Because I Care
Your magazine continues to reach for new depths with the latest Issue 29. You publish two-month-old news, and the reviews seem to be hype and a commercial for DTS. The ratings bear no relation to the DTS oriented text. You ignore important developments to hype DTS. I ordered the DTS Demo DVD disc from the recent Laser Magic 1998 special edition and it has never been delivered. I sent an e-mail about the non-delivery of the DTS demo and it goes unanswered. Based upon comments on the net, you failed to deliver to many people. You must deliver what you promise. The home theatre forum talks of the sad state of Widescreen Review. The magazine seems to have no set publication date. This is very unprofessional. It is sad to see that such a fine publication has sunk to such low levels. The bottom seems to be with the DTS audio issue. You have totally turned me off to DTS. What hype!!!!! Your reviews seem totally non-objective. They are of no value and are poor compared to what is now available on the web. A few years ago I looked forward to every issue. The current product is an insult despite the occasional special feature bright spots. I feel that DTS does have some merit, but your crusade has been a complete disservice to DTS. It has turned me off, and others report the same feeling. Please read the thread in Home Theater Forum and take its advice. I am totally upset about your failure to deliver the DTS demo after all the hype. I have complained to DTS. They responded that they understand. Widescreen Review should stick to the things that have distinguished it in the past and deliver a good product again. I know that my comments are harsh...but I care. Please do an objective evaluation. We need your publication for its excellent technical contribution. The obsession with DTS and failure to recognize change has hurt Widescreen Review. I write because I care. Please do a critical evaluation of your once fine product.
Roger Mathus
Editor Gary Reber Comments:
Roger, we are an independent publication and our editorial and reviews are our own based on our own research and listening conclusions. We praise those technologies and products which show actual performance gains using objective and subjective evaluations to determine how good they sound or how good they look (on a display device). I often wonder if, and to what extent, the people who criticize (or should I say espouse an attack attitude of) DTS have given the technology a fair listen in controlled level-matched comparative conditions using original master recordings of soundtracks and music. I have, on numerous occasions, compared DTS Digital Surround (and Dolby Digital) to printmasters and to analog and digital PCM music masters. I also personally know numerous highly respected recording engineer professionals who have done their own comparisons between DTS Digital Surround and Dolby Digital. Not all comparative results reveal dramatic differences, but most often in audio matters, the differences are subtle but nonetheless meaningful to engineers and audiophiles striving for perfection. Then too, not all equipment is capable of resolving the subtle gradations—as experienced audiophiles will attest. This is a fact of electronics and is the reason that respected expensive components often do, in fact, sound better, but not necessarily dramatically better than far less expensive gear. And this is why engineers and engineering teams constantly strive to refine their circuit designs to edge a little bit more performance out of their products with each new model. I am not going to defend DTS’ politics or their actions (or inactions). They have had plenty of political battles to fight to get their technology out on DVD and LaserDisc. And they still have enormous challenges ahead. They have blundered often, whether due to arrogance or simply not being knowledgeable and experienced with respect to de facto motion picture and home theatre standards, and it is frustrating and saddening for us all. I do, however, think, as do most professional recording engineers and manufacturers’ engineering staffs, that DTS delivers the best transparent lossy perceptual codec performance. As for the DVD DTS Demo disc... This was an advertisement taken out in the Laser Magic 1998 special edition by DTS. This was not OUR promotion except to let potential readers of the magazine know that there was a DTS offer inside because we thought that our readers would benefit. Once the business reply cards from the insertion ad in the magazine were received at our offices, we Federal Expressed them to DTS’ offices. DTS was responsible for fulfilling the disc requests that met the terms of their ad and cutoff date (“Quantities Limited... Offer Expires October 15th, 1998”). We have no DTS DVD discs and never have. Plus, as far as I am aware, we have answered every e-mail regarding a reader not receiving a disc, and we have faithfully resubmitted their name to DTS — including yours. DTS tells us it takes up to 12 weeks to receive the disc. They actually have contracted with a fulfillment house to send out the discs. The DTS offer has now expired as of the cut-off date noted in their ad. Laser Magic 1998, however, lives on as a useful reference resource for the home theatre enthusiasts. In fact, this special edition continues to be one of our best sellers. I think it is unfair to say that our news is old and not up to date as you imply. I do acknowledge that some of the news published in “From The Editor’s Couch” in Issue 28 was drawn from the time Issue 27 was released, but a lot was right up to date with late breaking news included a day or two prior to going to press. Issue 29 covered a four-month period of news because in between, we published the 500+ page Laser Magic 1995 special edition. We date our bi-monthly magazine at the end of the period— that is, the November/December issue would contain news reported in the November/ December period. Other monthly magazines typically contain two- to three-month’s old news as they date their issues far forward — that is, their December issue would be news reported in the August-September, (possibly October) time frame typically. By forward dating they appear to have the must current reporting; though in fact, that cannot be the case. Newsstands like forward dating and we are planning to switch to this dating scheme as well. We receive DVDs and LaserDiscs for review at the same time, sometimes after, the street date when the public is offered them. Rarely do we receive a title before street date, the earliest being received a week or two prior. We do our best to keep reviews current with our issues. Remember, we are now reviewing upwards of 200 or more discs an issue. No other print magazine or webzine puts out this volume of reviews, each emphasizing picture and sound quality performance. The magazine is a periodical, not a daily. We have restructured our website to make it a daily webzine for home theatre news, and we will soon be posting upwards of 3,000 reviews, everything we have ever published in the print edition. In fact, we will be publishing as much of our rich content as we can which we have produced over our six-year print history. Readers will be able to access this content at the widescreenreview. com site facilitated in an interactive format. Our community of international readers will be able to interact and watch the site mature over time and benefit from the timely access to this valued home theatre resource. Roger, we are a small publishing company of dedicated enthusiasts. We are not owned by a large and financially rich publishing company with tons of staff support. I wish we were sometimes because there is so much more we could publish to benefit our readers. Only five of us put out the magazine’s editorial content. Try it someday, and you will know what a real challenge is. During 1998, we published two enormous special editions, the 388-page Imaging Science Theatre 2000, and the 506-page Laser Magic 1998, plus four regular editions. In 1999, we will be producing more special editions and are striving to put out our regular issues in a timely manner on a bi-monthly basis, plus maintain and expand our interactive webzine edition. We have recently added staff to accomplish our goals. We have very few complaints, and I know from life experience that you can’t please everyone all the time. Nonetheless, I want to assure you that I and the magazine’s staff value your critique. We will continue to strive for excellence and to remain independent in our views regardless of the political climate and criticism and smearing of our reputable name. I appreciate your support as a subscriber. I would be saddened if you no longer liked the magazine. We will continue to produce an honest magazine, and I hope you will continue to support us as do nearly 40,000 other readers. And I can assure you that not all of our readers agree with our views or reporting. But then I think that is one of the aspects of Widescreen Review that is stimulating. Thank you for your concern and for your support as a reader. We are striving to do a better job to deliver a thought-provoking magazine, not one that merely supports what its advertisers would like to see in print.
You can E-mail Widescreen Review @ mailto:editorgary@widescreenreview.com