Definitely a pretty hot topic nowadays...
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Fake Reviews - Audioholics talk
- Thread starter VintageFlanker
- Start date
It is a good talk but they are not practicing what they say in all cases. I just looked up one of their reviews. It does not say anywhere where the product came from. That should be the first paragraph in every review as I do. Many online sites do the same.
Most (if not all) Audioholics reviews seem to use samples provided by the manufacturers, as is the case for Stereophile. One of the reasons I find value in this site, Amir, is that you seldom do that. (Have you ever?) I'd rather see samples from the field, to get a true sense of production quality.
OP
- Thread Starter
- #5
It happened quite often that manufacturers send samples to Amir...
Most SMSL, Topping, JDS, Matrix, Geshelli etc. In these cases, having a randon unit to compare would be a good thing... But it would drive our busy host crazy.
I say it is probably 5 to 10% of the time that I get gear from manufacturer. The vast majority of gear tested is provided by the members or I have bought them.
That is my assumption but per the point they made in the video, US Federal Trade Commission rules require very clear stipulation of whether anything of value is provided to the reviewer. Mathew made this point over and over again. Yet, it is not in their reviews.
ernestcarl
Major Contributor
Coincidentally, this reminds of another review where the reviewer liked the product so much he was literally begging (almost shamelessly) that the manufacturer let him keep the review sample permanently, on video — for posterity and proof that they did let him keep it, I guess. LOL
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Sorry, pet peeve of mine, as I have started seeing the word misused so much, stipulation. A stipulation is an agreement. Laws and rules are stipulations as they are not agreements.
Tks
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I was there for the stream, I hit them with that golden sample question at the end ;P
As for that whole ordeal honestly. I think audio is too small to have devices over-engineered and to try and pull something like that, as the reputation damage would be ridiculously high. I just don't know who would be willing to risk having a the scrutiny of a measurement site expose such a thing..
As long as we're not handed pre-production samples passed off as retail samples, then I don't see a problem with using manufacturer gear as long as it's returned (though keeping it and giving it away or something if the shipping cost is higher than the product cost, I can foresee being reasonable I suppose, though I'm not sure on this, I'd need to give it more thought).
As for that whole ordeal honestly. I think audio is too small to have devices over-engineered and to try and pull something like that, as the reputation damage would be ridiculously high. I just don't know who would be willing to risk having a the scrutiny of a measurement site expose such a thing..
As long as we're not handed pre-production samples passed off as retail samples, then I don't see a problem with using manufacturer gear as long as it's returned (though keeping it and giving it away or something if the shipping cost is higher than the product cost, I can foresee being reasonable I suppose, though I'm not sure on this, I'd need to give it more thought).
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I also had this view of Audioholics; however the recent nonsense they published regarding isolation gadgets make me skeptical. And now they publish a pure unadulterated commercial for Focal
I lost faith in audioholics. I gave them the benefit of the doubt for a while based on their past efforts but somewhere along the line they lost their way.
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The burden should not fall entirely on @amirm and Erin. If I was a decade or so younger, i'd establish a channel "The Blind Audiophile" and conduct appropriately designed blinded comparisons. Such is not a light undertaking and my only special expertise would be to design scientific protocols, I have no engineering / audio expertise. Hopefully one of our more learned (and younger) members will consider taking this on, I know there would be outstanding support from membership. Blinded comparisons of speakers and equalization methods is especially needed.
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