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That may be your take, and your reasons for reading audio mags, but.....

manufacturers/dealers spend their $$ on ads (which keep the mags afloat) and send the review samples you enjoy reading about for one purpose only....SALES. I don't read car mags, but I doubt Audi or any other car maker provides cars for review purposes and/or ad $$ to car mags just so people who will never buy their cars can enjoy reading about them. Of course I'm sure both the editors of mags and manufacturers want the reviews (ads/columns/industry news as well) to be entertaining in order to attract readers, who in turn are the potential customers of the advertisers.

While I understand your point about i-pods and the like, other than casual observations what can you site to back up the idea that the hi-end is shrinking (hmm, you did say "if there's a problem")? There seems to be an ever increasing number of companies making/selling a greatly increased number of hifi products when compared to, say, 15 years ago. Maybe JA could tell us definitively, but what I've seen at four S'phile shows certainly doesn't indicate diminishing attendance. AFAIK S'phile readership ain't in decline. Dunno about TAS and other mags, but just in the last few years a number of audio e-zines have sprung up and seem to be flourishing. It seems that for every hifi B&M retailer that fails or concentrates on HT a web hifi outlet opens.

I think you're wrong about fewer people learning to play instruments and/or taking music courses. Yes, maybe fewer amateurs than many moons ago before recordings were ubiquitous and people played/sung for entertainment in their homes. But I doubt there's less amateurs since 20-30 years ago, and I definitely don't believe there are less pros. I know first hand that Manhattan School of Music in NYC is packed with students, as is Julliard and quite a few other conservatories. Jazz programs have sprung up in colleges all across the U.S. where there had been no such program 20 years ago. When I finished my studies at Berklee (1971) there was a total of 300 students at the school, now they have over 3,000. I do agree that the work scene for musicians is worsening, but despite this young talented players (classical, jazz, and rock) are still streaming into NYC from all over the world every year.

I'll stand corrected if you can show me I'm wrong, but your view that "The existence of the information can't produce the desire: it is the desire needing the info that will make the enterprise successful..." seems to stand the whole concept of advertising on its head. Nobody is born with a desire to purchase 140 wpc tube amps, re-conditioned/re-plinthed idler wheel tt's, $7,000 cdp's, or even "budget" $2,000 systems (let alone Shun Mook, Shakti, the IC, Nespa, $5,000 racks, $2,000 power chords etc.). Reviews and ads create and spur the desire to get 'em. If it wasn't working mags like S'phile wouldn't exist.

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