In addition to any suspected bias from any payola or financial incentives, even a legit honest review is written according to the reviewers preferences and natural bias, which may or may not match my preferences. Sort of like depending on someone else to season your food. Not that a review can't be interesting and/or useful, but it should not be a substitute for auditioning audio gear for yourself and forming your own opinion. I think too much emphasis is put on other's opinions.
No More Fake Reviews - So Who’s Gonna Tell Us What To Buy?
Very interesting and with a fairly profound impact on our audiophile community:
Some strong language in the ruling. How are some of our YouTubers going to be able to sustain their channels without gifted products?
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@jayctoy I think the argument made is that being honest and truthful doesn't go hand-in-glove with being paid: "As long as the reviewer is honest and truthful. Perks benefits is ok with me." I suspect nothing much will happen until someone we know is made an example of. Then everything will change. |
Audio is a luxury product. Obviously manufacturers take care of reviewers. It's part of capitalism. As a consumer you must be ruthless. Government intervention is not the solution. Just take a break if it stops being fun. As an older guy I look at these older guys with their idioms and genuflections telling me some circuit board has a slightly bigger soundstage that is beautiful when it is angry. It's a sales job and a pretty decent one at that. I used to work for rich people. They eat that stuff up. |
It looks that many of you are expecting too much from this FTC ruling. For the most part, it applies to "consumer reviews." Those are reviews written by consumers, not by ostensibly "professional’ reviewers that would be writing for a real publication, such as TAS or Stereophile. Even many of the YouTube audio "experts" are arguably "professional," especially if their YT channel generates revenue. |
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