David Price leaving World?

[Audioman]

Hard to see how Choice can be improved unless they abandon their format. When times got tight for me a few years back Choice was the first magazine I stopped buying and based on my occasional looks on the news agents shelf I am not missing anything as it has got worse.

I wasn't really going to comment on this thread but I am quite surprised by this move as David is moving from a magazine that is txt based i.e mostly long form articles to a more photograph based magazine with more short form articles. So unless Choice is going to move away from the comparison based review process (a flawed one in my opinion (1) to more individual long form reviews I can't see that aspect of Choice, that I don't personally like, changing any time soon.

I am curious to see what happens but like Ken Kessler's short lived move to Choice I suspect David will be back in HiFi World before too long unless he has burnt his bridges; which I hope he hasn't as World (while not a fave of mine it did survive the cull of magazines I stopped buying at the time I lost my job nearly 4 years ago, though I don't buy it every month) will be a much poorer title with David gone.


Regards D S D L

(1)

In my view one system being used to review 10 CD players or 10 pairs of speakers etc does not work as system synergy with those components is hardly possible with this reviewing approach. The products that do well only do so so as they just happen to match the test system and those that do badly fail as they don't. Does that make them flawed products no. It was possible to predict which products would do badly with Choices group reviews based on the system used and the panel doing the review, just as it is with What HiFi and their acoustically dead listening room.

I am assuming the new owners have hired David with a view to format change. I can't see him lasting if he isn't largely allowed to do his own thing. Whenever I browse through the pages in WHS there isn't anything realy worth reading in Choice now.

I agree about the comparative reviews but to some extent all magazines do them on occasion with a limited range of systems or without defining in what context the product is reviewed. This also goes for individual product reviews where a reviewer sticks largely to his own system components. As far as World is concerned the queries section gives a better indication of products that they like long term than the 4/5 globe reviews. Hardly anything gets to review stage that would not get at least a 3 globe rating.

[Spectral Morn]

World do tend to do at least one comparison review each issue - I think it was amps last month. I agree using the same review system for every item makes no sense.

I had forgotten about that.

Choice though always have that comparison review as the headline article, a fair percentage of the txt and most of the rest are small one page reviews with the odd one that stretches into two pages. However once you take the large photos out there is not a lot of txt.

My biggest gripe with printed magazines and some online ones is there is not enough depth to the reviews. In order to really know how an item sounds it takes lots of txt to properly convey that in my opinion.


Regards D S D L

[Audioman]

My biggest gripe with printed magazines and some online ones is there is not enough depth to the reviews. In order to really know how an item sounds it takes lots of txt to properly convey that in my opinion.


Regards D S D L

Except the old Hi-fi + where reviewers took three pages of small print to describe the facia and knobs ! Ended up heading to the last paragraph for the sit on the fence / positive outcome. Oh and most people couldn't afford it anyway yet alone find a dealer that stocked it.

[Marco]

My biggest gripe with printed magazines and some online ones is there is not enough depth to the reviews. In order to really know how an item sounds it takes lots of txt to properly convey that in my opinion.

...or someone with the necessary language and communication skills to be able to portray their intended message within a finite use of carefully chosen words. Sometimes concise and to the point is better, Neil, than reams of flowery (often meaningless) prose

Personally, depending on the writing skills of the reviewer, I can tire quickly of the latter, as my attention wanders due to boredom.

Anyway, good luck to David in whatever plans he has for the future. HFW will definitely be worse without him!

Marco.

[Spectral Morn]

Except the old Hi-fi + where reviewers took three pages of small print to describe the facia and knobs ! Ended up heading to the last paragraph for the sit on the fence / positive outcome. Oh and most people couldn't afford it anyway yet alone find a dealer that stocked it.

I must confess to not liking lots of txt being wasted on button layout and operation details unless there are operational quirks found during the review process and those should be mentioned.

I miss the old HiFi + even Roy (I liked his style of writing) and the current version is a pale imitation of the old. Big txt poor quality photos compared to the old version of the magazine. It takes me no time at all to read the current + compared to the old which kept me reading for quite awhile.

Regards D S D L

[Spectral Morn]

...or someone with the necessary language and communication skills to be able to portray their intended message within a finite use of carefully chosen words. Sometimes concise and to the point is better, Neil, than reams of flowery (often meaningless) prose

Personally, depending on the writing skills of the reviewer, I can tire quickly of the latter, as my attention wanders due to boredom.

Anyway, good luck to David in whatever plans he has for the future. HFW will definitely be worse without him!

Marco.

We will have to a disagree on this Marco as frankly I am not referring to reams of such txt but the getting into understanding how a product works and interacts within system (plural) contexts takes time to relay and this is something that most modern magazines don't do; it is just pandering to a dumbed down media and those who can't be bothered to read.

My reference re quality in depth reviews is The Absolute Sound magazine of the 80s that had a main review and two alternative view points to expand on the understanding of the product. By the time you finished you had an excellent knowledge of how a product was and whether it would suit you or your system.


Regards D S D L

[Marco]

I guess that it depends on how you use magazine reviews, and magazines in general, Neil.

When I used to use them as part of the process of choosing the equipment I bought (those days are largely now long gone), all I wanted to know, with the minimum amount of 'waffle' and/or technical jargon, was whether the product(s) concerned were worth auditioning at my local dealer.

Therefore a well-written 'snapshot' of what it was capable of, sonically, was enough for me to put it on my shortlist, or not, as the case may have been. The finer points of what it was sonically capable of, which you're alluding to, I would discover with my own ears later, when listening to the equipment in question.

I simply get turned off and become bored reading excessive 'froth' (the definition of which I agree is entirely subjective), unless the review in question is written by someone I respect and whose opinion I generally agree with and can relate to in some way. That's just me, though. You're obviously different, which of course is fine!

Marco.

[KC Jones]

I have always been of the belief that less is more. A good guitar solo is more about the notes left out than the ones that remain.

If a respected reviewer were to say, that the CD Player he has just listened to is quite simply ‘the best ever heard’ and leaves it at that, the item will sell a million in anticipation. The more he adds to the review the more the initial proclamation will be diluted and interests fade. However that would impact future reviews and CD manufactures would soon be lobbying; all business is politics.

KC

[Barry]

I have always been of the belief that less is more. A good guitar solo is more about the notes left out than the ones that remain.

If a respected reviewer were to say, that the CD Player he has just listened to is quite simply ‘the best ever heard’ and leaves it at that, the item will sell a million in anticipation. The more he adds to the review the more the initial proclamation will be diluted and interests fade. However that would impact future reviews and CD manufactures would soon be lobbying; all business is politics.

KC

Do you seriously think that any reviewer stating in a review that the item is "the best ever heard" is going to be believed, and that "the item will sell a million in anticipation"?

[Marco]

I suppose it depends on how gullible/easily led you are

I know where Kevin's coming from, though.

Marco.