what really happened to j. skul


why did j skul get fired from stereophile?
capeguy
FOLLOWUP:
>02-17-03: Nrchy
J 10 it would not be a problem to name names, but since this was reported to me in confidence and the source is well known to many here I would not do the discourtesy to someone I respect (as oppossed to the discourtesy to someone I do not respect.)<

I see. Whatever is told you in confidence, but you drop it into AudiogoN. Not very courteous to your friend, actually, unless he meant you to repeat it for whatever reason. You will, however, as you say, be discourteous to me and repeat the unsubstantiated gossip. Nice.

> They were supposedly your former friends!?!

You must realize people have all sorts of reasons for saying things, especially after someone has departed. Why not ask whoever it was to e-mail me in privacy and air their beef. It might help me be a better manager of people now. Or maybe someone would apologize. Maybe not, but in this country, people have the right to confront their accusers, no matter how discourteous *you* feel like being. For whatever *your* reasons are. Which escape me.

> But I guess I would want to cast my own termination in the best possible light too, so I'm not surprised by your remarks.<

FYI, the "cast" of the termination was set by John Atkinson himself. Of course there was more, but I'm not talking. He cast it that way, it's totally true, allows us both to be productive now that I'm still in the business, that's the story, and that's all there is to it.

> Good luck at Monster Cable.

Thank you. I'm sorry to tell you... it's going extremely well.
JS
dear j-10
every months for audio ,i m reading,2 american,3 french,2-3 u.k,2-3 germany,1 japonese magasins.and every day i m spending few hours at internet for audio.because im audio nuts for a more than 20 years now.
for me you were really one of the best reviewer.i m really missing your review
votre depart de stereophile pour moi etait le debut dela fin pour la revue.
i would like you meet you one day(on a deja un ami commune ,mr.stein).

amicalement
j10, i didn't like archibald's views on politics or audio and i really didn't like it when he inserted his politics into a hobby magazine,but you have to admire a guy who put his butt on the line in those buses.sort of makes the silly little pissing duels in audio pale in significance doesn't it.
Oh Capeguy, why resurrect all that? LA really did very little in the way of inserting his politics. He wrote a monthly column that occasionally strayed from the main topic of the magazine. And for that, people canceled their subscriptions. If he'd been one of those wacko Henry Hyde types who care more about what goes on under the president's desk than what goes across it, I would have thought him silly but still supported his right to speak his mind in his own magazine.

Veering off the topic further, haven't quite a few Stereophile staffers just sort of vanished over the years? Some, like WP, got a decent send-off and others just disappeared from the masthead (not sure who without exhaustively searching back issues but possibly BS, GL, LL, DAS). Maybe I just didn't read carefully enough, but hell, I read many an issue twice!

For the record, I rarely had much interest in the stratospheric equipment that J-10 reviewed, but I found his reviews consistently well written and his column both informative and entertaining. And if, as I think has been implied here, he was the gatekeeper or go-between for hooking up reviewers with equipment, I think he did a damn good job.
J10, my post was not an attack on you. I don't know anything about you professionally or personally to make any comments.
I didn't say your responses have no useful purpose. It's fine to defend yourself. Like I said, I just don't see this thread as having any useful purpose. As in, what does dragging someone through the mud accomplish?