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Have you noticed that on several occasions certain advertisers, and in particular a specific audio dealer, publish ads in Stereophile featuring specific products that they carry which are receiving a rave review in the same issue of the magazine? I have noticed this several times in Stereophile, for instance with the Boulder Digital Preamp.Does this mean that the magazines are circulating the reviews to potential advertisers ahead of publication? Would this be an ethical practice? I noticed for the first time that this same thing happened in the "new" TAS with the MIT Oracle cables review, where one particular advertiser actually quoted from the review itself in the ad that appeared in the same issue. I guess that since TAS publishes its content in the internet ahead of time one could argue advertisers can legitimately decide to advertise without having unduly influenced the reviewers. In any event it would be good if these "consumer" magazines clarified this aspect of their advertising practices.
By the way, I believe the quality of TAS has dropped dramatically with Mr. Harley as editor. This includes the following dissappointments in recent issues:
- no more comments from a second reviewer
- almost no controversial reviews
- where is REG?
- a shallow classification of components, in its first installment focusing on amplifiers, which seems like the flip side of Stereophile's classes, where "Class A" is awarded pretty lightly. In the case of TAS only stuff which costs more than $20K is worthy of "Class 1" (where is, for instance, the Marsh A 400S which at $2.5K REG though was "as good as amplifiers costing as much as houses"?)
- a bunch of less than convincing new reviewers
- a home-theater magazine like feel
- etc etc
The practice of sending a review copy to the manufacturer before publication is commonplace in the industry (in fact, expected) and there is nothing unethical about it. This allows the manufacturer to draft a response, hopefully in a reasonable period of time (I once was given a mere 12 hours some years back...). If the proof is circulated early enough and it often is, it may give the manufacturer time to get the new ad copy in (nowdays usually on disk meaning that the ad copy can come in quite a bit later then it used to ten years ago) easily in time to show in the same issue as the article.In my experience there are only a very few magazines that connect any of the advertising (or lack of it) to the published reviews and commentary, and for the record, TAS is not one of them.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the new editor an owner/partner of some stores that sell more ARC than anyone else?
Char...
Gosh, you are questioning whether those publications are 'ethical'. Do you still believe that their goal is to help audiophiles to make a sensitive decision?Please understand once and for all. THey have sold their souls to audio manufacturers long time ago. Their reviews are nothing but extended 'informercials'. They don't care about you or about me.
I just hope the more people would realize their utter irrelevance - and then, hopefully, as their sales figures drop, they would simply disappear.
nt
(nt).
(nt) no text
- This signature is monophonic -
.
I think that TAS is emerging from a long, dark period into the sunlight again. Robert Harley is doing a yeoman job,IMHO.
With subscription costs as low as $1/issue for Stereophile, you don't think they could sell as many copies as they would need to stay afloat on newsstands alone, do you?Production costs alone would bankrupt any magazine these days. Nope, they have to sell ads, ads, ads.
Same for TV. Look how desperate the studios are regarding PVRs. Because you can edit out a commercial before you even see one frame, they're panicked enough to launch huge lawsuits.
The easiest thing to do is not to pay attention to the ads, because in reality you're probably only going to buy what you want and can afford in the first place. Ads do more to reenforce than to sway.
So, if you won't pay more than X for a new component, having ads for units that cost 5X probably mean little to you anyway. Units in your range probably won't get advertised unless they're from mass market companies (Sony, Denon), because ads are expensive and they're the only ones with deep pockets.
Advertising has become the lifeblood of America. That advertisers have access to reviews ahead of time does not bother me. An ad is an ad; it is not editorial. Advertisers are savvy, but so are consumers and people like you pick up on these below the radar tactics and it leaves you with a low impression of both the magazine and the advertiser. It's their risk. But, it's still up to the consumer to be diligent in their research for a product purchase and reviews are only ONE opinion, biased or not. The advertisers probably pay a premium to have access to the reviews beforehand, though this is conjecture. This probably occurs in every industry and is just a fact of life in a free market economy.The fact that advertisers have access to reviews in time to design their ads and submit them for publication means that the reviews are completed months before the magazine goes to press.
Hello -You are wrong in your assumption, and that erroneous assumption leads you to an equally erroneous conclusion.
It is not true that "advertisers probably pay a premium to have access to the reviews beforehand". Instead, the magazine sends a copy of the review (at no charge) to each manufacturer so that factual errors may be corrected. This most typically occurs when the reviewer makes some small errors in the technical details of the product in his description.
Your conclusion that "the reviews are completed months before the magazine goes to press" is equally false. The manufacturer typically receives the advance copy of the review less than one week before the magazine goes to press. (This can be annoying, as it the manufacturers often only have a day or two to compose a response for publication.)
Best regards,
Charles Hansen
So, is it the manufacturers who pass on the review to the advertisers so that copy from the review ends up word-for-word (presuming this is a true fact) in an ad in the same issue as the review? I'm just curious.
> is it the manufacturers who pass on the review to the advertisers
> so that copy from the review ends up word-for-word (presuming this
> is a true fact) in an ad in the same issue as the review?
At least as far as Stereophile is concerned, this doesn't happen.
We don't allow quotes from a Stereophile review to be used in an
ad until the issue in which a review has been published has
disappeared from the newsstands.
John Atkinson
Editor, Stereophile
Hello -I don't think you'll find this happening at the major magazines like TAS and Stereophile. If you do see this happening, it would certainly seem suspicious. Have you actually seen this happen? If so, in what magazine?
Best regards,
Charles Hansen
What Mr. Hansen says is correct. There was a discussion on this topic a month or so ago.*Most* magazines do send reviews for fact-checking ahead of time. It's a disservice to everyone, including the reader, if a review is published with wrong facts (everything from company address to pricing to supplied specs can be in error, or change from when a product was submitted to when the review appears).
Doug Schneider
SoundStage! Network
to give the manufacturer a look at the review so they can comment on it. The manufacturer also (obviously) knows what issue the review will appear in so it's only common sense to coordinate an advertising push with the appearance of the review.
nt
Audio magazines get plenty of flack because they`re now widely regarded as being part of `the establishment`, whereas at one time they were `our` champions - seeking out the truth among the myriad claims and counter-claims of audio-equipment manufacturers.Of course an experienced reviewer should have an inbuilt point of reference which has evolved over many listening sessions, but superior experience is NOT a guarantee of superior knowledge, taste, objectivity or wisdom.
Most of us (I`m making a BIG assumption here?) regard hi-fi as our hobby, probably/possibly our main hobby which although a constant drain on the finances - sometimes a strain on relationships even - gives us immense satisfaction by transporting us out of the living-room and into the presence of world-class musicians.Audio reviewers are a different breed entirely.
For a start their eyebrows meet in the middle and poor personal hygiene ensures no social life whatsoever, the only contact with `outsiders` being at Hi-Fi shows when the aforementioned poor personal hygiene ensures the `sweet-spot` becomes instantly available on entering the various demo rooms.It is at these shows where alliances and friendships are developed between manufacturers and reviewers; this is the main problem as I see it.
If I personally knew the manufacturer of a piece of equipment being reviewed - which had little musical merit in my opinion - there`s no doubt my review would pull punches.
Positive aspects would be highlighted, negative aspects glossed over or the usual opt-out of "some may prefer this presentation..." used, and most friends actually think I`m too blunt and brutely honest in most respects.
The difference with reviewing audio equipment is that audiophile products are usually manufactured by relatively small companies, run by enthusiastic owners who probably had some hand in designing or at least `voicing` their equipment. Criticise one of their products in a specialist magazine and it would ruin the prospects of that product`s sales and could quite literaly ruin the company, so we should all perhaps put ourselves in the position of the reviewer before being too critical ourselves I feel; however, that`s not to say we shouldn`t be critical at all. If you want to review audio equipment you MUST be prepared to give an honest, undiluted opinion - I`ll admit I couldn`t do it, but then I`d never become an audio reviewer.What I would also suggest is that it`s the over proliferation of gushing reviews which make the even slightly less gushing reviews so damning, and the perception of those gushing reviews themselves as `just another gushing review`.
I`m sure we all had teachers who praised every kid at every opportunity but who`s praise we held in low esteem; it was invariably the hard to please, stern-faced ogre`s praise which we sought and respected the most.To my mind, the vast majority of new audio equipment could be described as `slightly different presentation than the Mk1 version, more a sideways shift rather than an improvement`. Sometimes there`s the latest fad/fashion to be exploited such as bitstream/HDCD/20bit chips/24 bit chips/upsampling etc taking CD playback as an example where none of these `technologies` is overtly superior to the other if deployed within the same player with identical analogue components.
Audio magazines have to perpetuate the myth that audio is constantly making massive gains in quality, because if the truth was known we wouldn`t be very interested in reading about the latest and greatest products.
I`ve yet to hear a comparatively priced integrated amp which sounds better than the Sugden A21a pure class `A` which is probably about a 15 year old design, same with the EAR 509 monoblocks at their price point which is around 20 year old; why if audio equipment has been constantly improving incrementally over the years are so may turning to older valve designs, or in general find listening to music through their `Best Buy` components so uninspiring? Incorrect matching of equipment is a major factor admittedly, but at the end of the day people are taken in by rave reviews and rather than concentrate on correct system matching they assume one of their components just isn`t good enough.I`ve yet to read an issue of Stereophile just in case anyone assumes my comments are aimed in this direction, and will happily admit that I`ve been exploring their excellent website quite often lately for information on DVD players, so big thanks to Stereophile in this respect; in fact if it wasn`t for their technical information I`d never have known that the Philips SACD1000 didn`t output a PCM stereo digital signal and might have ended up buying this model myself.
Finally, I can`t really agree with the statement that reviewers can accurately describe how a system sounds even if they don`t like that sound; if he states a system is TOO bright or TOO warm etc this is not objective or useful to me unless the example of Hi-Fi+ is followed, where their reviewers` own systems are printed so I at least know what they`re using for a reference - and if they can put a decent system together themselves.
If somebody recommends a piece of equipment on this forum it`s usually possible to click onto his own system whereby many a time I`ll raise my eyebrows and dismiss the recommendation out of hand as coming from a cloth-eared gimp - other times it`s apparent someone is fairly knowledgeable and discerning (IMO) so I`ll take them seriously.Best Regards,
Chris Redmond.
> > this is not objective or useful to me unless the example of Hi-Fi+ is followed, where their reviewers` own systems are printed so I at least know what they`re using for a reference < <Stereophile does this all the time.
If the reviewers complete home system is displayed and not just the other equipment they`ve got in for comparison, then I would find this very useful in evaluating the reviewer`s tastes in relation to my own; it would also be revealing to see how often a particular reviewer replaced his hardware - is he a hi-fi equipment junky or a music lover?
Fortunately I`m content with what I have so far as hardware goes so won`t be subscribing to Stereophile in a hurry, but I`ll repeat again that their website (and reviews therein) is excellent.Best Regards,
Chris Redmond.
The lists of gear used in a Stereophile review are often quite exhaustive, in some cases listing such minutia as brand of record cleaning fluid used.I always list all of my gear in one of the opening paragraphs of my reviews in Listener .
Ah - Listener!
I received a 1996 copy of Listener with my Audio Note DAC (Peter Q recommends Listener) and subsequently considered subscribing because the music reviews were quite extensive, and even the hardware reviews were no-nonsense affairs lacking in hyperbole.
Handy size for reading on the toilet too. :0)Best Regards,
Chris Redmond.
Well, yes and no, Chris.First off, most reviewers (at least the ones who have a track record) have listened to a lot more equipment than you and I, so, if they charactize something as "the best I've heard at the price" that statement means a lot more than it would coming from me (or perhaps from you).
Secondly, the best reviewers do a pretty good job of describing the sound of a component, whether they "like" it or not. That's valuable information; because sound is, to some degree, a matter of taste. Given that auditioning multiple examples of the same component usually involves going to several stores, often not close to you, being able to narrow your audition list is a useful thing.
A good example that I have followed with amusement for some time was TAS's damning with faint praise the current BAT CD player. The two TAS reviewers who listened to it, said they preferred a number of less expensive players, including the Sony 777ES SACD player (playing CDs, not SACDs). A few months later, in a Stereophile review of BAT's big tube power amp, there was a sidebar review of the same BAT CD player that was much more complimentary. Picking up on the TAS's characterization of the player as "dark", Stereophile's reviewer wrote that "even in a room with the lights out, it wasn't 'dark'." (that's as exact a quote as I can remember) Clearly, the boys are having a little fun with each other.
If you go back in Stereophile's on-line archives, you can find the 1998 review of the original BAT CD player (by JA), who compares it to a much different-sounding player (apparently) at the same price -- the Wadia 850. Guess what? JA doesn't use the term "dark" but he implies something similar when he says it obscures detail in good recordings that is evident in playback on the Wadia. (On bad recordings, he says he likes the BAT, which is forgiving.)
When you combine JA's comments from 1998, his colleagues' comments from this year and the TAS comments from late last year, they are all pretty much in agreement as to how the BAT player sounds. (I'm assuming that the newest version sounds much like the older version.) Where they disagree is whether they like that sound. TAS clearly doesn't; JA is mildly enthusiastic; the recent Stereophile reviewers (sorry, folks, can't remember who they were) are definitely enthusiastic.
What's important to the reader is not whether JA or the guys at TAS like the machine, but the accuracy of their description of how it sounds. If the reader is someone who does not like that kind of sound, he probably will take the BAT player off his audition list. If that sound quality appeals to him, then he will no doubt have a listen. For that, I think the combined efforts of these guys is a service not necessarily available from a web reviewer of limited experience (typically an owner).
As for the conspiracy theory stuff, somebody dumps that garbage here about once a month. I would note that the fact that a reviewer can buy a piece of equipment at wholesale is not likely to influence his view of the product. Most likely, he can by any product at wholesale. The effect is that the might be able to own a more fancy stereo than a "civilian" with the same discretionary income; that's all.
Well, yes and no on your analysis also Bruce.Clearly, the BAT matter you describe demonstrates that a reviewer reading another review can be influenced by another reviewer. That may or may not be good, if he is listening for 'dark', or otherwise not evaluating afresh, the review is tainted.
Sure, the conspiracy theories are little more than that. But high end audio is a pretty exclusive club, and a small one. These guys know each other, have friends and not so friends, products they might want to push a bit, and other natural influences. And then there are the errors of omission, which are more grievous. Not reviewing products that should be reviewed.
And the greatest danger, of course, is believing that the review is any indicator at all of how the component will sound in your system. All too often the context is misleading. Reviewing an affordable amp with a Burmeister CD player and Wilson Watts is very misleading as to the performance that can be obtained with more relevant associated components.
The other great flaw is that of conflicting goals. For example, HP professes to seek some absolute. This, from what I can take, is searching for absolute neutrality. I hate neutrality. I don't want anything neutral, I want a point of view and personality. If I take HP's advice, I would be sorely dissatisfied. Stereophile also seems to do this, and perhaps there is a growing gap between the reviewers and the buying public. I see that reviewers are going in one direction, while buyers are very much heading in a different one.
Several years ago, Sonic Frontiers were the darlings of Stereophile. Every product was quickly reviewed and shot to the top of the recommended list. Sonic Frontiers were the biggest advertiser. Then they went bankrupt and the ads stopped. The next Stereophile review of a SF product was a combination of total pan and lukewarm praise while toasting the product between the lines. Coincidence?
> Several years ago, Sonic Frontiers were the darlings of Stereophile.
> Every product was quickly reviewed and shot to the top of the
> recommended list. Sonic Frontiers were the biggest advertiser. Then
> they went bankrupt and the ads stopped. The next Stereophile review
> of a SF product was a combination of total pan and lukewarm praise
> while toasting the product between the lines. Coincidence?
Hi Robert. Are you the same "Robert" who wrote something very similar
on the Asylum last September? If not, then please note that there
is not a word of truth in what you have written. If you are the same
"Robert," then it is disingenuous of you not to mention that I
took the time to address this point last September. This is
what I wrote at that time:
I dug into the Stereophile archives and here are the number of
reviews and followup reviews that were published in the two years
preceding the Sonic Frontiers bankruptcy and in the three years
following:
Product Reviewer Publication Date of Review
Sonic Frontiers SFCD-1 (Harley) September 1996
Sonic Frontiers Power 2 (Reina) May 1997
Sonic Frontiers Power 1 (Kastanovich) November 1997
Sonic Frontiers Line 1 (Kastanovich) November 1997
Sonic Frontiers Line 2 (Rubinson) November 1997
Sonic Frontiers Bankruptcy and Sale to Paradigm, August 1998
Sonic Frontiers Transport 3 (Dickson) October 1998
Sonic Frontiers Processor 3 (Dickson) October 1998
Sonic Frontiers Transport 3 Followup (Phillips) February 1999
Sonic Frontiers Processor 3 Followup (Phillips) February 1999
Sonic Frontiers Power 2 Followup (Reina) March 1999
Sonic Frontiers Phono One (Damkroger) May 1999
Sonic Frontiers Power 3 (Damkroger) April 2000
Sonic Frontiers Power 3 Followup (Rubinson) June 2000
Sonic Frontiers Line 3 (Rubinson) June 2000
We have not reviewed any Sonic Frontiers products since June 2000
as the company's product line did not change, but Kal Rubinson and
Brian Damkroger continued to use SF products among their references.
Sadly, I was informed at HE2002 that Paradigm has discontinued all
the SF 2-channel gear in favor of multichannel products to be sold
under their Anthem brandname.
But with respect to your original point, as I said last September, the listing above clearly shows that your recollection of what
happened vis-a-vis Sonic Frontiers and Stereophile's review
coverage of the brand is incorrect.
Sincerely
John Atkinson
Editor, Stereophile
You wrote: "The next Stereophile review of a SF product was a combination of total pan and lukewarm praise while toasting the product between the lines. Coincidence?"Which SF product was that one?
Robert H. wrote:
> > The next Stereophile review of a SF product was a combination of
> > total pan and lukewarm praise while toasting the product between > > the lines. Coincidence?
Kal Rubinson wrote:
> Which SF product was that one?
Hi Kal, according to the index data I posted to the Asylum, the
"next" Stereophile review of a Sonic Frontiers product to appear
after the company's acquisition by Paradigm was Shannon Dickson's
total rave about the Transport 3 and Processor 3 in October 1998.
And I note that "Robert H." has yet to respond to either of our
postings.
John Atkinson
Editor, Stereophile
I didn't reply to your post because it really didn't relate to the substance of what I was saying, unfortunately, you pop up to defend Stereophile, but unknown to you, Stereophile isn't the centre of the universe.Your comments are very misleading. obviously Stereophile works on some fairly long lead times. The reviews you list were in many cases already at the printer, or in earlier stages of preparation, when the bankruptcy took place. Quoting the issue dates is misleading, as you are well aware that some of those issues were finalized before the bankruptcy was known.
If you really want to be factual, why don't you search your archives and post here a listing of monthly SF advertising revenues correlated against reviews. that would be much more interesting.
Hello -I seemed to remember the Sonic Frontiers episode somewhat differently. They had a good product line that was quite successful. When they replaced it with a new product line with a different sound quality, it wasn't received well, either by the end users or the reviewers. It was sometime after that that SF went out of business.
Best regards,
Charles Hansen
And if they characterize nearly every component in this way, or in some other glowing cliche, that means a lot, too.
- This signature is monophonic -
As a long-time reader of Stereophile, TAS and (when they were published) Stereo Review, High Fidelity and Audio, I can tell you that a careful read of most of their reviews (the qualification "most" applies to SR and HF) will get you an idea of what the reviewer thinks of the product. And the "best I've heard" statement is not found in every review, even in SR, which was the least critical of the bunch.OTOH, if you have no truck with subtlety, i.e. your idea of a "tough" review is for the reviewer to say "This sucks, man!" you probably will be disappointed. I get the feeling that is the real root of the problem the seems to bother lots of the conspiracy theorists lurking here and elsewhere.
I assume, of course, that these whiners dutifully subscribe to all of the ad-free audio mags (and to Consumer Reports for good measure) so they can get their information unpolluted by those nasty people who make the equipment they want to buy.
Maybe not every review claims "it's the best I've heard" - which is not what I said - but I stand by the idea that the overwhelming percentage of reviews are highly positive, as in "glowing cliche[s]". "I would have guessed it was an 800.00 CD player" was never uttered about a 1600.00 one by Sam Tellig, unless you have an example.This positive bent is still the case when significant problems are found, as with the 1.5k Monsoon review, or the 50k shipping damaged Burmesters (can you imagine experiencing that as a consumer?), or the typically over the top little Mission review, to take just a few Sphile examples. But certainly it is possible to discover problems by reading the review or by reading between the lines, as you say.
On the other hand, I doubt Julian Hirsch ever printed anything meaningfully critical regarding audio equipment in his life. He was a total joke. Did he even listen to the stuff? You can't tell from the text. The online magazine reviewers are likewise even worse than Sphile/TAS. There's no differentiation in the fulsomeness of their praises.
Also, characterizing my idea of a tough review as one which calls something "cr*p" bears no relation to anything I said.
If you want to understand how high end audio works in my view, here are a couple of examples:
1) The 70's SAC salesperson course expressly taught never to criticize a component, on the grounds that doing so would reduce everybody's credibility. It's industry dogma, although not absolutely universally followed.
2) Thom Holman once demoed his Apt Holman pre at a show side by side with a Levinson product. While he didn't call it a name, so far as I know, he tried to argue that his pre amp was actually better in certain areas. I have good reason to believe that John Curl to this day strongly resents Holman for doing that demo.
Of course, there are industry exceptions. Brian Cheney at VMPS doesn't seem to pull a lot of punches, criticizing Wilson as over-priced. And moving away from the glad-handing press here, the British audio press regularly calls pieces of equipment failures, in so many words.
- This signature is monophonic -
Your last two points have nothing to do with the topic. Standard sales technique for any product is not to disparage the competitor -- for legal and psychological reasons. So what if John Curl is still ticked off at Thom Holman about the demo. What does that prove about reviews?I agree with you that some of the stories in reviews about malfunctioning components or ones that blow up are not encouraging. But, after reporting that a certain component failed during the test, what do you expect Stereophile to say? That it was a P-O-S? Beyond reporting the fact of the failure (which they don't have to do, BTW), they have no basis to draw global conclusions from the reliability of one sample.
As has already been mentioned by a number of people from the magazines, to some extent they choose to review stuff because they heard it at a show and it made a good impression. No magazine (other the Consumer Reports) purports to collect up all available examples of a given product and then rank them. So, it's not surprising that most reviews are, in varying degrees, favorable. What's interesting, in Stereophile at least, is that JA seems to operate as a check on the enthusiasm of some of his colleagues. Last fall, the magazine reviewed Joseph Audio's latest speaker and gave it a huge rave. But Atkinson did a sidebar and complained about the lower-than rated sensitivity and the bass, which he apparently didn't like.
Finally, I don't think you should lump the e-zines and the print zines in the same box. I agree with you that some the of e-zines, Stereotimes, in particular, have little credibility. Just for fun, try reading all of the Stereotimes reviews of wires back-to-back. Why does Stereotimes continually flog to Talon Khorus loudspeaker, which seems to garner no accolades from any other corner? Why did Stereotimes do a second review of the RGPC power conditioner after it was pretty thoroughly panned by Stereophile?
As for the Brits; I don't read their magazines enough to have an opinion about whether they are more or less critical than the Americans.
" Beyond reporting the fact of the failure (which they don't have to do, BTW), they have no basis to draw global conclusions from the reliability of one sample."I agree about the (lack of) statistical reliability from one sample but it is not true that we do not have to report a failure. Much to the annoyance of several manufacturers, it is Stereophiles policy that reviewers report all failures of equipment submitting, even if the unit is replaced by a fully-functioning sample. The serial numbers of both units is also reported.
I know it is Stereophile's policy to report failures; because I've read the policy. I was not recognizing a difference between a magazine's policy and an individual reviewer's practice.What I meant was -- in the terms you use -- it doesn't have to be Stereophile's policy to report those sorts of failures and malfunctions. That's a self-imposed obligation (which I commend, BTW, and which somewhat gives the lie to "it suits me's" argument that you're all in the pockets of the manufacturers).
Now if I could just get your mag's circulation department to send me the damn magazine, I'd be doing good!
Hello Bruce -Thanks for the laugh! I never have figured out the mentality behind those who think of manufacturers as those "nasty people who make the equipment they want to buy". Maybe manufacturers are only "nasty" when you *don't* want to buy their equipment. Who knows... Anyways, it certainly is a widespread phenomenon, even appearing in some of the "Bored", which surprised me upon first encounter.
Best regards,
Charles Hansen
and since you're referring to our thread over on Digital, I'll state that I don't find you nasty, however I did find your statement stating that you couldn't build a 'universal' player for less than $15k to $20k, hard to swallow.I'm sorry if you felt threatened when I questioned your figure and told you that others are doing it for less.
Chris
Hello Chris,I'm glad you don't think I'm "nasty"! :-)
I also don't feel threatened by any of your postings. I find your habit of misquoting me annoying (this is at least the third time), and I don't know why you persist, as you keep misrepresenting my position.
I never said Ayre "couldn't build a 'universal' player for less than $15k to $20k". What I actually said was, "The retail price of a player that could play *all* of the new formats (including multi-channel) at an appropriate performance level would probably be in the range of $15,000 to $20,000." These are two very different statements.
In my subsequent postings I amplified upon the caveats contained in my original posting, particularly the parts about "*all* of the new formats" and "an appropriate performance level".
I would appreciate it if you didn't misquote me. I would also appreciate it if you didn't imply that I (or Ayre) were "rip-offs", or engaged in price "gouging", although I suppose that everyone is entitled to their opinion. However, when the poster's opinion is bolstered by incorrect quotations, I find that annoying.
Best regards,
Charles Hansen
where I come from, a player that plays all formats: DVD~V, DVD~A, SACD, CD, CD-R and CD-RW, is called a UNIVERSAL player and by definition, it would have to be multichannel. So I don't think I misquoted you and I don't feel that my 'concern' over price is misplaced. If anything, your opinions on the current state of affairs regarding SACD in particular, are misguided.As an example of this UNIVERSAL player, look to the Pioneer 47a at a retail price of $1200.
Well, I'm through with this subject. In the future, if you have an issue with me personally, you're welcome to confront me directly and dispense with the allusions.
Take care, Chris
Well, Charles. Perhaps we should say: "occasionally over-zealous"?Present company excepted, of course!
(To be fair to us Boreders, there was that one fellow who maintained a platoon of sockpuppets and marched them around AA trumpeting praises of his company's electronics. To protect the guilty, I won't name names; but it's all in the archives. So, some stuff does happen that shouldn't happen.)
Not all reviewers are good at what they do, but a lot of them are excellent at what they do. To posit that "all opinions are equal" is to deny both the objective nature of reality and the fact of excellence.I do not seek advice on buying wine from people who do not drink, or are below legal drinking age, or who have not had enough experience to be able to give advice that is more predictive than throwing darts. Yes, a teenager may have an "opinion" after swallowing a mouthful of Puligny-Montrachet. No, that "opinion" is not equal in validity to Peter Parker's.
There is an ethos and a canon to arts such as playing the violin or piano or singing Schubert's lieder. Application of that ethos and canon results in an objectively extant phenomenon. Perceptions and preferences may vary, but there is an underlying objective reality.
Some pieces of equipment demonstrably reproduce the objective reality with fewer distortions than others. And I am talking perceived and not measured distortions. It is the critic's job to explain what the shortcomings of a component are and how much of a difference they make. And what the component does right, too. Some critics are better at it than others.
Consumers should not buy blindly just because a critic goes ga-ga. But that does not mean that a consumer who has heard three expensive amplifiers and bought one is worth listening to. Whereas JA is worth listening to, and, when he is on his game (rarely these days it seems) so is HP.
Cordially,
JM
Well yes John as far as it goes.But, objectivity is an ideal approached only the more we allow different values and viewpoints into the picture.
Though it saddens me - a bit, a lot of my musical friends don't know much about classical music at all, and don't reach for it like I do. The converse is also true.
I think the rise of HIP etc is evidence that the core repertoire matters in a very shared and thus important way, there si alot more of an aesthetic debate now. I happen to think this has always come and gone, at least since art music that lasted, became possible. It is definitely something I want to see survive
Whether this started with solfa notation in Italy, or in the late 18th C, is not what I am getting at.
Chris Hogwood's old orchestra, the ACAM now, takes its name from a group started to play music less than 50 years old, back in the 18thC.Because I a share a love of R&R or the blues or whatever, or jazz with some of the classical guys, well, I can still converse with them.
Timbo
Otherwise I am in agreement with you.
Yikes.This is not the first time I have done this!
I think what happens is I say to myself "Robert Parker," and then I say "No, that's the guy who writes violent crime novels."
Which I have an aversion to, so I think "Ah, Peter."
Ciao,
JOHN
Hello -Well, I'm glad that's cleared up. I kept asking myself, "What does Spiderman know about wine, anyway?"
Best regards,
Charles Hansen
UUmm,Isn't Robert Parker the 'Jazz in digital stereo' guy from Orstraya, down here. Recordings issued by the BEEB and ABC too.
No?
timbo
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