When a Reviewer "likes" something


... what does that mean in your opinion. I read in one of the last Stereophile mags a comment from Mr. Atkinson where he wrote about the differences in "opinions" in forums or in printed mags. After all he ended with the argument, a component is good when a reviewer likes it.
Isn't is more helpful, when a reviewer knows something about a real tone reproduction? Or is it ok, when he used every month another CD or LP he got for free, a kind of music nearly no one wants to listen to?
Harry Pearson used in the 90's always the same records for his reviews but that was an exception I think.
What is it worth for you when - for example - Mr. Dudley/Fremer/Valin/HP .... "likes" something? Do you have the same "taste" they have?
I know it is possible to like a Turntable even when that unit can't hold the proper speed, or is extremely sensitive to any influences, there are endless recommendations written about such units...what is it worth for you?
Atkinson for example measures units, some have top datas but they can sound very boring, far away from the real thing, some have no top datas, some "tests" are shortened because a unit can reach a area which can be pretty dangerous (see one of the latest Agostino units, just as an example) but they are rated Class A in recommendations anyway....
When someone "knows" what is right or not, then his "liking" is only a personal opinion which is more or less uninteresting or?
Most customers (not all of course) would prefer to know what a unit is really able to do sonically, or not? Would knowledge destroy the joy of Hardware rolling? Or is there a reason why reviewers use low efficiency speakers when they have a tube amp for review (for example Lamm ML2.1/ML2.2 with Magico Speakers)? Is the matching "expensive + expensive" the proper way to show competence?
128x128syntax
I think it would be most helpful if a reviewer used the same battery of test recordings for each review. This would at least give us a constant baseline from which we could evaluate the reviewer's impressions...

-RW-
It means nothing to me when a reviewer likes something because they like their advertisers, manufacturers that give away equipment and their friends, nothing more. Stereophile continues to offer me a 2 year subscription for $14 and TAS continues to send magazines to expired subscribers so advertisers will not know their circulation is diminishing. Reviewers have written "I like these speakers so much I'm buying the review sample." and 2 weeks later they are for sale for 50% of retail, right Art? Magazines have been deceiving the public for decades and in my opinion they have caused irreparable damage to an industry we love. Use your own ears to decide if you like the way stereo equipment sounds. You don't need someone else to tell you if you should like it or not.
I'm now at the age of having read reviews longer than many of the writers today have been writing them. To me it's kind of off-putting that reviewers as a group just simply don't take a meaningful or the proper amount of time to fully come to grips with the particular product they are reviewing. Very often they take no more than a month to listen and evaluate and then only jot down a few of the sonic highlights (while leaving the negatives to be either glossed over or completely ignored...or confined to practical matters as opposed to sonics). I usually find them to be not worth much more than the grain of salt I end up having to take them with...and a preponderance of them on the same product is of little help. To me it's too often as if NO pro writer will tell you flat out what's truly wrong with a component's sonics, even if it's apparent and especially, it seems to me, when it can amount to a flaw. And, I think, that if they see that they can rationalize that there's no point in doing so for us, then any hope of putting things into perspective for us seems to go right out the window and...voila, we exist in what I consider to be a culture of all positive reviews - EVERY reviewer likes EVERY product they've reviewed and somehow there are no bad products (that is, there is at least SOMEthing to like about every product, right?). I suppose I suspect part of the problem is that the fix may at least require a certain degree of comparing equipment to other equipment - something that I myself find perfectly valid in this hobby, despite there being the so-called "acid test" of comparing to live music. Knowing how a piece of gear performs compared to other pieces can be of considerable value, I think, especially to intermediate-and-up hobbyists. For my own money, it's a person's *experience* in this hobby that counts the most - not simply their judgment 'yea' or 'nea', but their *evaluation* of the gear. More evidence from pro writers on their willingness to spend that much time and patience overall and less 'being of help' in the most generic of terms possible is what I'd rather see. Not getting bogged down in minutiae either - just a comparatively informed view of the particular and overall relevance of the equipment involved would do nicely...one based on both its strengths AND its flaws. From a writing standpoint, it may be trickier to write about the negatives without looking like you're condemning the component, but I feel like that can and should be done. Isn't that the sort of thing they bothered to learn how to write for in the first place? I still DO read reviews on occasion, but I no longer put all that much stock in the tributes involved, but when it comes to the performance flaws I reread between the lines a dozen times or more to try (sometimes in vain, for reading's sake) to arrive at the truth of the degree of negative sonic performance that I have to believe the writer may well be only hinting at. Good OP. I realize you may only be talking about the irritatingly pointless trend of pro writers blithely "liking" any and every random piece of gear, but to me it goes deeper than that, I suppose. Regards. John