THE HIFI FIVE ROUNDTABLE DISCUSSION STREAMING LIVE ON YOUTUBE PREMIERING IN OCTOBER!
- Thread starter Ron Resnick
- Start date
The impact is on what you can afford versus those of us who are not afforded such discounts that opens up many more possibilities for you all
These anecdotes are in opposite to what I am discussing.
Let me copy and paste it for you:
I see a world of difference between a reviewer using his/her own money to purchase components at a discount versus long-term loans which cost the reviewer nothing.
Since reviewers are afforded approximately the same discount on every component the purchasing playing field is even. So what a reviewer actually buys for himself/herself -- even at a discount -- is extremely probative. What a reviewer buys with his/her own money tells me far more than any of that person's words in a written review.
I am talking only about reviewers, not regular consumers. So your example is not relevant to my topic.
This is baldly false. It is false because I have never suggested -- let alone admitted -- any such thing. As you sometimes do you are fabricating the question to suit your answer.
Another falsehood and mischaracterization. I have never said that I have "no conflict." Please cite for us where I wrote that.
I have conceded, as I must, that I have an apparent conflict of interest regarding being a dealer for Clarisys Audio loudspeakers. This is why I disclose this fact in my signature.
I have written numerous times that "not even Sherlock Holmes himself could find in my Masters & Makers interviews or show interviews any pro-Clarisys Audio bias." (Unsurprisingly this annoys Florián and Mike Bovaird.) No one has been able to find the slightest hint of pro-Clarisys bias or anti-Alsyvox sentiment. (Of course my love of planar dipole loudspeakers in general informs my interview questions to manufacturers of box speakers.)
On the evidence I believe there is no actual conflict of interest. In fact when discussing Clarisys Audio loudspeakers I tell people that anyone considering Clarisys should also consider Alsyvox, just like anyone considering Ferrari should also consider Lamborghini.
Any intellectually honest dealer should say the same thing about highly-regarded competing products. if you ask a dealer "what products do you not carry that you also think sound great?" and the dealer says "nothing else sounds as good as what I carry," that is a dishonest dealer and you should not patronize him/her.
Since reviewers are afforded approximately the same discount on every component the purchasing playing field is even. So what a reviewer actually buys for himself/herself -- even at a discount -- is extremely probative.
If you are shopping for a new sailboat and every sailboat store gives you the same discount then your decision process is entirely unadulterated by the discount. You are still going to buy whichever sailboat you want for its discounted price.
This is another falsehood. I have said no such thing. Please cite for us where I wrote or said that I am receiving "compensation." Accommodation discount is not "compensation as an influencer" for the reason I keep repeating for you.
When I purchase any component at an accommodation discount there is no obligation, understanding or arrangement for me to promote the component I am purchasing. If, in fact, I end up enjoying the component in my personal system, then of course I am going to talk about it favorably merely as a enthusiastic hobbyist -- just like any regular WBF member.
As a hobbyist you have raved about your American Sound turntable many, many, many more times than I have discussed as a hobbyist the Brinkmann Balance which I was fortunate to be able to purchase at an accommodation discount.
Please cite for us the examples of compensated influencer promotion I have done for the MastersounD PF100s.
Please cite for us the examples of compensated influencer promotion I have done for the Aries Cerat Incito S.
Please cite for us the examples of compensated influencer promotion I have done for the Brinkmann Balance.
Please cite for us the examples of compensated influencer promotion I have done for the Reed 5T.
Please cite for us the examples of compensated influencer promotion I have done for the Air Tight Opus 1.
Please cite for us the examples of compensated influencer promotion I have done for the Aesthetix Io.
Please cite for us the examples of compensated influencer promotion I have done for the LampizatOr Baltic 4. (I have done interviews with Lukasz, but that is because I like Lukasz and Fred, and because LampizatOr is a What's Best Forum sponsor. I would've done those interviews even if I didn't own a LampizatOr DAC.)
Please let's stay focused narrowly on the topic. I understand what you are saying.
But what does that have to do with my having a level playing field to purchase with my own money whichever component I subjectively as a hobbyist feel will allow me to achieve the greatest emotional engagement?
The fact that the discount opens up for me a wider selection of components than you might be able to consider does not adulterate my decision process, or make uneven or influenced my decision process, does it?
Ron, How is this "baldly false? I wrote that you refer to yourself as an "influencer" and admitted to receiving accommodation prices. Is that not exactly what you write here in this post on page 9 and what you have included now in your WBF signature? You call yourself an industry influencer and say you have purchased components at accommodation discounts.
Conflicts of interest are more about the perception of the person influenced than they are about the intent of the influencer. It is the mere appearance of conflict that I pass judgement on to assess the value of your comments. You can claim that you have no actual conflicts and demand proof. None of that matters to me as the reader who perceives a conflict and judges accordingly.
First, as in your previous example of accommodation discounts to audio reviewers, I do not agree with the premise. I am not aware of some universal or "same discount" offered by sailboat manufacturers to prospective buyers. Second, even if there were such a thing, it would certainly matter in my decision process. If I had a budget of say $80K, and there was the "same discount of say 20%, I would rather buy the $100K sailboat than the $20K sailboat, now that both were available to me.
If you are talking about your Clarisys speakers, you are not talking about them as a hobbyist and just like any regular WBF member.
Here is the thing Ron: I paid full asking price for all of my gear from DDK. I am a hobbyist, and I did not receive any discount, nor did I ever ask for one. I simply paid the price in full. Anything I discuss on my system thread or elsewhere is as an enthusiastic hobbyist, as identified in my signature. Now that you have disclosed receiving an "accommodation discount" on your Brinkman turntable, and not just a discount as some hobbyists might receive from a dealership, I no longer assume you are discussing that turntable as a hobbyist. There is no need to prove any obligation or understanding or arrangement to promote that component. No agreement is necessary. The reader's perception is all that matters here when he assesses you positive comments. Your admission that you were fortunate to buy it at an accommodation discount factors into my perception, especially when I had not already assumed such an accommodation discount. That is why I commend you for the disclosure.
Ron, I never claimed that you promote products as an influencer, so I am not going to cite for you examples. You are the one who claimed that you are an influencer, not I. And you now disclose it in your signature with a purchasing disclosure. You have still not answered my question about what criteria you meet to claim that you are an influencer? Is it simply that you are a member of the industry by virtue of being a dealer?
Elliot G.
Dealer - Bending Wave
Ok now I am going to be celibate and start day drinking
Of course if you are honest on YOUR opinion, you get blasted. Look at what happened to Eddie on jays you tube episode.
This is a good point albeit indirectly. To be an influencer one actually needs to be influential. Simply declaring oneself such is vanity.
It is not unusual for manufacturers who sell via dealer networks to set their retail prices higher than their margins so that dealers can offer generous discounts.
Elliot G.
Dealer - Bending Wave
Actually no mister smart a$$. That thought came upon reading someone upstream self-declaring.
Industry accommodation pricing to reviewers is intrinsically corrupting. Saying so doesn't mean there are no honest assessments uttered about gear acquired at half-list and therefore, say, 35 percentage points below what a savvy consumer pays, but the reader/viewer has to suspect otherwise. Why? If a reviewer has a system, or substantial portions of one, assembled from half-price components, it is almost certain they get to own and listen to a system that would otherwise be out of reach if said reviewer had to pay street prices. Is it unreasonable to presume they are grateful for that? So at the end of the day, without accommodation pricing, most reviewers would be living with and listening to lesser hifi systems. It also makes likely that loaned "reference" components will be evaluated in context of not-quite-reference gear. Accommodation prices can inflate reviewers' sense of self-importance and undermine objectivity.
Concomitantly, long term loans of gear to reviewers by manufacturers effectively become lived-with domestic objects virtually indistinguishable from items a reviewer may have paid for. We can debate where the line is, but I think that no loan to a reviewer should exceed six months. If you can't assess an item or even a system with six months of daily exposure to it -- especially as a full-time reviewer -- you are either woefully inefficient, lazy, overscheduled, undisciplined, confused or critically arrested. You can delay writing or recording your review if you need more time to consider your copious notes (you did take notes, right?). That's up to the reviewer. But manufacturers should issue that freight call tag on schedule, or sooner if the reviewer volunteers.
Pearson even more than Holt, planted the idea that hifi reviewing was / is some kind of high subjective art, and that there was something intrinsically valuable about it. There isn't. It's useful to some people, but it's not a valuable human pursuit. A true 1st world indulgence. It's not that difficult. Listen, compare, assess in six months or less, get organized to write or record, move on. It's all going to disappear into the great digital gyre, occasionally pulled from the muck by a search engine or a persisting link, but ultimately obsolesced and forgotten. None of this is important enough to pretend you need to have something for a year, two or three to know what you think about it. Music reviewing is a higher calling than assessments of audio gear, and that still has its foibles. This goes for cars, watches....all the 1st world gear-based hobbies and distractions. But at least in their heyday, the car mags had some friggin' great writers, and they had far better skills for making a car's driving experience vividly palpable to you than any audio reviewer attempting to help you understand a lump of hifi gear. And that includes Pearson. Hartley, et al are whiffs.
Accommodation pricing was originally offered to (underpaid) retail staff and channel owners who sold your product, and to employees of other business partners, friends & family, etc. It didn't start with reviewers, because...well....magazines weren't accommodating manufacturers on advertising pricing, except by price sheet volumes. Some people argued then that the practice was corrupting to sales people recommending products to customers, but it was common knowledge that any possible compromise caused by accommodation pricing was dwarfed by the practice of manufacturers or distributors putting "spiffs" (direct payments to salespeople for selling preferred items) on stuff they needed to move. And dwarfed by the influence of commission-based selling.
But a reviewer isn't in that economic sphere. They are selling trust on a presumption of competence, honesty and an ability to make their assessment comprehensible and meaningful to their audience, for whatever reason.
At the very least, be willing to say something to the effect of, "My hifi includes a bunch of components I got at prices only available to industry insiders like me, most of which I couldn't otherwise afford, or even if I could swing the price you'd pay, I like saving money whenever possible! And I get to have a system at a higher level so I get to review more fun things that I otherwise wouldn't have peer gear for. But don't for a moment doubt my objectivity on gear I bought at prices you can't get!" Na na na na na na; your mother wears army boots, and all that.
Phil
Concomitantly, long term loans of gear to reviewers by manufacturers effectively become lived-with domestic objects virtually indistinguishable from items a reviewer may have paid for. We can debate where the line is, but I think that no loan to a reviewer should exceed six months. If you can't assess an item or even a system with six months of daily exposure to it -- especially as a full-time reviewer -- you are either woefully inefficient, lazy, overscheduled, undisciplined, confused or critically arrested. You can delay writing or recording your review if you need more time to consider your copious notes (you did take notes, right?). That's up to the reviewer. But manufacturers should issue that freight call tag on schedule, or sooner if the reviewer volunteers.
Pearson even more than Holt, planted the idea that hifi reviewing was / is some kind of high subjective art, and that there was something intrinsically valuable about it. There isn't. It's useful to some people, but it's not a valuable human pursuit. A true 1st world indulgence. It's not that difficult. Listen, compare, assess in six months or less, get organized to write or record, move on. It's all going to disappear into the great digital gyre, occasionally pulled from the muck by a search engine or a persisting link, but ultimately obsolesced and forgotten. None of this is important enough to pretend you need to have something for a year, two or three to know what you think about it. Music reviewing is a higher calling than assessments of audio gear, and that still has its foibles. This goes for cars, watches....all the 1st world gear-based hobbies and distractions. But at least in their heyday, the car mags had some friggin' great writers, and they had far better skills for making a car's driving experience vividly palpable to you than any audio reviewer attempting to help you understand a lump of hifi gear. And that includes Pearson. Hartley, et al are whiffs.
Accommodation pricing was originally offered to (underpaid) retail staff and channel owners who sold your product, and to employees of other business partners, friends & family, etc. It didn't start with reviewers, because...well....magazines weren't accommodating manufacturers on advertising pricing, except by price sheet volumes. Some people argued then that the practice was corrupting to sales people recommending products to customers, but it was common knowledge that any possible compromise caused by accommodation pricing was dwarfed by the practice of manufacturers or distributors putting "spiffs" (direct payments to salespeople for selling preferred items) on stuff they needed to move. And dwarfed by the influence of commission-based selling.
But a reviewer isn't in that economic sphere. They are selling trust on a presumption of competence, honesty and an ability to make their assessment comprehensible and meaningful to their audience, for whatever reason.
At the very least, be willing to say something to the effect of, "My hifi includes a bunch of components I got at prices only available to industry insiders like me, most of which I couldn't otherwise afford, or even if I could swing the price you'd pay, I like saving money whenever possible! And I get to have a system at a higher level so I get to review more fun things that I otherwise wouldn't have peer gear for. But don't for a moment doubt my objectivity on gear I bought at prices you can't get!" Na na na na na na; your mother wears army boots, and all that.
Phil
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As an equipment and music reviewer of 20+ years I chuckled at your post which I actually enjoyed reading because it was well written. But it is not well argued.. Your opening paragraph is largely a non sequitar and does not effectively make your point that accomodation pricing is corrupting.
An audio review should be expository writing. It takes me hundreds of hours to listen to a component, research it and more hours to competently write about it. A good review is about much more than listening. The publisher pays a pittance to own the rights to my work. I thoroughly enjoy the audio hobby but you devalue my time. Fwiw I have no loaned equipment.
Imo, at the end of the day without accommodation pricing there would be few if any reviewers, few reviews and very little audio press beyond advertising. You might prefer no opinion and the absence of product exposure. Yet the continuation of audio review publications and their proliferation on the Web suggest it is a successful enterprise with continued demand.
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