CompuServe Messages

Hi John, ->For conspiracy theory accuracy, you should at least account for the magical ->process that might successfully influence all those people along the chain… ->the writer, the PR people (for and against a given product), the editors, the ->ad people, the publisher, the associate editors, etc. I realize this thread's about 6 days old, but I'm usually surfing a wave about 1000 messages behind the lead so it's hard to do timely responses. <g> Your are absolutely correct. Like James Coulter's comments about having lost faith in the media, I have vowed never to do another product review after the last few I wrote for 3D Artist. It's such a circus of owners, pr people, ad people, users, and whatever that there's absolutely no motivation for doing a fair review beyond personal integrity or money. And we all know how well 3D Artist pays writers. 🙂 After you do a couple of these you really start to notice that software reviews generally fall into 3 categories: 1. Glossy topographical overviews or reviews written by those without a clue. This is the stuff you see all the time in PC Mag and the like. Basically a rehash of the advertising literature, completely useless. 2. Reviews with a hard slant towards someone's personal gain. Harder to spot, you need to get familiar with all the players to gain understanding. Often disguised as a glowing endorsement. 3. The real thing, an objective review. Rare and usually found in the less glossy mags. Often results in someone getting creamed by the offended party, and bringing absolutely no positive return to the writer. Usually drives writers into retirement or category 2. What's truly needed is an independent reviewing organization like Consumer Reports for 3D software. Unfortunately a good 3D product is usually so deep and feature rich that it demands an entire issue to fairly cover all the features. And since there's no real money to made doing this other than selling it to end users we'll probably not enjoy it in our lifetime. Enjoyed reading your comments, -Heinz.