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Stereophile Nov. '09

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I had just renewed my subscription after about 6 months lapse but was surprised to find the following...
Anyone notice pgs 46 thru 72 are all advertisements(27 consecutive sides of ads). They look like mini product reviews w/ Q&A but if you look hard enough at the top of the page, in small muted white letters, the word "advertisement".
Nice work guys, you have now joined the ranks of my wife's magazines, e.g., Marie Claire, Allure, Ellie & Cosmo, etc...
You have now made it possible to read the entire magazine in one sitting at my local Barnes $ Nobles, over a couple cups of coffee. Nice!!
Bill

Follow Ups:

I have an idea to make the new ad section even more interesting... - rottenclam 20:40:31 11/08/09 (3)
First of all, I just want to say that I actually enjoyed the big advertisement section on computer audio. What I liked about it was how you have some of the early pioneers talking about their approach alongside some other participants that are clearly late to the party (some of whom are not even copping to their dependency on OEM in order to limp into this market).

Sure, these are advertisements that have the intention of selling products, but we were at least mostly blessed with ad-copy written by folks from these smaller audio companies that probably work in the same room as the designers of the products (or maybe they were even the same people), so the copy itself did not sound like it was completely sanitized by a 3rd party PR group, or worse, it did not sound like it came from a disembodied Marketing Department. It makes me appreciate the fact that most hi-end audio companies are still either small or medium sized businesses.

As a matter of fact, even though I already like Stereophile a lot, I would LOVE Stereophile if they continued to run advertisements like this more often, but lets shake it up a little bit each month.

For example, each month we could have something different like:

12 speaker manufacturers talking about their particular cabinet construction.

12 amplifier companies that explained how they approached building their statement integrated amplifier

12 Turntable manufacturers explaining their approach to suspension, non-suspension, etc.

12 Cable manufacturers that could explain....actually, please dont let them try to explain anything else to me. :)

12 Digital source manufacturers to explain why they use certain filters, non-oversampling, upsampling, etc.

What I like about this idea is that you're basically giving an invitation for these companies to give you an "elevator pitch". They may choose to use the pitch to dumb down the information to a layman, or they may use the page to distance themselves from their competitors by explaining on a very technical level why they are different, or they might even just share some of the lessons that they've learned as they've tried to perfect their designs over the years.

This may seem like a stupid comparison, but we should be looking at this new ad section (and I am assuming that there will be more) as if it were like going to one of those speed-dating events. I have never been to a speed-dating event, but this is the closest analogy I can make.

Of course, I read Stereophile for the content and not for the ads. However, I will admit that I thought this recent issue was greatly enhanced by this "special advertising section". When I first saw the banner across the cover that said there was a "special advertising section" I rolled my eyes, but it was the first thing I opened up...simply because I wanted to see the train wreck (because, c'mon, those special advertising sections in other magazines usually suck eggs)...and wow, cool, Charles Hansen explaining all those twists and turns for Ayre, Gordon Rankin pulling down the curtain on the industry a bit, etc. Great stuff!

Please dont get me wrong though; I would much rather learn about all of these things by having industry personalities / designers be interviewed by Stereophile staff, but I've heard worse "elevator pitches" than the ones I read in this recent issue, so I am NOT going to be cancelling my subscription.

Keep on keepin' on, John A.
- Why not just cut out the middle men - ScottZ 12:51:12 11/09/09 (1)
  and have all of the editorial content written by company representatives?
  
  Actually most reviews in Stereophile do a good job of passing on the manufacturer's talking points about the product to the reader.
  - RE: Why not just cut out the middle men - rottenclam 19:14:27 11/09/09 (0)
    I hope you did not take away from my post that this is what I think Stereophile should do.
    
    My opinion is that Stereophile's current core group of "middle-men" are much more fun to read than all of the other audio magazines out there (well, I have to admit that I do not read any of the non-English magazines).
- I enjoyed the section - mcondo 05:07:35 11/09/09 (0)
  As one who will eventually go Computer Audio, I found the section informative - the advertising part was obvious but not overdone.
RE: Stereophile Nov. '09 - John Atkinson 06:35:57 11/07/09 (9)
> Anyone notice pgs 46 thru 72 are all advertisements(27 consecutive sides of ads).
> They look like mini product reviews w/ Q&A but if you look hard enough at the top of
> the page, in small muted white letters, the word "advertisement".

We follow the American Society of Magazine Editors guidelines regarding "advertorial"
sections like this, which are that a) none of the magazine's writing or editing staff be
involved in their production, b) that every page of the supposed editorial content be
labeled as a advertisement, and c) that the design, font, etc be maximally different
from the magazine's usual style. All those guidelines were followed to the letter with
our November issue.

> Nice work guys, you have now joined the ranks of my wife's magazines, e.g., Marie
> Claire, Allure, Ellie & Cosmo, etc...

All successful magazines, it should be noted. Seriously, supplements like this help
pay the bills, thus allowing me to continue bringing you the regular content.

John Atkinson
Editor, Stereophile
- RE: Stereophile Nov. '09 - jimdgoulding@yahoo.com 06:45:26 11/10/09 (0)
  Ya can't argue with that. Well said.
- I don't get all the griping - Beetlemania 11:23:25 11/07/09 (2)
  > > > All those guidelines were followed to the letter with our November issue.
  Exactly! It was VERY clear to me that it was an advertorial. It says so on the cover. It says so on each page. The layout and fonts are distinctly different than any of the main content. Good grief! I guess you have to have some type of alarm installed when people flip to those pages of their $1 per issue mag!
  
  And yet there are multiple whiners here and on the 'phile forum. I just don't get it. Stereophile is one of the few places in my life where, not only do I not mind but, I actually like to see some ads. There are a shit-ton of products out there that I might not otherwise be aware of.
  
  Keep up the good work, Mr. Atkinson. It will be a sad day if the printed version ever gives up the ghost.
  - Live And Let Live - Diode 08:59:51 11/08/09 (1)
    ""And yet there are multiple whiners here and on the 'phile forum.""
    
    Is it really necessary to personally attack and name-call those whose opinions don't agree with your own? Good grief, it's a big world out there and we're not all going to share the same viewpoints, so let's not be narrow-minded and let's show some tolerance for the opinions of our fellow Asylum members.
    - Yes, I agree - Beetlemania 15:39:09 11/08/09 (0)
      What I should have written was that "I don't understanding the whining".
- RE: Stereophile Nov. '09 - Mr_bill2 08:12:22 11/07/09 (0)
  I've been reading Stereophile on and off since Vol 4 No. 5(which I proudly display - to my wife's dismay - on our center book shelf.
  
  Ads or not, as a long as the content is there, my zeal will never diminish.
  
  Thank you for responding.
  
  Regards,
  Bill
- RE: Stereophile Nov. '09 - Spendor Harbeth 08:01:49 11/07/09 (3)
  Even ol' SpenHar here has to say, they have to quit the fake outrage......they have to understand if they want Dog Day Afternoon they have to put up with Any Given Sunday.
  
  The fact is Stereophile has to pay salaries, bills, rent, and the usual cost of doing business.
  
  Otherwise you can pay $250 a year for a Wall Street style news letter.
  
  I'll take the current set up any day.
  
  Lastly, those "supplements" are done as about as well as they can be.
  - I thought... - goblin141 12:35:54 11/07/09 (2)
    the issue was done very well as they always manage to each month. I look forward the each one that my wife forwards to me.
    - RE: I thought... - John Atkinson 05:21:18 11/08/09 (1)
      > the issue was done very well as they always manage to each month.
      
      Thanks.
      
      > I look forward the each one that my wife forwards to me.
      
      Now that's some wife! :-)
      
      John Atkinson
      Editor, Stereophile
      - RE: I thought... - goblin141 06:33:13 11/08/09 (0)
        
        In Reply to: RE: I thought... posted by John Atkinson on November 08, 2009 at 05:21:18
        
        Absolutely the best. I've been working away from home for 2 years on water projects. Will be home for Christmas and them some this year. Looking forward to her, my daughter and lots of records (something else she is very good about).
What does a subscription cost, anyway? - Anji12305 04:31:17 11/07/09 (0)
I recall it being less than $20 for the year.

If I want real news, without clear bias, I read the Economist.

Magz like the Phile are a gateway to more information. In particular, they refer to music selections that I would never hear otherwise.

My Charles Tolliver recording would have remained an unknown entity without reference in the music reviews section. I don't know why the advertisement section is such a worry, we gladly pay for a magazine twice yearly that is one large advertisement.
In the early 80's I got a Car and Driver with 21 cards stuffed in it. 21! * - mr grits 16:20:15 11/06/09 (0)
.
Share a bowl of grits with someone you love tonight.
I'll have to cancel my subscription to The New Yorker. - samtellig 13:44:28 11/06/09 (4)
They run advertising supplements all the time.
- You're forgetting an important distinction - ScottZ 13:02:38 11/09/09 (1)
  Stereophile and other audio magazines review the products that are also subjects of the advertisements. Last I checked, The New Yorker doesn't review cars or write feature articles on vacationing in Mexico.
  
  That said, I don't think it's a big deal that Stereophile includes advertising supplements as long as they're clearly marked as advertisements.
  
  I do have a problem when a review reads like ad copy, which I think has the effect of undermining the credibility of the review.
  - Reading reviews - John Atkinson 07:42:13 11/10/09 (0)
    > I do have a problem when a review reads like ad copy, which I think has the effect of
    > undermining the credibility of the review.
    
    The fundamental test of a review is to ask yourself whether there was anything you
    had learned about the product that you would never have known by reading the
    manufacturer's literature or its ads. If you didn't, then the review was the result of what
    J. Gordon Holt used to call "reviewed in the box."
    
    John Atkinson
    Editor, Stereophile
- I gathered your politics are too right wingish for The New Yorker - keith_d 10:44:16 11/07/09 (0)
  Maybe you just like all the cartoons which feature cats.
- RE: I'll have to cancel my subscription to The New Yorker. - lord addleford 14:21:30 11/06/09 (0)
  as with the new yorker, a pair of shears, snip, snip and the supplement goes into the garbage: stereophile get revenue, readers get more content: everyone is happy.
Mosquitos that buzz... - Jim Austin 13:24:09 11/06/09 (0)
...don't bite. I don't actually know whether that's true, but someone told me that once. I think they said it was a male/female thing: One buzzes, the other bites.

If you see advertorial content in a magazine that's clearly labeled "advertorial", count your blessings. Because, on the one hand, it means a nice chunk of revenue to support the editorial content. But more importantly, it means it's a principled magazine. There's a lot of money to be made blurring that boundary between editorial content and advertising. Give Stereophile and JA a pat on the back for keeping the lines clear.

Beware the mosquito you can't hear.

Jim
I'm willing to overlook it. - Prisoners 10:41:51 11/06/09 (2)
I enjoy the print version and wouldn't want to see it go away. If it takes a ream of ads that I can filter through to keep them in business so be it.
Baba-Booey to you all!
- My feeling also--NT - lancelot 19:30:36 11/06/09 (0)
  NT
- I did. - Kal Rubinson 11:42:13 11/06/09 (0)
  Guess my ad filter is working at a high level.
  
  Kal
Nothing wrong with advertisements in magazines - Bill the K 10:09:39 11/06/09 (1)
I love to look at them and read them.One learns a lot from them,especially the mini review type.And I dont think we can complain with the pittance we pay for the subscription.Who is forcing you to read all the pages anyway.

It is a smart editorial move to have those in consecutive pages.If somebody wants they can pluck them all out in one pull rather than sieving thru the whole magazine.
- RE: Nothing wrong with advertisements in magazines - Mr_bill2 10:27:02 11/06/09 (0)
  All good points but...
  
  Seeing that almost every other page is already an advertisement, they have no alternative but to group the ads together at some point within the magazine to increase ad revenue dollars.
  
  That being said it...Yes, seems like a "smart editorial move" to me.
  
  I do agree a yrs sub for ~$10 is "pittance" but then again, they need us more than we need them(ie w/o a subscriber base, no rev $). Next yr I plan to hold out for $8 and if it takes a few more ads, so be it! :)
You make me wanna sell ultra high priced cables to ya t - keith_d 09:34:35 11/06/09 (0)
t
"Anyone notice...." - robert young 09:23:35 11/06/09 (9)
Did you not notice Pjay's thread just a wee bit below yours?
- RE: "Anyone notice...." - Mr_bill2 10:33:28 11/06/09 (8)
  Why, no!
  I had this originally posted in "General" but the boys in blue moved it to here.
  Hats off to Pjay, & sorry to have stolen some of your thunder. Sounds like we're both plenty mad and we're not going to take it anymore. :))))
  
  Edits: 11/06/09
  - yeah, that was funny. - Pjay 05:56:54 11/07/09 (0)
    I don't care for ad supplements clogging up magazines. I don't know why, I just do. Seems low class.
    
    BUT as many have noted, if the choices are an ad supplement or a lot more of my mooola, I can live with them.
    
    P
    
    My speaker building site
  - Don't throw your amp out the window, though! - robert young 10:45:49 11/06/09 (6)
    Bothers me if the content drops because it has been replaced by ersatz content, but if the mag pages stay the same, and the special section helps keep the mag going, I'm not going to get too worked up. I've never bought into the conspiracy theories about buying positive reviews by advertising, so I don't find the situation so ethincally challenging as some do...
    
    Wish the mods would put in some note saying a thread had been moved from another forum. Otherwise it just looked like you weren't paying attention! Sorry to have mistakenly called you out....
    - Just the opposite - Jim Austin 13:18:19 11/06/09 (4)
      Did you see the letter about the missing October music reviews, and the reply?
      
      Ad pages pay for content pages. More ads, more content.
      
      Jim
      - RE: Just the opposite - lord addleford 05:41:04 11/07/09 (3)
        
        In Reply to: RE: Just the opposite posted by Jim Austin on November 06, 2009 at 13:18:19
        
        at what point, if any, will the addition of ads - via sequential page supplement, or dispersed through the issue - outweigh the gain in content? hypothetically, how much additional content will be generated by, let us say, by a a page of ads?
        
        RE: Just the opposite - John Atkinson 06:29:36 11/07/09 (1)
        
        In Reply to: RE: Just the opposite posted by lord addleford on November 07, 2009 at 05:41:04
        
        > at what point, if any, will the addition of ads - via sequential page supplement, or
        > dispersed through the issue - outweigh the gain in content? hypothetically, how much
        > additional content will be generated by, let us say, by a a page of ads?
        
        Our goal is to maintain a 50:50 ratio of editorial content to ads. (Because issues sizes
        are quantized in steps of 8 pages, any specific issue can vary from this goal.) But the
        2009 issues actually contained 52% of editorial content.
        
        John Atkinson
        Editor, Stereophile
        
        RE: Just the opposite - lord addleford 10:53:26 11/08/09 (0)
        
        In Reply to: RE: Just the opposite posted by John Atkinson on November 07, 2009 at 06:29:36
        
        thanks for the 'skinny'. the perceoption of the ratio seems to be a variable worth 'unpackin': in my monthly tour of 'phile, i would not have come up with a ca. 50/50 ration, perhaps due to the dispersion of the ads throughout the issue. when a supplement - sequential full pages- are inserted, the balance- the perception of ratio also tilts (for me, from the acceptable 50/50) toward overly intrusive, detracting, space consuming ads, regardless of the actual ratio.
        
        It depends... - Jim Austin 06:13:25 11/07/09 (0)
        
        In Reply to: RE: Just the opposite posted by lord addleford on November 07, 2009 at 05:41:04
        
        ...on the magazine, and I have no inside info on Stereophile.
        
        Jim
    - RE: Don't throw your amp out the window, though! - Mr_bill2 10:56:53 11/06/09 (0)
      Completely understandable, N-P!
I found it informative. - Vic D 09:07:34 11/06/09 (0)
IMO, there is substantial editorial content for the novice PC Audio enthusiast in the beginning of the clearly marked advertisement/article. Since I respect many of the manufacturing participants, I found their comments informative as they pertain to their innovative products and the subject. If there's a gripe it should come from those manufactures of more pedestrian digital related products who advertise in Stereophile and who may or may not have been included or invited.
RE: Stereophile Nov. '09 - Travis 07:05:38 11/06/09 (3)
I believe that's the first time they've done that.

I guess we could pay a lot more for a subscription and lose that ad section.

"If people don't want to come, nothing will stop them" - Sol Hurok
- "I guess we could pay a lot more for a subscription and lose that ad section." - Chris O 08:49:30 11/06/09 (2)
  No, all you are covering on your subscription is a portion of the mailing cost. You could not pay enough in a subsription to save a broken business model. Without eyeballs, the ad revenue plummets. More ads, fewer eyeballs, lower ad rates, even more ads, fewer eyeballs.... Without a vital magazine, eyeballs plummet. You need a page of ads for a page of content. Once a male oriented publication goes above this 1:1 ratio it is doomed.
  
  We are living through the death of print media and that is GREAT! Online offers 1000% better potential if they can make the transition to a profit model (offering something that people want to pay for). Multi-media is so much better than print for these types of things. Imagine watching interviews, show reports, factory tours component setup, 1000's of pictures, hotlinks, content downloads. Rather than a castrated version of the print edition.
  
  ___
  Long Live Dr.Gizmo
  - Doomed... I hope not - Gag Halfrunt 10:17:58 11/06/09 (1)
    Although I spend much of my working life in front of a computer, I despise reading reviews of audio products online. Even the ones that try to make something of it (ToneAudio, for example) seem horribly hobbled by the experience.
    Every online media outlet has one eye fixed firmly on its Google ranking and that always seems to influence the content. Dumbed down writing, repeating the product name every hundred or so words and very simple sentence-structure is the norm online. Some aspects of audio demand a degree of abstraction, and that is not the sort of English usage that lends itself toward simplification. Google's spiders demand simplification. So, unless your audio concept can be immediately understood by a dyslexic preteen, with a second-language command of English at best, Google passes it by and down the ranking you go.
    I am also unconvinced by the lack of authority from online sources. Anonymity and its close friend the sockpuppet mean those with the correct answer often get shouted down by those with an agenda to push. While the old chestnut "a little knowledge is a dangerous thing" should be a scrolling banner across the top and bottom of every website and forum. I don't particularly like the idea of holding reviewers in higher esteem simply because of their job title, but I would rather that than take at face value the pontifications of a person whose background and experience remain hidden from public view. If a reviewer says something about a product, I can see they at least have some provenance, be it good or ill; if 'mugwump6782' (or 'Gag Halfrunt', for that matter) says the same, I have no idea whether they have any experience of that product, any experience of that product in context, any experience of that product's rivals and what connection that person has to the product (or its rivals).
    The difficulty is that as people become less and less able to parse the complexities of the English language, so the magazines grow dumber to accommodate. We've already seen this with magazines like HiFi+, which has become easier to read, but lacks gravitas. In fact, most magazines have dumbed their style down over the last two decades or so, but I'm more aware of the changes in HiFi+, because it did it over a couple of issues.
    I think the surviving audio magazines need to make the most of being magazines. Not try to compete with the internet, but provide a valid alternative to those who want to know more.
    
    Edits: 11/06/09 11/06/09
    - RE: Doomed... I hope not - slovell1 01:51:37 11/21/09 (0)
      I miss the letters section, one or two pages is not enough. Reading letters from audiosnobs who won't listen to music in their cars is hilarious. John, your mag has really gone downhill over the past few years. It used to take me a couple of days to go through it, now its about a half hour. I still subscribe so I can read about audio jewelry that costs as much as a decent house and is defective right out of the box. Still recommended though.
      Best Regards, sam

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