CompuServe Messages

Just to echo what Jim said, I've been writing for over 10 years. Once, and only once was I offered a 'bribe' to get a good review. It was when I was a free lance writer about 8 years ago. I reported teh incident to my editor and went on to trash the product – on its merits. As far as influence on a magazine directly, companies will often scream bloody murder when they get a negative review – and will threaten to pull advertising. And some will do so. In fact I recently received such a thjreat from a very well known company. My response was just to laugh and tell them I am glad I work for a magazine where I am allowed to say that ads make no difference in how we cover a product, and threats such as thgis could give me a suspicious attitude about them. They quit making such threats. Lou