Did I say something to offend you? If so, I must have missed it.

I do know about Boating Mags and all magazines because I worked for a
marketing company and we used to "buy" these PR pieces all the time.

What did offend you about my comment? It was a PR fluff piece, nothing
wrong with that.




"Gould 0738" wrote in message
...
It's a PR piece for a new product. "Articles" like this is very common
in
all boating magazines. Normally they agree to run so many ads if the
magazine agrees to run the piece.

You don't know a goddam thing about boats, and don't even begin to
insinuate
you know anything about boating magazines.

Pick up any issue of any boating magazine, and if it is reasonably
successful
you can go through the magazine and say, "Oh, look! Here's an ad for that
company or brand of boat that was featured in an article this month. Must
be
something fu'd going on here." Of course the fact that the same company or
product may have advertised regularly for years means nothing....

Now count the dozens, scores, or in some of the largest publications the
*hundreds* of ads for companies that do not have articles appearing in the
issue. Any explanation for those?

Add the publishing business to the list of things you need to learn more
about.

"Gould 0738" wrote in message
...
It's a PR piece for a new product. "Articles" like this is very common
in
all boating magazines. Normally they agree to run so many ads if the
magazine agrees to run the piece.

You don't know a goddam thing about boats, and don't even begin to
insinuate
you know anything about boating magazines.

Pick up any issue of any boating magazine, and if it is reasonably
successful
you can go through the magazine and say, "Oh, look! Here's an ad for that
company or brand of boat that was featured in an article this month. Must
be
something fu'd going on here." Of course the fact that the same company or
product may have advertised regularly for years means nothing....

Now count the dozens, scores, or in some of the largest publications the
*hundreds* of ads for companies that do not have articles appearing in the
issue. Any explanation for those?

Add the publishing business to the list of things you need to learn more
about.



Undies in a knot tonight Chuck? Chill.

"JimH" wrote in message
...

"Gould 0738" wrote in message
...
It's a PR piece for a new product. "Articles" like this is very
common
in
all boating magazines. Normally they agree to run so many ads if the
magazine agrees to run the piece.

You don't know a goddam thing about boats, and don't even begin to
insinuate
you know anything about boating magazines.

Pick up any issue of any boating magazine, and if it is reasonably
successful
you can go through the magazine and say, "Oh, look! Here's an ad for
that
company or brand of boat that was featured in an article this month.
Must
be
something fu'd going on here." Of course the fact that the same
company or
product may have advertised regularly for years means nothing....

Now count the dozens, scores, or in some of the largest publications
the
*hundreds* of ads for companies that do not have articles appearing in
the
issue. Any explanation for those?

Add the publishing business to the list of things you need to learn
more
about.



Undies in a knot tonight Chuck? Chill.



Must have seen the latest zogby poll

On Fri, 15 Oct 2004 20:32:15 -0400, JohnH
wrote:

On 15 Oct 2004 23:41:58 GMT, (Gould 0738) wrote:

It's a PR piece for a new product. "Articles" like this is very common in
all boating magazines. Normally they agree to run so many ads if the
magazine agrees to run the piece.

You don't know a goddam thing about boats, and don't even begin to insinuate
you know anything about boating magazines.

Pick up any issue of any boating magazine, and if it is reasonably successful
you can go through the magazine and say, "Oh, look! Here's an ad for that
company or brand of boat that was featured in an article this month. Must be
something fu'd going on here." Of course the fact that the same company or
product may have advertised regularly for years means nothing....

Now count the dozens, scores, or in some of the largest publications the
*hundreds* of ads for companies that do not have articles appearing in the
issue. Any explanation for those?

Add the publishing business to the list of things you need to learn more about.

Chuck, do any of these magazine pieces ever find anything wrong with the boats
they 'test'. I take "Motorboating" and it has several articles a month about new
boats. All of the new boats are 'spectacular'. None have faults. Are there any
magazines which actually compare different brands?

I can tell you that "Sal****er Sportsman" has never met a boat it
didn't like. To give them some credit, they do comment on some
fishability things, but the critique is tepid at best.

A couple of years ago, one of the NE fishing publications asked me to
review a bay boat - if only because I'm one of the only people in NE
who actually has one. :)

I said sure and I took the boat for a week. Ran it over in
Narragansett Bay, out around Fisher's, The Race, up the Connecticut -
did some fishing and wrote detailed critique of the boat including
most of the issues I have detailed here about my Ranger plus a couple
of rather unique ones comparing the test boat to my Ranger and the
Polar bay that I had run.

The editor called me after I sent it in and told me I needed to cut
back on the criticism and be more positive.

Oh well - some of us are destined to be Hemingway and some are
destined to be....well....me. :)

Later,

Tom
-----------
"Angling may be said to be so
like the mathematics that it
can never be fully learnt..."

Izaak Walton "The Compleat Angler", 1653

I take "Motorboating" and it has several articles a month about new
boats. All of the new boats are 'spectacular'. None have faults. Are there
any
magazines which actually compare different brands?



Usually not head to head. I subscribed to Poweboat Reports for a while, but
their editorial budget is almost non existent and they draw absolute
conclusions about items that are obviously very subjective. Many of the
considerations are pretty subjective. For example, most new boats have a shiny
gel coat. Does Brand A shine more than Brand B? Who knows? Does it matter as
long as both are really shiny? How big does "roomy" stateroom have to be? Etc.

There are also differences between a thorough, clinical test and a review of
general impressions and experiences while aboard. Sort of like the differences
between David Pascoe's "reviews" and an actual survey.

Take the battery article- you wanted "tests, statistics, charts, graphs, etc"
to back up the guy's claims about his batteries- but really beyond the amp hour
rating, physical case size, and CCA of the batteries he didn't make any claims
that
would have to be verified by an indpendent laboratory.

One of the challenges with boats is that the majority of gasoline powered boats
share the same mfgr's engines. Tough to rate one brand a lot higher on
mechanical reliability than another when so many major components are exactgly
the same. With some of the diesel boats, you might find a particular engine
throughout the production run, or you might find several.

Best way to compare, head to head, would be to save the "performance data
chart" (if there is one) from one issue to the next.

If you're lucky, you might learn enough about a product from a general article
to know whether or not you want to investigate it further, but nobody should
expect a magazine to tell them everything they need to know to make a decision
about any product. Boats and accessories included.

Undies in a knot tonight Chuck? Chill.

Not at all. The man of a thousand screen names presumed to declare what the
item *really* was, and why it was written.
He was wrong on both counts, wrong about the way the business works, and wrong
to run his mouth about a subject where he is so clearly underinformed.

Did I say something to offend you? If so, I must have missed it.

I do know about Boating Mags and all magazines because I worked for a
marketing company and we used to "buy" these PR pieces all the time.



You presumed to declare a motivation behind the article. You were wrong.

You presumed to declare that there is an advertising deal in the works between
my publisher and the battery company. You are wrong again. There is no
quid-pro-quo as you insisted.(The company that retails this product in town
*does* advertise in my publisher's magazine, and all other regional
publications, and has done so every month for about 20 years. Odds are good
that they will advertise for another 20 whether we ever mentioned their name
outside of their ad space, or not. Our revenue from that account will not
increase, or decrease ten cents as a result of the interview).

When you run a specialty publication addressing a narrow field of interest,
there will certainly be many instances when an article features a company that
is also an advertiser. I suppose to be really uptight about it, we could adopt
a policy that read,
"We will refuse to accept any advertising from your firm for one issue prior
and two issues beyond the month any editorial regarding your company appears."
Not likely to happen. We try not to be whores, but by the same token there's no
point in being a self righteous martyr.

"Gould 0738" wrote in message
...
Undies in a knot tonight Chuck? Chill.

Not at all. The man of a thousand screen names presumed to declare
what the
item *really* was, and why it was written.
He was wrong on both counts, wrong about the way the business works,
and wrong
to run his mouth about a subject where he is so clearly underinformed.

As an engineer, I found the article interesting but a little light on
details as has been noted by others. It did have hints of a penumbra of
an emanation of the kind of article Motor Trend was famous for. Do you
recall the raves for the Vega and the wonderful new engine process in
which the bores were anodized which was said to be far superior to using
liners? Popular Science was another magazine given to that sort of
article. I will not venture a guess as to the motivation of the authors
and editors. I doubt, except perhaps for motor trend, that it was so
crass as a straight money for editorial transaction.

Providing all the bloody details, especially if independently arrived
at, is way more work that one person can handle.

del cecchi

On 15 Oct 2004 23:27:09 GMT, (Gould 0738) wrote:

I believe that "lighter per amp hour" is accurate.

==========================================

Possibly a dangerous assumption since they are still lead-acid cells.

For any given battery chemistry such as lead-acid / nickel-cadmium /
NiMH / etc., capacity tracks very closely with weight. The way I read
your article, their "break through" was compressing more lead into the
same area (thinner plate separation). The batteries sound to me like
a variation on AGM (Absorbed Glass Mat) which has been around for
awhile. As others have stated, I'd be interested in a side by side
tabulation of specifications against a conventional lead-acid 8D.
Even though there are big quality differences between 8Ds as expressed
in longevity, they all tend to have the same specifications.

On 16 Oct 2004 01:51:52 GMT, (Gould 0738) wrote:

~~ snippage ~~

When you run a specialty publication addressing a narrow field of interest,
there will certainly be many instances when an article features a company that
is also an advertiser. I suppose to be really uptight about it, we could adopt
a policy that read,

"We will refuse to accept any advertising from your firm for one issue prior
and two issues beyond the month any editorial regarding your company appears."
Not likely to happen. We try not to be whores, but by the same token there's no
point in being a self righteous martyr.

Interesting you should mention that. When I was slowly transitioning
out of the world of corporate piracy and back stabbing, I worked for a
year with the ARRL as a Technical Editor for their main magazine "QST"
and was the de-facto editor of "QEX" which was their heavy theory and
experimental magazine.

I asked that question one time at an Editorial meeting - it was when
several manufacturers were introducing DSP into their products and we
were testing the products - how do we avoid conflicts with brand
loyalty (I was a Yaesu guy for example), etc., personal preference and
still continue to accept ads from the companies.

It was interesting how the ARRL did it. First they would buy the
radios at various retail establishments at retail. Right off the
shelf. Then, they would farm the radios out to individuals by random
lot - some of them went overseas believe it or not. There were two
random reviewers and they were given a week to play with the gear,
write a review and return the radio to HQ. It was then given to a
staffer by random lot (you had to be a minimum Advanced to get one),
given a week and write a review. Then it came to the Technical
Editors who would read the reviews, play with the rigs to see what was
what, then the review was written.

What happened was very enlightening. Once you eliminated all the "my
Kenwood does this well, but...." and "Yaesu sucks because" and "Icom
does this better than..." you got a fairly accurate view of how the
radio preformed, what the faults were and a general impression of the
quality level - a very good picture of what the equipment did, looked
and operated like.

It was very fair.

My problem with boating and fishing mags is that they depend on the
ads for a living, thus saying something like "The Ranger T-top is
undersized and didn't quite fit the center console properly causing
vibrations and their unwanted side effects" is translated into "The
Ranger T-top, while somewhat under engineered, looks good on the boat
and has four rod holders". :)

All the best,

Tom
--------------

"What the hell's the deal with this newsgroup...
is there a computer terminal in the day room of
some looney bin somewhere?"

Bilgeman - circa 2004