Walter Lippman
John Atkinson
Editor, Stereophile
But John - Is the reviewer also not a firewall? An Editor corrects spelling and grammar and ensures factual content. And puts the page together in a somewhat attractive way.
But I as the review know what I wrote because I have the original copy. If that's not what it looks like when it gets printed to the website then I am the check or balance on the editor as well, no?
And if a reviewer can be in cahoots with an editor then why can't the advertising exec be in cahoots with the editor too?
I suppose it depends on what job the editor is doing. If the editor is choosing the gear that is reviewed and ALSO is in charge of the advertising then I fully agree with you - they should be separate bodies because the editor could simply choose to review manufacturers that are sending money.
But the editor in my case does not choose the gear I review - I do. The editor does not tell us what to review or from whom. I think that is the difference between a print magazine - you have to choose what goes into an issue - a magazine has a limited space in an issue and a limited number of issues in a year (and the issues have to be somewhat consistent). So you have to make a call as to what will fit. Maybe you have to make other calls such as - we need to have a truntable reviewed because it's been a while or we need to do more CD players, or less speakers etc.
A Website (E-zine) can have 50 reviews in a week or 3 in two months. So there is no decision needed as to having to "make a call" on which products will be reviewed because space is practically limitless. And consistency is less important since it's free to view - people are not expecting to get a review by the 12th of each month on classical recordings, or speakers.
The "ad firewall" is a short chain-link fence but in no way a complete solution. I would bet regularly in JA's time at the head of Stereophile that while attending the various shows manufacturers have in the conversation about reviewing one of their pieces of gear mentioned wanting to advertise. No firewall can stop that. Nor can a phone/email conversation about a piece of gear arriving safely or background/technical questions about the gear prevent the manufacturer from tossing in a statement inquiring about advertising costs.
One job of a publisher I assume is to act as a gatekeeper, especially if review products come to them first for a look-over before being distributed for review. If the product doesn't meet a base level of quality standard it should be sent back. In the case of Tone, it is obvious the publisher reviews gear (much like JA). It seems perfectly reasonable to me that a time frame be allowed to exist for basic capability checking before switching over to the review time.
The original purpose of this thread as I see it is a crying out in a further attempt at nanny-stating the audio community. Instead of expecting to be spoon feed the information the OP should go proactive and research. The world of information is at one's fingertips, and within a month or so of release any product is going to have a Google list.
> I would bet regularly in JA's time at the head of Stereophile that while
> attending the various shows manufacturers have in the conversation about
> reviewing one of their pieces of gear mentioned wanting to advertise. No
> firewall can stop that.
No, but I refuse to discuss advertising in such situations.
> Nor can a phone/email conversation about a piece of gear arriving safely or
> background/technical questions about the gear prevent the manufacturer
> from tossing in a statement inquiring about advertising costs.
Of course, but I always refuse to answer, and refer them to one of the
magazine's three ad reps and/or its publisher.
> One job of a publisher I assume is to act as a gatekeeper, especially if
> review products come to them first for a look-over before being distributed
> for review.
If you mean the person who is the publisher, then no, that person in a
traditional print-based venture is responsible for the business activities and
the advertising; it is the editor who decides what should be reviewed and
sets the magazine's policies about reviews..
> If the product doesn't meet a base level of quality standard it should be
> sent back.
This is plain wrong, in that it is putting that manufacturer's interest ahead of
those of the magazine's readers, by protecting him from criticism. At
Stereophile, as I said in the essay I linked to earlier in this thread, once we
have received a sample for review, the review always appears in print.
John Atkinson
Editor, Stereophile
From what I've seen, whether a magazine has a real firewall or not depends entirely on the publishers. Stereo Review and High Fidelity obviously didn't, and I'm guessing they were representative of the majority of publications at the time. But I mentioned the Reader's Digest, which rejected tobacco ads and campaigned against tobacco use. I remember too the New York Times having ads withdrawn when it ran some kind of article that the drug industry found unflattering. So there are always some publications that act with integrity.
Consumer Reports and even Mad Magazine refused advertising. Before we laugh -- would we kids have had those great fake ads skewering Madison Avenue falsehoods if they hadn't? Both Stereophile and TAS were ad-free when they started. Not only did it remove one avenue of potential bias and pressure, it makes that clear to the readers who otherwise have no way of distinguishing between an honest and dishonest publication. Sure, the magazines were expensive then, but if you're spending thousands on equipment, that seems a minor expense.
Of course, that doesn't remove other possible sources of bias, not the least of which is that if a product isn't getting good reviews the manufacturer can withhold review samples. So a manufacturer can cherry-pick reviewers who like his product, sending horns to the horn-lover, SET's to the SET-lover, etc. Sure, if you read every show report and forum post you'll learn that this product wasn't reviewed because the manufacturer wouldn't provide a sample, that one because it wasn't very good, a third one because there were just too many products to review them all. But most readers don't have the time to do that.
I think there are several issues at play with what is ethical and what isn't. And I think you have to consider the manufacturer here as well since there are people's jobs on the line if a bad review comes out. Yes reader's come first but there does need to be serious consideration for the manufacturer end of things. After all there could be reviewers out there who will deliberately go after some company because he has a personal vendetta against someone.
So looking at the review process from the manufacturer point of view - well they are only going to send something for review if they think it will benefit them in some way - it's free advertising (well cost of shipping). Would they want to cherry pick - of course but logically it only makes sense.
You don't send your horn speaker to the panel reviewer who has publicly stated that he hates horns. That does a disservice to both the manufacturer and the reader - the reader should want the Horn/SET gear sent to the HORN/SET lover because I as a Horn/SET guy want to know that the reviewer has good ears (LOL) and that he can tell me how good it is in the field of Horn/SET or how it stacks up in the value for the dollar department. Having the guy who hates the technology say he hates them doesn't help me and only serves to hurt the manufacturer's employees and dealers.
As for your arguments about no advertising - I agree with you fully - the best way to remove bias (certainly perception of bias) is removed. If you don't take any money and refuse to you are illustrating that you can't be bought. Of course that doesn't really stop a company from saying - I'll give you $10,000 in cash to give us a great review - hush hush wink wink nudge nudge.
Although I suppose if this was rampant we'd see a lot more pro BOSE reviews since they have enough money and they love marketing so...
Ultimately what I am saying is there is a difference between the "perception of integrity" and really having integrity. If someone is willing to be bought they can be bought.
Still I would consider what I said before - a print magazine can not survive without advertising dollars. The advertising price tag is very high for manufacturers - their survival depends upon it. I don't think you can say that about the online magazines.
Now I am talking a bit out my arse here since I've never run a website but I can't imagine the dollars to be very high - not high enough to be "buy" the editor.
And isn't the check also the reviewer? The reviewer is on the front line - if the editor changes it drastically then the reviewer can call him on it no? The editor can also serve as a check on his reviewers.
I use my magazine as an example - basically I am told - go review whatever you like. Until this thread I had no clue who advertised on our website (heck I get targeted audio ads when I go to Yahoo so there is probably some cookie that knows what I look at and targets me - I've tuned out the side bar adverts
Anyway on the front page it's all stuff I'll never be able to afford - Acapella speakers $80 grand LOL - and that's a cheap speaker for them. Ypsilon, Bergman, Einstein - Maybe I could afford Ayon. I don't even know if I've heard an Ayon.
What I would like to see at all magazines is a very clear code of ethics in writing and an explanation of policy. Manufacturers and dealers and consumers can see it right there in print. If the policy at Tone is that they will send something back if it sounds bad and won't review the item then it has to be explained why that decision was made. At least then you know what their policy is even if you don't agree with their policy.
Bottom line - trust yourself. People don't give themselves enough credit for trusting their own ears. That way you can read the reviews as pure entertainment.
I don't blame manufacturers for not sending products to reviewers that don't like their product. After all, it's an expense, and who would want to spend the money to send out a product only to damage sales?
That, however, doesn't serve the reader very well. So I think complete reliance on manufacturer samples is problematic. But this I think is an issue for the magazines rather than the companies.
BTW, I suspect that editors aren't likely to direct equipment to reviewers who don't have an affinity for it, and reviewers don't seem eager to review components about which they aren't enthusiastic. That last makes sense to me, insofar as it goes -- who wants to waste time and space reviewing a product that the reader isn't going to want -- but I do think negative impressions should be reported, since otherwise it's hard for a reader to know what wasn't covered because it was bad or for one of many other reasons.
Agree with you that magazines should make their policies available in print. John Atkinson wrote an article detailing some of Stereophile's policies. This would have the effect of increasing reader confidence in the magazine, unless, of course, the policies were ethically questionable, in which case I doubt the magazine would print them.
I see reviews as more than entertainment, BTW. Like many, I no longer live near a major dealer so don't have much of an opportunity to hear new stuff. If I were contemplating a major purchase, I'd make a trip, but I'd want a short list of products to listen to. And some people don't even have that option anymore, or don't have a chance to listen to an item that their local dealer doesn't carry. Also, I think that a review can be useful even if you do get to hear a product at a dealer's, because critics listen at length, under conditions that more closely reflect the conditions at home. So buying something on the basis of what you hear at the dealer's is something of a crapshoot, and a show even more so, given the vagaries of show sound. I also find that I get a sense over time of which critics hear the same things I do and have tastes that are similar to my own. I'd say my experience has been about 50-50, in that whether I took the recommendation of a critic I trusted (I bought my Tympani 1-D's used without ever having heard them, and they were my best audio purchase ever) or listened at a dealer's about half of the things I've brought home were successful purchases. That's far better than chance, and I think the best that can be achieved unless you can arrange a home trial.
I tend to shy away somewhat on talking too much about gear that I like and what it doesn't do well. I am a "big picture" guy and I want a speaker or product that overall sounds "right."
People seem to often keyhole on the 1-2 negative comments and ride those when debating the merits of the speakers. I don't know how many Audio Note E debates I've been in and some putz will bring up that Art Said -the left hand on the piano was a little strong - as if reason enough to write the thing off. When I consider that his other speaker is a Quad (which doesn't have enough left hand on the piano) then such comparison need to be in play. Regardless big picture was it was good enough at the price range to buy em - which should tell you something.
Stuff I really like I don't want to have thrown up as the reason someone discounts the speaker - or worse they read a graph. Plenty of fine measuring speakers in Stereophile's class A rating list sound utterly dreadful in the real world - every room I've tried them in regardless of what is driving them. You take the ten best subjective speakers - THEN after you have heard the ten and deemed them best ONLY THEN do you look at the measurements - what those measurements say is what is "the best measurements."
When I audition a speaker, I'm focused on the big picture as well. Namely, does it sound like real live music. Comparing it to my auditory memory of real live music.
However, it doesn't take long before I start noticing specific aspects of the sound -- is it detailed, is it peaky, how does it image, etc. These are the kind of thing that, in concert, determine whether the speaker will sound realistic or not. And I think it makes sense for a reviewer to report these aspects of the sound, so the reader can better determine whether the speaker might be of interest to him, what its special qualifications are, etc. Forex, if a critic says "Speaker X is wonderful in most respects, but a bit bass shy," and you happen to be a bass freak, you're probably going to want to look elsewhere.
Measurements are dangerous. I grew up in the High Fidelity/Stereo Review era, and as a teenager, really thought that great-looking response curves and distortion pictures told you everything you need to know about the sound. Then, as I heard a broader range of equipment, I realized that that wasn't so. Typical measurement suites are partial, and it can be difficult to correlate the measurements with what we hear, e.g., we're more sensitive to broad low Q peaks than narrow high Q ones, and there's research that tells us how sensitive, but how do you apply that to a frequency response curve? Still, with experience, I find that the measurements, and the overall speaker design, can tell me a lot about a speaker even before I hear it. There's a stat sound, a horn sound, a ribbon sound, a mini-monitor sound, etc., and while speakers of course vary sonically within their categories, they tend to share certain family characteristics as well, because of basic constraints of practical design. You can also see design flaws and good design -- if a manufacturer departs from good practice in one aspect, he's likely to do so in another. And you can tell a lot from the measurements, though it requires I think a fair amount of experience to do so. For example, what does diaphragm self-noise look like, and sound like? Metal cone breakup? Standing waves in mylar? Arguably, two waterfall plots that look comparable to the eye will sound completely different to the ear, depending on the harmonic (or aharmonic) relationship of the resonances, their Q, etc. The mylar resonances in electrostatics don't even sound the same as the mylar resonances in planar speakers. The more experience you have, the better you can make those distinctions.
In one regard, I think, measurements are invaluable: they keep us honest. In their absence, you chase your tail. There's too much of that in audio, producers who listen to the mix on a crappy little Auratone because it better suits the lousy equipment they think their customers will have, rather than just making a good recording and leaving it to the consumer electronics people to improve their gear. They can also tell me whether the reviewer is overlooking something that would almost certainly bother me, like certain response aberrations -- but again, you have to have the experience to know that ruler-flat response isn't always desirable, and that one meter and on-axis measurements don't necessarily correspond to what you'll hear in your listening chair.
"And I think you have to consider the manufacturer here as well since there are people's jobs on the line if a bad review comes out."
You do? If the manufacturer makes an expensive boat anchor, let's say a product that does not work, never mind the sound, then why should you or any reviewer care about that manufacturer continuing to make money off consumers by selling them a bad product? As a reviewer, you are in a position to live with a product for several months, certainly more time than a consumer lives with a product before learning a design may be faulty. If you are as a reviewer have a component that blows up every three months, then you have a responsibility to inform the reader - regardless of how it effects the manufacturer.
Yes but has that ever happened?
And when it does happen it will get reported by the reviewer and the magazine.
I own a Cambridge Audio CD 6 CD player. This model was reported by a lot of people as having QC issues. I have owned this player since 1996 and it operates flawlessly to this day - If I reviewed it then or now I would tell the world how great this thing was and how overbuilt it was for a sub $1k CD player.
If I got the lemon then I would report that too but in reality neither is particularly true - in order to really comment you would need statistics - this player broke down at a 10% rate within the first 5 years versus a competitor that broke down at a 2% clip.
A reviewer is responsible to review the product given to him for review - if it fails get another one (but say that in the review) From time to time I have read such reviews where a second unit had to be sent.
John Valin recently raved about the sound of technical brain amps but he noted that while the sound was first rate he could not recommend them due to their 100% failure rate or some such disastrous high failure rate.
That is a different thing than sound quality however. There is a hugely popular speaker out there right now that I find to be the worst above $10k loudspeaker that I have ever heard by anyone ever. I think it sounds like shit. But it's built well enough.
How does that review help anyone? - pisses off the fans. The people who agree with me already buy other things and would never own the thing anyway. It could in theory hurt the companies business.
The thing has received numerous glowing reviews that I shake my head at - even the dealer that sells the speaker doesn't love them.
This speaker has done very well in TAS and Stereophile so what should I do? Should I get one home and review it and pan it or just let it go?
I simply chalk it up to the fact that that sound is not my cup of tea but obviously there is a massive fanbase that thinks otherwise and they are built well.
I do not agree with what Tone did - if this is what you're wondering - if a maker sends something to be reviewed and no one liked it then someone should write something to say why - even if it's a half review or two paragraphs stating the reason we sent it back.
Manufacturer X sent us an amplifier however we sent the product back because it had a continuous hum that we could not get rid or. Or it sounded out of phase or whatever the reasons. But readers should know about it - so I do agree with you in those cases.
I dunno, I've learned from negative reviews of products that I happen to like. Sometimes the reviewer confirms a sonic flaw with which I'm familiar. Sometimes he mentions something of which I was unaware, or quantifies it.
> If the advertising keeps the magazine or e-zine afloat then the advertising
> revenue department is the one in control - there is no real wall there.
In your world, perhaps, RGA, but not necessarily in the real world. Every
month an editor, if he is worth his salary, will need to make editorial decisions
that result in ad dollars being left on the table. Long term, those decisions
help the publication survive. See my mentor the late John Crabbe's
comments on this subject in paragraphs 6 and 7 at the link below.
John Atkinson
Editor, Stereophile
I wasn't attacking you or Stereophile just making a point that whether it is ONE person or TWO - which is the debate in this thread makes very little difference.
Even the link you posted - I agree that having a good magazine increases readership which increases who will want to advertise.
But it still comes down to ethics - One guy can be ethical and run the entire show ethically - just as easily as it could be for two guys to be unethical in tandem but put on the "perception" of being ethical.
Plenty of people at Ford got together to cover up hide or ignore the fact that they would rather let people die from rear end explosions and pay court costs - that wasn't one bad guy - that was a bunch of bad guys.
Studying several of the biggest most respected Newspapers in the U.S. as part of my history degree and their so-called News reports during WWII were laughable - it took more than one person to put out some of those lies. And Fox News is allowed to be called News.
So it's not my world view - it's THE world we live in. Money talks.
Obviously long term survival is more important than immediate profit - but long term survival is still about money since it's money for longer. Japanese business model worked better because they looked at 40 years down the road not just the next quarter.
Again I am not saying or implying - if I did I apologize - that you were doing anything wrong or that Stereophile was only interested in the dollar - my point was merely that simply by virtue of having more than one guy at the helm is not automatic proof that it has walls to ensure honesty and ethics.
I'd rather assume they're honest and are genuinely into this for the right reasons until such time as they are proven guilty.
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