Collective letter s to Stereophile
I basically agree with your comments but you should remove Dunlavy from your list of "preferred companies". Believe me, there is a LOT of "funny" circumstances around what took place with the SC-IV. Besides that, how many Dunlavy products have been reviewed compared to Musical Fidelity, Harmon International, etc ??? I only know of the SC IV off the top of my head and they demoted that one as it is. Sean > |
Upgrade, MANY of those "loaner" components are never returned or returned WAY, WAY later. I've read reviews where a reviewer broke out an amp for comparison to what he was currently writing about. As it turns out, the amp that he "took out of storage" was a unit that he had reviewed WELL OVER A YEAR PRIOR !!! As such, who is going to "badmouth" a product or manufacturer that basically gives you "free" gear to use "indefinitely" ??? Besides that, what manufacturer is going to have the guts to "burn bridges" and literally demand a product back from a reviewer that might just "fix them" next time around ??? There is a lot of "complimentary hand washing" take place in this field and it's not only taking place at Stereophile ( believe me, TAS has MORE than its fair share too ). So long as one hand keeps the other clean and neither one of them "rats" on the other, you'll RARELY see anything but a complimentary review. Between that and the "advertising revenue game", most of the glossy mags are nothing more than entertainment at this point in time. While i have little respect for many "reviewers" ( on a business level, nothing personal ), i will publicly state that i think that John Marks is "ethical". Whether or not you or i agree with his opinions and preferences may be a whole 'nother ball of wax. I also think that John Atkinson is "trying", but is kind of stuck between a rock and hard place. Fremer should stick to vinyl based products as that is what he does best. Sean > |
For the record, "Grooves" is Michael Fremer of Stereophile. He is responding to this thread through a link that i provided in a discussion that was taking place over at AA. Mike, as far as your comment about "negative reviews of MF gear" goes, what product was this and what issue was this printed in ? I think that we may have different ideas about what a "negative review" consists of. As to "getting lumped in with" reviewers that "hang onto" gear for extended periods of time, that was a generic comment that i made applying to those in the industry in general. I know that some reviewers are more ethical / timely than others. As a side note though, the suggestions that i made over in AA regarding Stereophile and other audio rags following a set procedure in terms of the reviewing process might go a LONG way towards smoothing ruffled feathers AND making the subscribers happy. Sean > |
Joe: I agree that Kal's writing style is different than some of the other writers that we are used to reading in Stereophile. Having said that, i think that Kal tries to convey specific ideas more than he worries about making his words "float off the page", etc... It is always nice when you can find someone that can do both "convey" AND "entertain". Unfortunately, most that are good at "entertaining" aren't quite as good at "conveying" hard-core data and vice-versa. You have to remember, Kal is a Professor and he probably writes in the same manner that he teaches i.e. "just the facts". As to your comments about having multiple people reviewing similar types of equipment, try taking a look at this Stereophile based thread over on AA. Pay close attention to my responses to "Grooves" as i say much the same thing that you do here. I find it interesting that Mr Fremer, Kal and John Marks have all responded to this Agon / AA thread, but we've not heard a peep from the "head honcho". I would really love to hear his thoughts on the suggestions that i've made as to how to stream-line and "clean up" the reviewing process. I'm not holding my breath though... Sean > |
Lee: While it might have ended up being a "dogpile" on me, i'm not crying foul. Let's just say i opened up all the cages and expected something like that to happen : ) As far as why i "stuck up" for Mikey, i think we all know what it's like when people are on your back, you're agitated and even more crap is dumped on you and your co-horts. It's easy to get pissed and respond accordingly. As to your other comments, i agree 100%. I've tried to pass on ideas to JA directly and i know that others have posted similar thoughts to those that i expressed in public forums, yet it seems to fall on deaf ears. To top it off, we all know that EVERY writer and the editor have seen the hordes of threads / complaints about lack of diversity of products / brand name coverage, especially from specific parties. What do we get ? ST delivers yet another helping of "Triangle Pie". Really makes you wonder if he's doing this for spite just to get our goat or if he doesn't know how to contact anyone else to obtain other brands for review. Other than that, i thought this issue was quite diverse in brands and types of products covered. Unfortunately, the price bracket on most everything was still pretty well up there ( $2000 for speaker cables and one pair of interconnects ), but at least there was no Musical Fidelity in this issue. Instead, we ended up with Audio Advisor's replacement for MF, which is now Perreaux : ) Sean > |
