Audioholics equipment reviews

[calbear]

To Audioholics;

I have found your reviews to be benefical and worthy. In looking for a local dealer that sells the MordauntShort speakers, I came across o dealer that said, "We have the whole 500 series THX speakers (Ms502's, the Ms504 center, the Ms506 rears) set up for surround and a pair of MS912's and 914's for stereo listening." And they also stated, "In that room we also have Marantz receivers which we think are the best of the mid-fi." I asked them to provide supporting facts regarding their statement "our store think it (SR-8400) is the best of the mid-fi" because I could not find any Marantz SR-8400 and SR-8500 reviews not even from audioholics. The House of Music representative came back with the following statements:

- "I wouldn't spend too much time on audioholics because it can get confusing."
- "I don't have all day to search on the web and provide people with reviews that companies are paying for to have consumers read about them."

Hence, I ask audioholics, do companies in any way pay audioholics to do a review of their equipment/product?

 

[Rock&Roll Ninja]

Telarc isn't paying me anything and I'm about to write a biting review of one of their CDs.

 

[mitch57]

Which one?

 

[calbear]

For those who write reviews to pay the bills

Rock&Roll Ninja

Thanks for the reply. Do you write reviews to pay bills? Will this review be published in a magazine or newspaper?

I need to know if what the House of Music representative stated ("I don't have all day to search on the web and provide people with reviews that companies are paying for to have consumers read about them.") is true?

 

[sjdgpt]

do companies in any way pay .......... to do a review of their equipment/product?

Can't speak for this website, any other magazine, or any equipment manufacturer.

But this question has been around audio (and cars, trucks, dishwashers, boats, toliet seats, toasters, airplanes, Top 40 radio etc) for a long time, and is commonly answered as such....

A couple of manufacturers (with deep pockets and lots of glossy advertising) do provide lots of equipment (read free of charge) to be reviewed to magazines that either have a friendly policy towards free equipment, write nice reviews about everything they see/hear, are friendly towards a brand (read advertisers), or have a huge audience of readers that just want to read a wonderful, glowing review.

For most of the industry, the manufacturers seldom have budgets for free equipment (or bribes), but some of the manufacturers may budget for a few loaner items to rotate between serious reviewers (such as Audioholics). Those loaner items are few and far between, and will be typically left with the last reviewer for long term reviews. Magazines love to get those long term items.... it is a sign of respect, not a bribe.

Which means that many of the review items that you read on this website and other websites, have been purchased by the magazine for the review.



Personal note: Is cash exchanging hands? Not likely, this industry is just too small for the cash bribes to amount much more than lunch at a greasy spoon.

 

[Audioholics]

calbear,

To be honest, it sounds like you're asking the wrong question. What you should be asking is why does he say "I wouldn't spend too much time on audioholics because it can get confusing" ?

Is it because he thinks consumers are too stupid to research products on their own and interpret detailed reviews? Or because its far easier for you to just listen to whatever recommendations he makes?

You might also want to ask him if he makes better markups on the equipment he recommends versus others he does not. Or perhaps you can ask him when was the last he recommended equipment that he was not the dealer for? But to be honest, this is all completely irrelevant (as were his comments, which for whatever reasons - though I bet they were cable-related, seemed a bit biased.)

We do not get paid to do reviews. Reviews are separate from advertising. Our readers, and the insane detail and complexity of our reviews keeps us honest. You can't fake a good review for a bad product... OK, I take that back- we can't fake a good review for a bad product.

As we add more and more objective measurements to our reviews, this gets even more apparent.

If you want to know if we are ever biased... the answer is a resounding YES. We are biased in that we want better quality equipment available to ourselves and consumers. As such, we don’t give anyone a break regardless of whether they advertise with us or not. We have also declined or ceased advertising for companies whom we felt did not offer good quality products or who displayed shady business practices.

I hope this helped answer your questions. If this response doesn't satisfy you then I'm not sure any will. "Pursuing the truth" isn't just a motto - it's how we try to handle ourselves in everything that we do.

 

[Rob Babcock]

Audioholics is not paid by manufacturers in any way to conduct reviews of their equipment. I'm not aware of any credible paper rag or ezine that would condone something like that. At most, reviewers get the loan of a peice of gear to be reviews, with the stipulation that it be returned afterwards. True, the review peice can often be purchased at 'accomodation pricing,' and there are rumors of some big name magazines essentially recieving 'permanent loans' in exchange for favorable reviews. But consider one thing- it the gear didn't sound good, why would the reviewer want to keep it in the first place?

This online mag is supported mainly thru the advertisements taken out in the clickable links. For the AH staff to even accept the ad they must believe the product is a strong value-for-money vendor. Hence the lack of ads by snake oil vendors.

If you're concerned about bias, be aware than under most conditions, the salesman you're talking to simply wants to sell you something. Some may be genuinely knowledgeable about the products and interested in helping you out, but dealers arent' charities. Does you salesman tell you to ignore certain publications that publish poor reviews of the products he sells? Does he badmouth other brands that he doesn't carry? Those are two 'red flags' that would make my leery of trusting his opinions.

Lastly, there are thousands of products out there, and AH can't review them all. If there's a certain product you're interested in, the best thing is to post your suggestion in the appropriate forum. The AH staff reads this to determine what products the readers may like to see reviewed.

I hope this helps you out. Please let one of us know if you have any other questions.

EDIT- Clint, you're to fast! You scooped my by a few minutes...

 

[sjdgpt]

Rock&Roll Ninja

Thanks for the reply. Do you write reviews to pay bills? Will this review be published in a magazine or newspaper?

I need to know if what the House of Music representative stated ("I don't have all day to search on the web and provide people with reviews that companies are paying for to have consumers read about them.") is true?

Ninja wrote a nice review, for the sake of writing a nice review. A nice review does not mean a glowing, this item is wonderful, type of review. A nice review means he was thorough and fair.

(in my opinion he was thorough and very fair!)

As far as the HOM rep.

Some people speak with the head attached to their shoulders, other speak with another head.

(in other words, some people have a clue what they are talking about, others are just a d*****)


Do a little research, most of this industry is essentially a mom and pop, back of the warehouse, minimal advertising budget type of business. Sure, Sony and Phillips have mega billions of dollars in annual sales, but there is a whole segment of the industry is hanging on with sales under $10 million, with some even under $1 million. How can such a small business afford to keep half a dozen journalists writing positive comments about their products? They can't! Everytime I read a review about a small company's products, I have even more respect for the journalist, because I know that he did not just get his annual salary picked up by the mom and pop.

 

[sjdgpt]

be aware than under most conditions, the salesman you're talking to simply wants to sell you something.

How do you know when the salesman is lying? His lips are moving.


Ok, I know, an old joke. But I couldn't resist.

By the way, I refused a sale today. Told the prospective customer that my competition was better situated (location wise) to take care of his needs. Takes guts to turn away a customer.

 

[zipper]

You would think that if the entire staff at that store shared the same opinion of the Marantz gear they were selling then they would already have some literature to support their stance...............it's one thing to say "It's just our opinion", but to get defensive,or skirt the issue, when asked why they feel the way they do, I'd say the salesman is being unprofessional & assuming you are a raw newbie.

Don't you just love a guy with the "don't bother me with detailed questions,just shut the hell up & buy" attitude?

 

[Rock&Roll Ninja]

I wrote my review, and I'm working on a few others in my spare time, just for the fun of it. Audioholics has a whole discussion area for "write your own reviews" and, well..... Nobody else was writing CD reviews!

Curently all the reviews are of Telarc material, because I just bought them. And I'm sorry but you'll have to wait for the review to see which album I didn't think was worth my $$$

I'm not being compensated for any of my time. I'm even buying the CDs out-of-pocket! But if somebody in the future wanted to pay me to write a review, they wouldn't exactly have to twist my arm to do it.

 

[Leprkon]

I need to know if what the House of Music representative stated ("I don't have all day to search on the web and provide people with reviews that companies are paying for to have consumers read about them.") is true?

You might want to consider this... a traditional stereo reviewing magazine has complete control over everything in it... even the content and number of letters where people disagree with the reviewers... you might see two or three per issue.

The Audioholics website, however, is pretty much beyond the control of, well anybody, and there are nearly six thousand hard-core lurkers and countless anonymous's who can post freely anytime they disagree with the reviewers. Few, if any, of these people are simple lemmings and most have serious passion about audio and some technical background.

From time to time, you will see people throw down on the reviewers. Unlike many places and pretty much all magazines, the posts are left for all to read. The threads may be closed occasionally when people are just bickering, but I have yet to see any honest facts be actually removed from public viewing.

 

[aspaceintime]

thanks to all...

I'd like to take a second to thank this site. I was able to search here and find a multitude of answers to my questions. Chances are most of us had similar issues/questions when they started out in the HT hobby. Very informative, helpful site...