NEW Musical Fidelity DAC

I certainly agree on the Sam Tellig thing - between Musical Fidelity and Triangle speakers he doesn't find much time to write about anything else. He appears to be close personal friends with the founders of the line and gets treated like a king. MF, at least, appears to spend a fortune on advertising with Stereophile and, as Sean says, everything ST reviews of their's gets a rave review. I enjoy Stereophile a lot and try not to go out of my way to bash them, but the ST columns for the past 12-18 months have broken just about every rule I can think of if one wants to maintain objectivity and credibility. -Kirk

Upscaleaudio - lots of good points and interesting insight. I wouldn't, however, liken anybody's assertions to be conspiratorial to the point of being ludicrous. If nothing else, even if MF is the greatest value / gear ever made, what's up with covering every component they've ever produced? I mean, ST has covered so many of their pieces in the past 18-24 months it's almost silly. Then they've also received full blown reviews on the high-end components as they've come rolling off the production line as well. I have no experience with MF gear, but am more than willing that believe that it's excellent stuff. I'm also willing to believe that there is no direct connection between this number of reviews and MF's place on the back cover of recent Stereophiles (certainly one of the most expensive full-page ad placements in the magazine). But the combination of all this coverage, coupled with the glowing (even by Stereophile standards) reviews and the hands-on service is certainly going to bring suggestions of impropriety. Even if it's not accurate (or completely accurate), it's not "out there" to suggest that this behavior causes the opinions generated to be somewhat suspect.

And, no, I doubt anybody here thinks that this behavior is unique to audio. I'm sure if we were talking about cars, guitars, power boats or what have you that there would be threads with the same theme. I'm in a position where decisions I make can direct a significant amount of capital expenditure and am therefore exposed to nice "offers" that are, of course, not intended to influence my behavior. It's why many corporations have a "no gift" policy - they don't want this type of behavior to influence the right business decisions. Of course the behavior is still rampant, but some companies are much stricter than others specifically because they want to be "above" reproach on the topic. If you're openly hand-in-hand with the equipment supplier and potential advertiser, and all that that brings with it, you're going to legitimately bring a shadow of potential impropriety on yourself.

It is funny how the pattern of upstart vs. established plays itself out across so many hobbies. A friend of mine is into biking and, without knowing any of the brand names, I started describing the "overpriced piece of crap" made by one of the big players, that nobody "in the know" would buy because they know the real performers. Only those thousands of satisfied semi-enthusiasts who don't know any better buy that stuff. -Kirk

Where would you advertise if you were Creek or YBA? There are obviously companies that try to go word-of-mouth for their advertising, but if you're going to run print ads, don't you pretty much have to go through Stereophile, or maybe a combination of a couple other avenues? Just because there are advertisers who aren't personal acquaintances with ST, having dinner with him, personally delivering and setting up their gear to be reviewed, and having their product covered by him every other issue doesn't change the look of impropriety for those that do.

I don't much care if the "politics" of getting good reviews is thick or thin. They charge a buck an issue for their magazine, so I'll read it. They can cover whatever they want, acquire it however they want, and have any opinion they want. They do a lot of things that are incredibly informative and objective. They have a lot of good reviewers. In general, I think they're an excellent magazine. They also walk an interesting tight rope in their commentary, which is sure to draw commentary from the bleachers, and a few of their practices amplify the commentary. -Kirk