CNET Scandal:

I couldn't find anything already posted about this.

http://www.theatlanticwire.com/technology/2013/01/can-we-trust-cnet-again-after-ces-scandal/60976/

 

Interesting.
Mrk

 

This is what can happen when you're under the control of these mega-corporations. Being under the control of mega-media just makes it worse. There's no such thing as independence under them. CBS won't get harmed by it, CNET, well, that's a hell of a hole they're going to have to try to get out of. I guess they're going out of my bookmarks for a while until they can prove trustworthy again.

 

I 've substituted CNet with Softpedia a long ago.

If you go even today on CNet, in the "Password Manager" category and in the "freeware" subsection, you are still offered...non other than the infamous GATOR, the horror of all computer users in XP days and a common detection by all anti-spyware programs of that era.

Very trustworthy...

 

CNET news and CNET downloads have always been two very different subjects. The downloads site is about as good as a fox in a hen house. As to Gator, yeah, it's listed, but I think the link and the site is long dead. In fact, I thought Gator was under some new name now, but still rather untrustworthy. There are a lot of other obvious scams in that list though for sure.

 

Now this shows up at the CNET website; already chronicled but linked here only to call attention to the 217 (at this posting) comments to the story.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-30677_3-57563877-244/the-2013-best-of-ces-awards-cnets-story/

 

Who cares about CNET. Useless drama.

 

This is why I like Consumer Reports. They allow no advertisements in their magazines or on-line sites from ANY manufacturer or service provider. They are a certified non-profit organization that relies on revenue from regular subscribers like you and me. This eliminate any biases, background persuasions, or even the appearance of improprieties. They don't even allow any products to use their reviews.

And unlike typical review sites, they accept no test samples from the makers for reviews. Instead, they send anonymous buyers out to Best Buy, Fry's, Sears, Walmart, etc. and pay retail for off-the-shelf samples for testing. This eliminates the very real potential of makers sending specially tested and prepared (perhaps tweaked) samples to the review sites.

Another thing I like about CR is they are real techies - not journalists. They don't write for sensationalism, but rather to give consumers the facts.

Finally, they don't write a review on new products then forget about it. Instead, they poll their millions of subscribers, regular consumers, to see how well these products held up over 2 - 3 years (not 2 - 3 weeks) of use in the real-world.

There are a couple downsides. The reviews are not always timely because they must wait for the products to hit the shelves. And they don't have the time to test every CPU, every PSU, every this or that. But at least they are unbiased reviews and not persuaded by advertising dollars.

 

These media giants are like the RIAA, they just refuse to leave the 70s and 80s and progress with the viewing audience and consumers in general. No one wants to have a 30 minute TV program whittled down to quite literally in some cases 10 minutes of actual viewing because 20 of those minutes are spent on advertisements. Why do they think a lot of "illegal" TV streaming and piracy happens? I already pay north of 80 dollars a month for cable access just so I can catch channels that my provider is bound and determined to nickel and dime me on, and then when I sit down to relax and watch a great show, I'm bombarded with ad after ad after ad. For the same dang reason that internet users use adblocking software, TV viewers use things like Dish Hopper or resort to using DVR to catch a show later, the amount of ads has gotten excessive. Of course what happens at times when you go back to that DVR episode? You can't fast forward through the ads, Dish Hopper or not. It's insanity.

You know, I watch a lot of old TV shows from the 40s and such. Used to in those days, the ads were done by the actors in the middle of the show..and there were like 2, very rarely 3. They were very short, straight to the point and had the same effect if not a better effect on consumers because the celebrities of the time were the ones doing the ads. Now it takes a full minute of watching some woman on a beach before the ad gets around to telling me Burger King has a new sandwich, or a bunch of freakin mice driving around bobbing their heads for a car ad. I'd say do it the old way, like in the 40s, but if the advertisers of today took to making the ads of yesterday, there would really be no show.

 

I haven't paid a lick of attention to CNET since its purchase by CBS.
PC World reviews are far more trustworthy. Their daily tech news app and website is none too shabby either.

 

Actually, I've found that a lot of software articles on PCWorld are simple reprints of past reviews they've done. Not as often as PCMag seems to, but it still happens. I prefer ArsTechnica myself for stuff like that.

 

Yes, I like ArsTechnica a lot, but there's been some changes I don't like since their sale to Condé Nast Publishing. I'm also growing fond of ReadWrite (formerly ReadWriteWeb).

 

I don't think they are anything like the RIAA. The RIAA was rightly concerned about the mass pirating of music cassettes and CDs, and the sharing of copyrighted materials (the precursor to illegal filesharing). That is totally different from technology that allows you to skip commercials.

I remember an old VCR I had that had a neat "Skip" button that would advance the tape 30 seconds for each push. Push it 4 times, it skipped 2 minutes. One of my favorite features - great for skipping commercial breaks. But because the advertising industry (not the RIAA) whined and cried, later VCRs didn't have that feature.

 

They are like the RIAA in that they are resistant to changes in technology and in the way that consumers "consume" that technology and things like movies and music. As far as any "skip" buttons on VCRs, it's called "fast forwarding" and every remaining VCR on the market has it. Now if we're talking DVDs, yes, the industry somewhere along the line disabled the ability to move forward or skip through the "FBI warning" and the various ads before the main menu comes up. It's just another example of the fact that true ownership doesn't exist anymore in the media, electronics and computing industries.

Edit: I wanted to add one more thing about the RIAA's "concerns".

1. Most music groups, especially rock of the 70s and 80s would have never succeeded as well as they did had people not recorded the performances at places like the Whiskey A Go Go, The Roxy , CBGB and all the little hole in the wall spots around the country. Had people not traded cassette tapes, bands not sold demos out of the trunks of their cars to people in the streets or even given them away, a good portion of the "legends" would have never made it any further than those clubs.

2. Piracy of music did not start with the creation of Napster. It started back when record stores were still in malls, and those stores were charging extremely high amounts for CDs (many times 16 dollars or more for a single CD, not even a double album). Then, you have the still occurring issue of many albums having one good song and 10, 11 or 12 "meh" or crap songs...which would be the real reason iTunes took off instead of "Oh hey, I can take this wherever I go now!".

3. You always have to keep in mind that the RIAA's "concerns" are for themselves and the record companies, not the artists. Artists have, in almost the entire history of the big record labels, never made one single cent off their albums. In almost every case, by the time they've been given the advance money, recorded their song/album, the promoted it, made the video, etc...they end up owing the label. Album went platinum or even better? Fantastic!...you're still in debt because your portion of the profit from sales is miniscule. This would be why people like Trent Reznor don't go through record labels anymore.

The industry is a lot more sinister and shady than most think it is. Between paying to have songs played on the radio, the process I discussed above, "tweaking" chart placement by counting double albums as two sales, having clerks in stores rescan bought albums twice at the counter and even more tomfoolery, the RIAA and the recording industry as a whole can hardly be looked at with pity because bad old pirates are taking 1s and 0s off a torrent site.

 

No, the skip buttons were preset to skip a specific amount of time - typically 30 seconds. Yes, similar to fast forward, but not quite.

It is wrong assume the RIAA was only concerned with their own bank accounts though I will not argue that was a major motive. However, the RIAA was created to protect the intellectual property rights and Freedom of Speech of the labels and the artists and did, does, more good than harm.

For example, the RIAA established the "Equalization curve" standard used in recording to vinyl, thus ensuring accurate "high-fidelity" across the full audio spectrum (frequency range) during the reproduction of the stereophonic sound (playing of the record).

No again. RIAA was started way before the invention of CDs. Your youthful lack of experience is revealed! The RIAA has been around long before the CD having been established in 1952!

And your complaint that a single album (cassette or CD) might have only a single good tune on it is irrelevant. It is your personal opinion about those extra tunes, even if a common opinion and that "one good song on the album" excuse was the twisted rationale thieves used to steal.

As someone with nearly 400 LPs and more than 600 CDs, I share the frustration for those who bought an album only to discover the only good song was the one played on the radio. But that is still no excuse to steal (make illegal copies).

The hope of the artists and the record producers is that all songs would be hits. But no one can accurately predict the fickle public or foretell what will or will not make radio play, or become a hit.

Records labels gamble every time the make an album. And they gamble with their money, not the artists - just as movie producers do. The actors are not funding those production projects.

Not true at all. They even get royalties each time their songs are aired (at least on legitimate broadcasting services). You are merely citing examples of the extreme cases of injustice - not normal practices.

 

They did not establish "the" equalisation curve.
They adopted an already existing internationally standardised curve that was on the RCA Victor New Orthophonic curve, as did all the other labels/standards bodies around the world and was the main standard until LP Stereo became popular.

Cheers, Nick

 

I read the average band gets 13%, superstars 20% from sales/royalty deals, cant remember the source though !

Cheers, Nick

 

Actually, I believe I am right. Note I said they "established" it. I did not say they developed it. And I said for "stereo" recordings. Prior to RIAA "establishing" the RIAA Equalization Curve as the industry standard, every recording studio had their own equalization curve - which obviously created problems for the emerging home audio reproduction equipment industry.

But to be truly accurate, recording equalization is all based way before that - in the 1920s by Bell Labs.

See: Stereophile - RIAA Equalization
The RIAA Curve
Granite Audio - RIAA EQUALIZATION CURVE FOR PHONOGRAPH RECORDS

 

No you can't single out the RIAA as all the industry around the similar time period started adopting identical curves to RCA Victor's.

Cheers, Nick

 

Yes I can single out RIAA. That was it's purpose. To "establish" a single standard. Please read the links I provided - at least the first link to the Stereophile article. I am not denying RCA was a major player, and the RIAA curve may be adapted from the RCA standard. But not the point.

The point is the RIAA is a consortium of leading (virtually all) recording studios AND reproduction equipment makers who got together and agreed on a standard. A standard established by the RIAA - as I originally noted.

It really does not matter who came up with the original protocols, just as it does not now matter that Sony and Philips created the Compact Disc standard. What is important is that because of these standards, the media (LP or disk) result in the music sounding the same, regardless the phono cartridge or phono-preamp/equalization maker.

 

I was in L.A watching many of these 80s groups and early 90s groups come up, get bottles tossed at them nightly, start bar fights..I'm not that young, Bill As to the RIAA, I'm well aware of them being around far longer than CDs. You should be doing more studying into the methods the recording industry uses to sell, chart and promote artists and albums, it's a very shady business with the artists/bands getting the short end of the stick. You can believe what you want, but ask the ones doing the performances and forget what I say, they'll tell you they make almost nothing off of album sells and everything they do make comes from touring and merch. Again, don't believe me, look up the stories yourself, get on some Twitter accounts and ask the past and present groups, talk to local bands and performers and ask what they're making even without a major deal.

The Rolling Stones got filthy rich because they've spent the last 50 years touring themselves to death and now are in a position to have contracts the exact way they please. Ask them if that was possible in the 60s and 70s. That goes for all the "superstars" and "supergroups". You're just simply wrong about that specific part of the discussion.

All that serious discussion aside...you've only got 400 LPs and 600 CDs? Small timer

 

A friend has well over 2000 albums so yes, "only" is how I feel. In my defense, in the 24 years I was active duty military, I moved around the world a bit and albums quickly ate up my weight allowance - not to mention, the pay for military personal typically leaves too much month at the end of the money. The good news (for me) is that I also had a high-end Duel turntable with a top Shure cartridge and two nice Teac reel-to-reels with over 80 tapes - so most of my albums have been played just 2 or 3 times - and some I paid $3 for in the 70s and early 80s are now worth 10 times that.

FTR, I have worked as a sound "grip" for visiting artists at a couple major venues in my area in the past. I am well aware of the RIAA's strong arm and sometimes shady tactics signing new talent, and when going after illegal filesharers.

But I am also aware of the immense amount of good the RIAA has done since formed in 1952. The RIAA EQ Curve standardizing phono EQ across the entire industry is certainly one of them. Illustrating the severity and extent of piracy is another.

We must take the good with the bad. The RIAA has done an outstanding job at protecting intellectual property rights - though sadly, they have smashed a few innocent toes along the way. Software piracy (to include tunes in digital format) WAS totally out of control. Drastic, immediate measures were needed, were developed, and were put in place. But like so many drastic measures, they tend to run roughshod over some.

RIAA was instrumental is shutting down Grokster and similar pirating sites that were ripping off starving artists big time. However, the RIAA is fighting a loosing battle and that is due, much in part by sites like Google, torrents, P2P sites and other big Internet presences who make downloading tunes illegally so simple - and by consumers so willing to rip those artists off.

I am NOT defending everything about the RIAA. I am just saying it is wrong to condemn everything about them when much of what they do is good.

 

Maybe in your part of the world RIAA was the only thing you heard of, but in my part we had RCA and DIN standard curves, then the IEC 98, RIAA was unheard of as a curve standard.
Think that’s why we are having differing views !

Cheers, Nick