Has Keyboard ever reviewed a product that

[NYKeys]

They did not like

[b3_john]

 

Huh?

[NYKeys]

Sorry about the 1st post I was trying to do too many things.

 

 

 

[zeronyne]

There have been a couple of Sample CD's that got mild criticism, but not from the big boys.

 

Oh, and I think they rightfully panned the Sequential Circuits Studio 440 and the Korg S1.

 

It's sick and sad that I can retain that in my limited RAM.

[zeronyne]

Oh, and wait...there was a period of time, I think, when Jim Aiken hated everything.

[ITGITC]

Oh, and wait...there was a period of time, I think, when Jim Aiken hated everything.

 

:grin:

 

I think I've got those issues in my basement.

 

It's inspirational. I'll never throw 'em out.

 

 

[K K]

Sure.

 

Anyway, a review with only positive comments for a product is not a review. Even the best gear has their (at least little) faults. So a unbiased review must tell about both sides of the coin.

[K K]

And of course same applies with vice versa.

[ITGITC]

And of course same applies with vice versa.

 

There's always two sides to a coin. Could be poles apart. Perhaps even diametrically opposed. Maybe even... backwards, bottom up, inside out, inverted, overturned, topsy-turvy, upside-down, wrongside out.

 

Again, apologies for the hijacking behaviour of my friend Cydonia.

 

 

[SilverDragonSoun]

There's a real fine line here for keyboard IMO when doing reviews. Generally they are reviewing the products of current magazine advertisers or potential magazine advertisers. I imagine a large part of the expenses of the magazine are covered by advertisers. You don't want to bite the hand that feeds you.

 

I also think many of the things reviewed have large areas of subjectivity which will of course be judged differently by each person. If I hear something and think I don't like it or I don't like the layout ect. that makes it my opinion. It may not be shared by everyone or even most people.

 

I had to do movie reviews for a local paper years ago and I quickly learned how quickly people can disagree with you. I rarely got letters/email saying people agreed with me. It was usually the people who disagreed who I heard from. I had to learn to word things differently so I wouldn't offend so many people yet still try to get my review done in a way that I believed in. I do have respect for reviewers whether I agree or disagree since I've been in their shoes.

[Dave E]

All Keyboard reviews have a list of pros and cons... I don't remember seeing a review without some "cons" or "things they wish had been included". It makes sense to me that a completely useless product wouldn't warrant a review.

[The Real MC]

In the early days of reviews they did not list pros/cons.

[Ernie Rideout]

Hey guys 'n' gals,

 

This is always a great question to ask, because the answer is, in my opinion, a good one. We never let an advertiser's status influence the course or outcome of a review. If they currently run ads, great. If they don't, great. We focus on the instrument or product and how well it performs its intended musical duties in a professional environment. There have been many times when an advertiser has pulled their ads because of the conclusions we've reached in our review of a product.

 

Zeronyne is not far off in recalling that Jim Aikin has in the past been extremely critical of certain products. But then, those were the earlier days of our industry. Audio quality, user interfaces, and musical appropriateness were not what they've become today. It's much more rare these days for a company to manufacture and release a real dog of a product.

 

That said, we always do point out shortcomings when we encounter them.

 

To their credit, most manufacturers have no problem with us being honest in our reviews, as long as we're fair. They know their product's limitations better than anyone. For my money, no review is useful unless it lets you know what the musical potential is of a product, and that involves taking a long, hard look at how it performs.

 

Silver Dragon is correct in that there is a lot of subjective evaluation that goes into a music product review. That's why we try to have more than one of our trusted writers weigh in on each review. We try to make comparisons with instruments and products that are in widespread use, so you can get an idea of our point of comparison.

 

It's all part of earning your trust, which is something we take very seriously here at Keyboard magazine. In our experience, when we've earned that, we'll earn the respect of the manufacturing community as well.

 

Thanks!

 

Ernie

 

 

[NYKeys]

This is very true you never bite the hand that feeds you. Plus most people here are smart enough to know that reviews are just opions

[kanker.]

It's much more rare these days for a company to manufacture and release a real dog of a product.

I think this really gets to the heart of it. There's certainly a lot of prosumer stuff out there that can't compare to a MotifES or a FantomS, but it's geared toward a slightly different market and has different standards attached to it. Now if the new Korg M3, for example, were not a major step forward from the Triton series, then I would be very disappointed to see a review that was not critical of that. The Triton series died on the vine years ago, and Korg's taken its sweet time replacing it - it should get it right.

[raddtunes]

Thanks for chiming in Ernie! For me, product reviews - as well as articles on getting more out of your product - are among the most valuable articles in Keyboard. If you could find out a way to simply have more of this per issue, I'd happily pay more per issue. Some things I'd also be perfectly willing to tolerate would be:

 

1. No reviews of "dog" products

2. Open up the advertising - - (must be G rated).

3. Shorter/fewer artist profile articles

4. More Craig Anderton. At any price.

 

 

[SilverDragonSoun]

 

It's all part of earning your trust, which is something we take very seriously here at Keyboard magazine. In our experience, when we've earned that, we'll earn the respect of the manufacturing community as well.

 

Thanks!

 

Ernie

 

 

Thanks for weighing in Ernie. I think most people value the magazine who subscribe to it, at least I do. I find that the product reviews certainly act as a source of information for me and when I got to play a keyboard I have that much more information to use and fall back on. I also value the opinions of the reviewers and respect the time and effort they put into the review. I also get to learn about many things I previously didn't know about. Keyboard is the only magazine I read cover to cover. All this equals trust for me which is one the main reasons I subscribe to the magazine.

 

I also find these forums a source of great information and opinions and often I seek them because I trust and value the opinions of the members.

[Bobadohshe]

Agreed, thanks for the info Ernie. Not to broaden the scope of this thread or turn it into a debate, but unlike some I happen to really enjoy the artist profiles. It keeps me up to date on who is making waves and innovating on today's music scene. I value that info as a professional myself and lately I have been exposed to a lot of great music because of those artist profiles. I am pretty satisfied with the format right now.

[raddtunes]

And I certainly don't want to advocate or argue for less artist profiles if a majority of us want them. But I really could use more reviews and "power app" type articles Would a wider base of advertising open this up Ernie?

[dementia13]

Someone brought that question up to a magazine a while ago, it might have been "Guitar Player", and part of their answer was that they don't hold back from pointing out a product's flaws, but neither do they have space to devote to bad products. Keyboard's not Maximum PC, who will absolutely slam a product even if it has a full-page ad directly facing the review, but I do always get the feeling that I'm getting an honest and well-thought-out opinion.