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"Your readers would not expect your drama critic to have no background in drama or your architecture critic to not be an architect," Jeffrey Chodorow wrote [in a full-page ad]. "For a publication that prides itself on integrity, I feel your readers should be better informed as to this VERY IMPORTANT fact, so they can give your reviews the weight, or lack thereof, they deserve."
- http://www.comcast.net/news/national/index.jsp?cat=DOMESTIC&fn=/2007/02/21/592893.html&cvqh=itn_foodcritic (Open in New Window)
Follow Ups:
What's the difference?
Is that the reader learn over time whether to pursue or avoid what the reviewer likes, that is, the reviewer should tell you if you will like something. So the reader has some responsibility, too.Of course, readers of the NYT are a gullible lot, as Judith Miller showed. Sheep regarding WMD lies, sheep regarding restaurants, presumably.
A critic has a slightly broader function, imo, and that is to enlarge upon the meaning or significance or understanding of whatever is being reviewed.
- This signature is two channel only -
s
When one can't refute an argument with data, facts, examples, anecdotes, etc. ... then one must attack the character and motives of the other person.You should know this as well as anyone else here.
Oh, by the way, what are YOUR qualifications for the audio writing you do?
Were you an "A" student at a top Audio Reviewer School?
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Richard BassNut Greene
Subjective Audiophile 2007
My editor keeps asking me to contribute.clark
PS Actually I do have a degree in physics, two decades of employment in imaging science, an interest in hi-fi that began in grade school and a lifelong love of music. Plus, I wrote the only non-how-to book on audio. I realize these qualifications are modest by your standards.
Indeed!And I intend to *continue* to ask Clark to contribute for as long as he enjoys writing for Positive Feedback Online. I consider him to be a superb essayist...one of the very best in fine audio.
But definitely not a "reviewer"! A thousand times no!
;-)
Does this mean Clark has asked you to be a reviewer a thousand times and you have said "no" a thousand times?Just want to clarify the unusual wording.
Didn't you star in Lost in Space on TV before you got into audio.
I do know first hand about Clark's mighty pen, as he came up with such a classic insult in response to one of my posts yesterday ... that it may take me 15 or 20 minutes to come up with an equally good put-down in reply.
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Richard BassNut Greene
Subjective Audiophile 2007
I mean one negative enough to significantly hurt sales of the product?What product (s)?
From CJ in Positive Feedback issue 16: The Biggest News You May Ever Read (About Audio)"And now I give you RealityCheck™ CDs, It’s perhaps not the greatest name in the world. Maybe you prefer BetterBit Technology™, BetterBits for Better Sound™, NanoBit Ultralog™, or Reprocessing with Bezier Curve Re-Algorization™? All those are employed by the discoverer of this phenomenon, who is nothing if not careful to tie up loose ends. He is—George Louis (no relation) in San Diego...."
I particularly like the "nothing if not careful to tie up loose ends" bit. George Louis -- of "polarity" post fame on General -- is of course well known for tying up loose ends....endlessly.
z
I'm fine with whatever ya wanna say about gear, but what you write are not "reviews?"Some examples:
"Earlier I reported on Gordon Lewis’ silver interconnects imaginatively called The Perfect Foil. And I liked them very much. Having now compared these to stiffer competition (which shall remain nameless, sorry!), that impression is reinforced. Also I remarked that his speaker cables seemed promising, although I had only heard the lesser version. Today, however, I own the middle level "AG#4" which consists of four-per-run fine-grade silver foils floating loosely in tubes (i.e., in an air dielectric, very important I think). And they are very, very good."
Here, you even call yourself a "reviewer:"
"Currently I am enamored of silver foil and even of silver rod sometimes, and this multi-silver-foil air-dielectric cable from Lewis Laboratories is performing magnificently for me. In fact it has displaced my long-regarded (in audio temporal terms anyway) Synergistic Designer Reference — still a great cable for bass — but overall, and especially in the "vital midrange" as we parrot reviewers like to say, it can’t command the candlepower to illuminate the music equally."
More...
"That said, the Dangles are Lloyd’s own and very much worth (at this time) the price asked, $295 the pair. Or put it this way: their impact surpasses many speaker cable upgrades that cost one or two thousand more."
All apologies if you were kidding, but you seem to write "reviews" and call yourself a "reviewer" alot.
z
Are you also a politician or something?;)
s
Nice flip flop!
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nt
I've received my share of 'slightly negative' reviews.So what DO you write about and where can we read it?
This may lead to a new opinion about you ...
(or better "ammunition" to hurl back at you)
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Richard BassNut Greene
Subjective Audiophile 2007
A Show report:http://www.enjoythemusic.com/hifi2002/clarkjohnsen/
An essay:
http://www.positive-feedback.com/Issue24/cjdiaries.htm
On music:
http://www.positive-feedback.com/Issue3/johnsen.htm
That should hold you.
YOU sir, are obviously a Clark Johnsen impostor!But thanks for the links anyway.
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Richard BassNut Greene
Subjective Audiophile 2007
More than a little bit of projection there methinks.
I'm so disappointed, especially after hearing that just about any bait would get you all riled up.
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Richard BassNut Greene
Subjective Audiophile 2007
x
have to have lead to a broken business? Also wouldn't it have to be the only bad review? It looks like it was the secon bad review. Maybe it was deserved. Looks like the business is surviving to boot.
I can recall how a remark in a good review badly hurt an audio company many years ago. The reviewer remarked on supposedly slim AC cord and it hurt sales badly for a small company for 1/2 a year. The company made it and lasted for years fortunately. Great car has to be taken in both good and bad criticsm. Even bad criticism should be done describibg what is wrong specifically, not in such a snide way as the restaurant review cited. The review should be the thing, not the writer.
zx
I am an architect and I can tell you that very few architectural critics are architects!
As in audio....the guys who really know their stuff...are actually designing and building. Being an erudite critic is a full time job (except for Anthony Cordesman so you can see what devoting only spare time to reviewing can lead to?)
So this brings in the age old fable......do you need to be able to lay an egg, to tell a bad one?
Haven't seen his name on any reviews lately, but perhaps I'm looking in the wrong places.Reminds me of one of my all-time most embarrassing occasions. As a birthday present, my dear wife had bought and paid for some "consult" time from Lew Lipnick when he was in that business --maybe still is, for all I know. Ten minutes or so before he was to arrive, My Conrad Johnson Premier 3 preamp went silent in one channel (a tube problem, as it turned out), so there wasn't much for him to consult about. Nice guy as I remember (I'm still trying to forget) although I don't recall any offers to refund any of our money.
nt
Although he surely hoped it would.
Crown should have challenged him to a double blind test.
That would have been telling.
I can see some basis for a complaint that a reviewer lacked the "bonafides" to back up a criticism, but, other than being a discerning consumer, what qualifies one to describe his gastronomic opinions?His criticism of pricing? Probably spot on.
His notion that some dishes were insipid or insulting, also probably spot on.
I think even I am "bonafide" enough to spot an over-priced insipid dish.
What background does the restaurant's owner demand? That a critic be a trained chef? Have experience as a waiter? I'm at a loss as to what would qualify a person to be allowed to report on his experience at that establishment.
When he mentions "reviewers without agendas," then perhaps someone with culinary experience would be more likely to have an agenda than a lay person.
Thinking of the obvious Hi Fi analogy, I am happy to read reviews by Hi Fi reviewers who are not electrical engineers or equipment designers. I read Hi Fi reviews to get a notion of what another enthusiast heard, and over time, to compare my experience with his. The only bonafide I demand is a good description of the reviewer's experience so I can try to relate it to my own experiences.
I even allow Hi Fi reviewers to be of an age that their high frequency hearing skills are diminished…;)
So, as I said, until they open a food critics' school that I can be convinced is necessary in order to allow myself to consider a reviewer's opinion, I say let him go at it.
It seems his opinion is in line with more "established" critics, as well.
Bon apetit!P.S. One problem with many new critics is that they seem to work overtime looking for things to be critical of, in order to demonstrate that they are, in fact, bonafide. It's a short step from neophyte to relentless criticizer. I bet you've seen it in Hi Fi and I certainly have with wine appreciation. I guess I'd like to know if the newbie critic has written any positive reviews...
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Boo!
nt
ages.........................Are you saving all the best material for your next writing venture?
s
I simply meant that Mike's timely humor came along when all this BS about "reviewer loans" and other stuff was swirling around.
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