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Reviewing the Reviewers - and the decline of HiFi

I know that Arthur Salvatore has an ongoing tirade with Michael Fremer, and whilst I don't wholly share his views so far as Fremer is concerned, I support the sentiment that reviewers themselves ought to be themselves reviewed.
I say this after having read another 6Moons review that basically says that the item they have reviewed is the best thing since sliced bread. With the exception of HiFi news - and that was about 7 years ago, and HiFi Critic (which is regrettably not distributed very widely as yet)- none of the magazines ever criticize products.
This may well explain why the industry is in such decline. Let's face it in the United States Breitling made more than the whole of the US HiFi industry put together! Think I am mad? Well think on this cars sell, and continue to sell well. New cars are by and large a luxury, because we can recycle old cars, but we convince ourselves on their necessity. Car reviewers are unfettered by the need to give wet reviews. The buying customers are therefore not forced to listen through the BS of a review to get some real and genuine information.
Manufacturers also have to wake up and not be so hypersensitive of any genuine comparative criticism - it leads to product improvement. The reviewing industry should get out of the habit of expecting 5 star reviews when they lend equipment to magazines for 'extended periods'. let's face it - most people see hifi and music as coming out of white ear buds, computers, and mobile phones.
lohanimal
tubegroover
2,320 posts
 
I completely agree with Mofimadness, Nonoise and Chayro. The thing with reviews is that you have to learn to read between the lines. So to me, the good reviewers are better at conveying what they hear and through experience in reading reviews the reader learns to discern what they are communicating. Most reviews to me are for entertainment value.

As for any reviewer, they are no different than us, they have their listening preferences and biases. The good ones communicate the characteristics of a component under review regardless of whether you agree or not, it's up to the individual reader to review the reviewer and determine whether or not to value his judgements. The decline of HiFi, if it is happening, never did, is or will have a thing to do with reviewers. Your premis seems a real stretch and you give the reviewers much to much credit. As long as people listen to music there will be a fringe group that will want to hear it well reproduced regardless of the new technologies on the horizon.

lohanimal OP
659 posts
 
I do wonder who on this forum read the second half of my thread starter.
It's not about a conspiracy either.
A failure to relate and be genuinely critical will lead to the continuous demise of Hi End hifi. If reviews are always wishy washy, uncritical, and irrelevant, then when people have a browse through the magazines on the shelves, like many people do when researching a moment of big spending, do writers genuinely believe they are doing the world of audio a favour?
Remember my point about Breitling outselling the whole of the High End audio industry in the states put together...
mechans
3,048 posts
 
The review process is almost completely unrelated to the decline of hi-fi. The whole technical world seems to be currently revolving around the concept of portability. Therefore whatever is small is of high value seeemingly without regard to the sound quality. I don't think 99.99% of people even bother to read a review of high end electronics, therefore whether it is an honest appraisal or not doesn't matter. For those of us who do read them we have to read between the lines. I find the same to be true for most car reviews as well. My enthusiasm is not altered by reviews and I doubt that others are affected either.
rja's avatar
rja
2,356 posts
 
I like the reviews where the first sample broke and the second sample malfunctioned but the third sample sounded really, really good. Has anyone read one of these reviews recently?
tubegroover
2,320 posts
 
"A failure to relate and be genuinely critical will lead to the continuous demise of Hi End hifi."

Hi Lohanimal

The above is what you said so I guess it is what you mean and completely in line with the responses to your query as far as I understand, am I missing another point somewhere? First off there are reviewers that are entertaining writers at best who's judgement I don't hold in any higher regard than anyone else's. Then there are reviewer's who by the consistency of their descriptions of products lend more credibility to what they describe. Another thing to consider is that most reviewer's review products that they think they will like. Why waste time on products of little interest? This idea about being "genuinely critical" is a bit vague, what exactly do you mean? There are usually clues in the review that let you know the plus and minus points of the product. There is no need to openly bash a product in a publication unless there is some type of consistent objective method involved, certainly not subjective, that would be totally unfair to the manufacturer of the product and would go back to biases and preferences. Measurements are one of those objective tools upon which the reader can draw his own conclusions but as most experienced audiophiles know, they don't always tell the whole story.

I don't completely understand your point about Breitling and how this relates in any way to Hi-end audio sales, could you explain, I am curious.
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