wjm@whuxk.UUCP (10/01/83)
Some recent submissions to the net have raised concerns that audio magazines
do not give unbiased reviews since they accept advertising from manufacturers
and prefer reviews by "Consumer's Reports" since Consumer's Union does not
accept advertising. While I agree that CU's no-ads policy is certainly one
way to remove potential bias - there is another one which is followed by
"Stereo Review" and "High Fidelity" - Julian Hirsch is NOT an employee of
"Stereo Review". He runs his own independent audio test lab (which SR contracts
their test work to). Admittedly, the editors of SR and HF pick the units that
get reviewed, but I don't think Hirch would be so unprofessional as to give a
"dog" (my apologies to my canine friends) a good review just because its maker
advertised in "Stereo Review". As I said earlier, "Consumer Reports" is one
of the few publications that attempts to review everything in a given price
category - e.g. budget receivers and who will publish a BAD review. The other
audio magazines will NOT say anything good about a bad product, but they won't
publish a bad review either (This may be more due to a fear of lawsuits by
irate manufacturers rather than fear of lost ad revenues - I won't say anything
bad about a product on the net as a general rule either, and I don't get
any ad revenue).
Keep in mind a potent force for producing good products and honest reviews -
reputation built on word of mouth from satisfied customers. It probably sells
as many products as advertising bucks and can't be bought. A reputable high
fi equipment manufacturer who is in business for the long term has nothing to
gain by foisting an inferior product on the public - it will destroy the good
name he has spent much time and money he has built up. The same thing is true
of publishers of reputable audio magazines - they have nothing to gain by
publishing bloated reviews of inferior equipment.
I do have two gripes about Consumer Reports - since they try to review all
products in a given category they don't devote enough space to the quirks of
a particular model and they try to reduce their evaluation to a single number,
which in the case of speakers is absurd - also they (since thats where mose
of their customers are) concentrate on budget and mid priced equipment, which
doesn't do much good for those of us who are interested in high-end stuff.
Bill Mitchell
Bell Laboratories
Whippany, NJ (whuxk!wjm)
P.S. This past week some newcomers to the net strted to take pot shots at
Mr. Hirsch and several of the regular contributors to the net - Please, let's
keep net.audio a place to discuss the technical points of high fidelity sound
reproduction - and there will be honest technical disagreements - I don't
always agree with rabbit!jj but I'm not taking personal swipes at him either.
Let's leave the personal attacks to net.flame or net.trash ... Thanks .
(whuxk!wjm)