This is a most bizarre thread. Stereophile and TAS are called, in the industry, buff books. They are bought by fans of the subject, just like Car & Driver, Sailing, Photography, etc.
Every serious magazine and newspaper separate the editorial side from the advertising/business site. If the two sides cross, that is a serious breach of ethics. And accusing a magazine or newspaper of crossing that is a serious charge. Most important is to understand what business they are in, and what they are selling. The business is delivering eyeballs of "fans" to advertiser's advertisement. The customers are advertisers. The subscribers and folks who buy the magazine on the newstand are the product, not the customer. I don't understand why the hi-fi books don't sell ads for premium brandy and good cigars, as they seen natural partners with serious stereo. Claims that its a big deal to have the CEO of a boutique high-end manufacturer hand setup a piece of pricey gear are not grounded. Nearly all of the high-end manufacturers are very low volume, usually about a million dollars gross revenue a year. (Meridian, and a few others are exceptions that prove the rule). This is not like having the CEO of General Motors or IBM visit you. This is more like the owner of your local hardware store recognizing you when you come back a couple of time. There are not a lot of mass market products that get serious reviews in any of the buff books. Look at the articles on Porsche and high end Mercedes-Benz cars in Car-and-Driver, now compare the number to the number of articles about Chevy Malibu or mid-level Toyotas. Hint, a lot more people buy the Chevy and Toyotas than buy the Porsches and M-B. Bot you can't tell that from the number of pages of copy in the books. -- Pat Farrell http://www.pfarrell.com/ _______________________________________________ Touch mailing list [email protected] http://lists.slimdevices.com/mailman/listinfo/touch
