Stereophile complains it's readers are too informed.

I agree w erik to an extent; on the other hand I don’t :) The part I disagree with is erik’s later comment that speakers should be judged based on the designers goal. I don’t give designers that latitude. It’s my firm belief that all speakers should be designed with the goal of reproducing the signal fed to it ... with precise fidelity to that signal in all aspects, frequency,dynamics,phase,etc.

@erik_squires,

Thanks for posting.

The entire article smacks of a desperate retreat against the vanguard forces of increasingly shared communal knowledge. Looks like Stereophile must have gotten complacent after all these years of churning out piffle on top of piffle.

However thanks to sites like this and others, (can I mention ASR?) an increasing number of today’s readers are far better informed than their brethren of yesteryear. The tide of knowledge has turned and there’s no putting the internet genie back in the bottle. The piffle must stop or else...

How about this for an initial plea for understanding?

’As the late Art Dudley wrote in one of his last columns, "From its acoustical beginnings, when two incompatible forms of physical media—Edison’s cylinders and Berliner’s flat discs—slugged it out for primacy, domestic audio has attracted an almost incalculable number of iconoclasts, heretics, mavericks, nonconformists, lone wolves, enfants terrible, and hidebound kooks.

Because the above are among my favorite people, I don’t have much of a problem with that state of affairs.’


No, of course you don’t, since your main directive in attracting as many advertisers as possible you can wallow in as much subjective twaddle as your readers will, sorry, used to permit.

Those intending to pay out large sums of money in search of sonic performance might have a lot of problems with this.

The article then goes on expound upon the crux of the matter here, the issue that’s bugging them the most as referenced in its title - ’Hoisted on your own petard?’


’It’s especially disheartening when narrow-minded online critics use one aspect of our coverage—our measurements—to attack the other side: our subjective judgments.’

Ouch! That’s what really hurts, isn’t it?
The fact that savvy readers are ignoring your subjective ramblings and obfuscations and using your own measurements to reach their OWN conclusions!!

To finish with, the author Jim Austin, offers up a final plea bargain to the reader.

’We’re providing a complete picture; the two halves make a whole. You don’t get that from our competition.

Broaden your mind. Seek perspective. Look at the big picture.’


He just forgets to add ’please, and pretty please!’

Face it Jim, the game is up. The broad picture, at least your version of it, has clearly very little value in today’s informed market.

Either you tell it like it is or dispense with what has been your main selling card for years - a decent set of technical measurements.

Not the final word in analytical data by any means, but as you say, more than some of your opposition.

Exactly how you will go about keeping your friends (and paying advertisers) happy in the future is not our concern. You need to keep in mind that your loyalty must primarily be to your readers who frequently place their trust in your words.

We understand you’re in a hard place now, having to chose sides (advertising revenue versus sales revenue), but that’s not the readers dilemna, is it?

If I were reviewing, I would state the data, and state what I heard in the product. It’s not for me to make inferences for others. Now maybe the magazine might claim to be adhering to those standards? Not sure they claim that they do that, or that they obligated themselves to point out deviations from a certain standard. 

~~~Whena   componet is measured,,,to what should be the comparison reference?~~~
Answer is easy, experience,,of course not exp as to say you've heard every speaker on the market,,
I have some 40 yrs, off/on audiophile experience...It does not take me long to figure out what grade i consider a  piece of audio.
Of course its not easy at times,,, you have to know how the amp is voicing in the system, the cd player is voicing and thus is reflected in the speakers.. You need to analyze how each is affecting the overall sound..
Thus if I hear a  over bloated midrange,,I know well enough there is no amplification chnage which will delete  /cancel the muddiness of the speakers unique character. Lets say the listening audition room in the adio shop has another set of spakers to compare,,now you can hear how the amp responds to speaker B vs speaker A. 
IMHO, SEAS speakers are the benchmark against which all speakers are measured. Relatively speaking,, I am not refering to speakers over 100 lbs. Speakers over 100 lbs are dinosaurs as they offer nothing over which a  99 lb /less speaker can offer, w/o breaking the bank, nor the back. 
Bigger is not always better, and in this case, not in any way superior to a  99lb/less speaker. 
Conclusion : all speakers over 100 lbs should not be drawn into a  topic of speaker recommendations. 
I see anudiogoners mentioning /suggesting speakers w/o telling us any of that speakers defects = its over 100 lbs and costs $$$$$$. IMHO speakers over say $3K, make sure you bring up the price factor , this way we are all ~~Informed/Educated/Enlightened~~~
this is what the author is trying to get across. 
Lets all get out of lala land (leave lala fantasy land to the CV19 hype propagandists *The Experts~~~ and let us audiophiles speak with some authority and accuracy,, We all want our systems to present highly refined music images,,yet most here on audiogon convey biased muddy opinions,,which do not help for the seekers who want solid fair evaluations.
Snakeoil buster here

 deviations from a certain standard.


I believe standards are real,, but I will not mention any product names. 
Read the reviws from unbiased critics,,that will tell you where the standards are. 
In speakers, I know well that SEAS is The Gold Standard. 
Scan Speak and SB are excellent, but as in all things of this world,,where Olympic swimmers win a  silver medal due to  ~~losing~~ by a  milli second, = no gold cigar, onlya  silver cigar...in speakers we also need Gold Standard (SEAS) , Silver Standard, Bronze Standard.
Time to bring audiophile out the early medieval times into at least The Renaissance Epoch...,,,, then we can start to move into ~~THe Audiophile Enlightment era~~~
Snakeoil buster here.