What Direction Should They Take?

Gregadd

WBF Founding Member
Apr 20, 2010
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1,774
1,850
Metro DC
I think we can agree that that the Audiophile industry or Highend is at a crucial if not critical juncture. The review industry for better or worse is ad dependent for it's survival. Moreover as the worlds wealth is concentrated in the hands of fewer and fewer people the desire to separate them them from some of that cash is understandable.

It appears that highend industry response is to embark on an unprecedented barrage of expensive products. it appears everyone has a high priced product. Even a mass market company like pioneer has $50k products. Also we are experiencing the return of the local audio show. The role of the audio press has always been to promote the industry. Despite the claimed allegiance to its readers, subscriptions don't pay the entire bill.

I'm prompted to write this because recently I renewed my subscription to Stereophile and the absolute sound. I regularly visit thier Blogs and Forums. What bothers me is the unadulterated endorsement of some very expensive products and the glowing endorsement of the industry as a whole.

For example you might read lines Like this, X company debuted thier new cable that was producing nice sound for kilo bucks, per meter. A new speaker ws producing good sounds in the x company room price $50k /per pair.To say that these prices make you blush for what appears to be average results is an understatement. The highend is not alone. I watch Home and Garden TV and see young couples struggle to come up with > $300 k for what is at best a mediocre house, only to watch the real estate agent advise them to toss another $30k on that just so they don't lose the house to a "bidding war. " It's always unclear who the real estate agent is working for. Higher prices mean higher commissions.

Speculation exists in every industry. Obviously there are dedicated talented people who drive every industry. There are people who are in it just for the money.

My latest issue of the tas represents an abashed promotion of the industry, complete with interviews from the manufacturers.


Contrast this with another reviewer who has openly trashed two speakers without review. One hideously expensive from a company unknown to me and when from a very respected company.

While I refuse to refer to a product as "snake oil or "fraud", words or terms like incompetent, price gouging or ineffective don't bother me at all.

In the words of Frederick Douglas ,"You may not always get what you pay for , but you always pay for what you get." I can recall when the term best buy was the most coveted.

Should reviewers be the promoters of the industry or consumers/ hobbyists or both? They derive their income from both sides.
 

mep

Member Sponsor & WBF Founding Member
Apr 20, 2010
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I have stated before that audio magazines aren’t directly deriving their income from us in the form of the subscription prices we pay. TAS and Stereophile are actually subsidizing our subscriptions. I really don’t think that cost of printing either TAS or Stereophile and mailing it to my door costs them less than $1.00 per issue which is about what I pay for either of them. The real game is to drive up the subscription numbers in order to increase ad revenue. The more subscribers you have, the more you can charge for ad space. So when Stereophile and TAS send you notices begging you to re-subscribe and the price keeps dropping the more they have to beg, you understand how desperate they are to keep their subscription numbers up.

Now having said all of that, what is the reviewer’s role which is the meat of your question? I’d say get out your fiberglass pole and your shorty-shorts, and hop your ass onto the tight rope and start walking. We have seen from Nicholas that the policy of 6Moons is that they don’t publish negative reviews. If a manufacturer sends them a pile of bovine excreta, they just package it up and send it back and don’t tell us how long it took them to remove the stench from their house. Other magazines will hem and haw around some serious flaws like a friend trying to set you up on a blind date with a fat girl.

My point to this is that when you are using subscribers to justify ad revenue prices to manufacturers who are the ones really paying the bills for the magazines; you can see it is quite the balancing act for them. As a subscriber, I don’t think we carry much sway in driving editorial direction.
 

MylesBAstor

Well-Known Member
Apr 20, 2010
11,236
81
1,725
New York City
I have stated before that audio magazines aren’t directly deriving their income from us in the form of the subscription prices we pay. TAS and Stereophile are actually subsidizing our subscriptions. I really don’t think that cost of printing either TAS or Stereophile and mailing it to my door costs them less than $1.00 per issue which is about what I pay for either of them. The real game is to drive up the subscription numbers in order to increase ad revenue. The more subscribers you have, the more you can charge for ad space. So when Stereophile and TAS send you notices begging you to re-subscribe and the price keeps dropping the more they have to beg, you understand how desperate they are to keep their subscription numbers up.

Now having said all of that, what is the reviewer’s role which is the meat of your question? I’d say get out your fiberglass pole and your shorty-shorts, and hop your ass onto the tight rope and start walking. We have seen from Nicholas that the policy of 6Moons is that they don’t publish negative reviews. If a manufacturer sends them a pile of bovine excreta, they just package it up and send it back and don’t tell us how long it took them to remove the stench from their house. Other magazines will hem and haw around some serious flaws like a friend trying to set you up on a blind date with a fat girl.

My point to this is that when you are using subscribers to justify ad revenue prices to manufacturers who are the ones really paying the bills for the magazines; you can see it is quite the balancing act for them. As a subscriber, I don’t think we carry much sway in driving editorial direction.

About 10 years ago, it cost [industry standard] a magazine about $75/subscription. That's in large part because of the cost of doing direct mailing campaigns whose return is in the low single digits. I imagine the price/sub has gone up in the last decade.

But a magazine then makes the money up on ad rates eg. the greater the number of subscribers, the more they can charge for advertising. It should be pointed out however, Stereophile is the only audio magazine whose circulation figures are professionally audited (in part because the auditing service costs a LOT of moolah). That's in large part because magazines can very easily pad their circulation numbers (a combination of subscription and newstands sales) by printing many more copies than needed and claiming that as circulation, giving away magazines and counting that as circulation, not accounting for sell thru when claiming circulation numbers (remember that 40% sell thru on an issue is considered excellent), etc.
 

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