Anyone else find that magazine's description of markers isn't exactly accurate?

[paint magnet]

This is mainly for those big "marker lists" that APG and similar magazines seem to run every year. You know, the ones that still list a .68 Automag as a MSRP of $580, has a picture of the same STO cocker for both the right feed, vertical feed, and black magic listings, and say that Angels run on your choice of Co2 or Compressed air and are manufactured by Bob Long, etc.

Also, I've seen the Timmy listed as a blowfoward gun, a Centerflag "Hyperslow" regulator, and of course the countless reviews that tell you how reliable Spyders and Rebels are, not to mention announcing to all the newbies that Brass Eagle released a new revolutionary open bolt stacked tube blowback and how they should go buy one right now because they're so wonderful! :D

I don't know about you but this seems kind of pitiful for magazines of this calibur. Who rights these things anyway, or more importantly, who edits them? (wonder if English is their primary language :confused: )

[aaron_mag]

Actually with APG/Paintball the many of the articles are written by the masses. You can find many people on the board who have written some articles (Rambo Preacher and Bill Mills come immediately to mind). I've actually written a couple myself although for one of the ones published they took the introduction of the article I wrote and used it and didn't put the rest in. Oh well :)

Like any other publications there are some articles I don't even read and others that I find quite funny. Some of them even inspiring (the one about the guy in the wheel chair who plays). You have to remember that every month Jessica and Dan (both nice people who love paintball) have to come up with paintball articles. I mean how much can you really say? You point the marker and shoot at your opponents. It is a simple game! As far as reviewing Spyders and Rebels go you have to keep price in mind. I have a M98, Retromag, Omen, Maverick Pump, JT Excellerator 4.0, and a Rebel. The Excellerator is the only problem child of the bunch. For $60 that Rebel has been an excellent loaner marker. It shoots at 300 fps and with an aftermarket barrel is pretty darn accurate. I mean for $60 what more could you ask for?

[Muzikman]

Well, since you specificly pointed out APG. That would be Dan Reeves and Jessica Sparks as your editor. Both are great people. Why not email them with your comments, better they hear it than us seeing as they can do something about and we can't. Give it a shot...you should be able to find their email addresses out there. If not, I got them some place.

[paint magnet]

I haven't emailed them because pretty much all of the magazines do the same thing. Also, I realize there may not be that much to write about, but APG is at least half made up of ads. Its still a good magazine and I enjoy reading it, but there's a lot of wrong info in there.

Also, I have yet to see a negative review in APG, and seldom in any other magazine. (not to mention the fact that an ad for the product that was reviewed is printed on the next page) I know they try to look at the good side most of the time with markers, but with all the products they have reviewed, you know there have to be some with problems. It just doens't make me want to pay $5 for a magazine composed of 50% ads and the other half is wonderful reviews of great products and wonderful reviews of crappy products.

[CameraGuy]

Well, you've pointed out one of the fundamental problems with the vast majority of written product reviews (from cars to vacations, and then some). When both your revenue and getting access to the products you review relies on good relations with the person who sells said product (and advertises in your magazine, because it reaches their target audience) it's very difficult to write anything truly negative. Of course in the end, that tends to make peolpe sceptical about what they read... and a testimonial by somebody who actully owns the product much more believeable.

As for incorrect information, who knows? Maybe if you send the magazine an email, they'll offer to make you an editor ;) .

[845]

They target a newer audience since it is the mainstream paintball magazine. They are more interested in introducing people to the sport than giving in depth tourny coverage. If you want a magazine like that subscribe to facefull, paintball games international (www.p8ntball.com)or P8nt (more of a lifestyle zine). These are targeted more towards the more experienced tourny crowd. PB2X also has good tourny coverage. Also do not expect a magazine to give any marker a bad review. This is because what do you think their sponsors/advertisers would do if they said their marker sucks.

[Kevmaster]

at least PB2X admits that yeh, NPS owns them and so they are going to have to say the timmy is teh best gun out there....

sponsors = who has the best gun. If WDP pays APG enough, they'll say the speed is the best gun ever. Sadly, thats how it works

now, those inaccuracys you mentioned...email the editors. they will usually make a note of it in the next issue

[BarryTolar]

So do you think paintball needs a "Consumer Reports" style magazine ?

How much would you pay for that type of magazine.

If your not aware of Consumer Reports it's a magazine that does not have advertizing in it and seems to give a mostly accurate review of a given item.

Just wondering.
Barry

[adam shannon]

consumer reports is a privately funded magazine...they even buy the products and even the cars they test at full retail...they arent given them by the makers thus skewing the reviews.

its a given that a magazine that gets its money from ads isnt going to bite the hand that feeds it. its sad that many kids dont realize this....but thats the nature of the world. once you know how it works your better off and able to make your own informed decision based on first hand experience and some info from magazine reviews.

on a related note my fav ad is ed poorman saying that the egg 2 is the "fastest loader ive ever shot" granted that may be true as he was probably contractually obligated by be/jt/vl (all his sponsors) to never fire a halo. but on its face that statement is misleading to newbs although probably true at the time that ad was first written.

[i like tictacs]

seriously,

who would be into starting a paintball consumer review magazine? count me in...

[BarryTolar]

I would be in but I doubt it would ever work.

Barry

[aaron_mag]

Originally posted by adam shannon
on a related note my fav ad is ed poorman saying that the egg 2 is the "fastest loader ive ever shot" granted that may be true as he was probably contractually obligated by be/jt/vl (all his sponsors) to never fire a halo.

Yeah that one is pretty funny!!! Same thought probably occured to alot of us. :) Still it really is a good loader.

First off as Kevmaster noted PB2X just comes right out and says that they can't afford to give a bad review. I like that honesty. At the same time, however, I think some credit should be given to Dan and Jessica Sparks. I don't think it really is a matter if WDP pays them enough they will say X is the fastest marker out there. When have you ever read a review where Dan or Jessica have ever blatantly endorsed a marker as the best. I really think they do their best to give a good review but don't get into marker bashing. Alot of the markers reviewed are, after all, quality products. I did a review on Level 10 and of course it was good. Was I lying? It really did deliver what it promised so what was I supposed to say? If I did a review on my Rebel I'd give it a really positive review. As I mentioned above for $60 it is a great marker. If I did a review on the Eggo II it would also be positive. I don't have a Halo but for the savings I had with the Eggo I am more than satisfied.

When was the last time you went on Warpig and saw Bill Mills totally trashing a marker. Discussing how and why it sucked. I think we would all agree that Bill Mills is honest and knowledgeable so why was his review on Level 10 and the A-5 both good? Could it actually be that they are both good products and not because he is nefariously trying to hide product flaws?

[billmi]

Originally posted by Kevmaster

sponsors = who has the best gun. If WDP pays APG enough, they'll say the speed is the best gun ever. Sadly, thats how it works


While that's often how people *think* it works, that isn't how it works.

For about a year and a half, My wife and I edited Paintball Magazine, which is a sister publication to APG. We had to answer to the same manager, and advertising sales people, and publisher owner as APG. APG's publisher, CFW enterprises publishes many (like 25 or more) magazines on various topics. The staff that does management cares little to nothing about what fills the pages, that's not their job, that's what the editorial staff (us, at that time) does. The closest they ever came to influencing the content was asking if at all possible one particular product could be reviewed in time for the next issue, because if it was, they'd close an advertising deal. They said absolutely nothing about the contents of the review. I've discussed this topic with the present editors of APG and Paintball, and found that their experiences were similar, and they'd be quite offended by the idea (both are attorneys big on the constitution and freedoms of the press) of advertising sales dictating content.

I think the real reason you see few magazine articles pointing out the shortcomings of products has more than anything to do with the writers submitting articles. I think it is very important to point out the failings and weak points of a product, but I don't trash the product. I also talk about it's strong points, and those portions of it which are innovative, with the goal of letting the reader make up their own mind as to whether it's a good product for them. There are few writers in paintball who do that. Most, simply write a glowing review only, or slam a product (those which do just slam a product are more often than not very poorly written and offer little support for their point of view.) Reviews that simply slam a product don't look professional, and usually won't be published.

Even then, the reader's biases often have an impact too. If you go through OLD, OLD, OLD posts here at AO, you'll find posts saying I trashed the Galactic Z Body, or that it was a flawed review. I originally wrote that review for Paintball Magazine, and then reprinted it on WARPIG later. In the review, I did a real world test, with a variety of paintballs and barrels (i.e. in the real world, if you go to an FPO field, you can't choose the paint) and found the backspin effect to be inconsistent. I sumarized that situation by saying to use it consistently would require carefull paint and barrel choices (which I later discovered was very similar to wording that even the manufacturer used on their own web site.)

As for a consumer reports style magazine, I don't think there are enough critical thinking paintballers out there to support it. Look how many people follow some of the largest sites in paintball which (aside from WARPIG) feature product "reviews" that have a "buy here" or "find the lowest price here" button in them. For every person that buys a product through the site linked on that button, the web site makes money, so it's in their best interest to write a sales pitch, rather than a review. Then it's not a review, it's an infomercial.

See you on the field,
-Bill Mills

[Wickster]

Years ago there was Paintball Consumer Reports International (called PCRI). I think it has evolved into PCRI.net

I know that years ago it was in a newspaper format and was pretty good in giving true reports and reviews. After a while it seemed to disappear. I believe it was run by John Amodea who now has to do with paintball2xtremes. Perhaps PCRI.net will give a more balanced view, but I'm not sure anymore.

Maybe you could start another one.

[aaron_mag]

I don't think the reviews are that far out of line now (as I stated above). I mean you buy a cheap blowback and it works out of the box. Isn't that what you are expecting? How about all of the anti chop stuff stuff with the A-5, Omen, and Automag? I've shot all three markers and they all work so what is a review supposed to reveal? Where is the secret information that the reviews are covering up?

[Wickster]

I'm not a big complainer about this issue, as I certainly see your point of cost for what you get. I really like my spyder flash and my F-1 Illustrator (that I got in 1990). Both are cheap and work well. I have never had to fix anything on the f-1 except to put in a velocity adjustable bolt, better barrel and a bottomline kit (all for ease of use not really fixing). It still works well with normal maintenance.

That being said, some magazine reports never seem to have any negative aspects of reviewed products in them. Some also seem to imply that a lower end marker is just as good as a higher end one. Personally, I would like to see the markers evaluated against each other. The problem with that is that the basis of comparison would be subjective. For example, is the original barrel worth comparing? Is ROF really a big difference if you play rec ball?

In short, it would be nice to see a more realistic comparison, however I know that it is difficult to compare low to high end markers.

[Kevmaster]

Bill, my opinion and view came directly from PB2X. In a letter to the editor, the question is posed: "why does the paintball community not see real qualitative reviews?" and in John's reply (in addition to cost and time prohibitive) he writes "First, no magazine in the paintball industry has enough reader-only support to survive without advertisers. Thats why you won't see 'real' head to head studies on equipment or ratings on guns or gear. if we did a top ten barrel article we'd prolly lose all barrel advertisers except for the winner"

May, 2003 issue. Vol 10, No 5. (PSP LA Open issue)

[aaron_mag]

The comment of wanting head to head marker comparisons seems to come up alot. Realistically, however, I think it would be a disaster because of what you mentioned (subjectivity). I know if my brother wrote a head to head comparison with his A-5 and my mag the A-5 would come out ahead in everything to price/value. How can someone possibly judge those things objectively when what we are talking about is personal taste?

I can honestly say I don't know which is a better marker between our Omen and the mag. The mag is tried and true plus the trigger feels right to me. I personally like using the mag. Given a choice, however, my stepson would choose the Omen every time. I just can't see head to head comparisons working.

[billmi]

Originally posted by Kevmaster
Bill, my opinion and view came directly from PB2X....

Kevmaster,
It was great to finally meet you in person last month.

Your post on which I was commenting isn't exactly the same as what John said. John made a blanket statement about paintball magazines in general (one with which I do not completely agree) losing advertisters if they did head to head comparisons or ratings.

In contrast, you said that if WDP pays CFW enough, that APG will say the Speed is the best gun ever. Having worked for APG's publisher, and being in regular communication with it's editorial staff, I know that the ad sales staff (the side that gets the money from WDP) is very distinct, and separate from the editorial staff (the side that says what goes in the magazine's articles.) While I worked for them, never, ever, did any amount of money paid by anyone result in me being asked to skew the magaine editorially, and I've been told the same from APG's editorial staff.

While it may be a minor difference in wording, I think it is a big one in terms of implications, to jump from magazines not wanting to offent sponsors, to saying they are selling out their journalistic integrity to the sponsor who cuts them the biggest check.

As for John's statement, that may be his reasoning, but I don't believe that a magazine would have a serious loss or gain in advertising revenues directly from an accurate and realistic product comparison. When he was editor of PCRI, he used to rank products and award "best INSERT CATEGORY HERE of the year" awards, and rank products with a number of stars. If loss of advertisers is the reason PCRI folded, then perhaps that is how he came to his point of view.

In my opinion the problem with head to head performance tests comes from the complexity of doing that comparison - most publications do not have the facilities, equipment, or staff to do an accurate, impartial, detailed, objective performance test that would use repeatable conditions from marker to marker.

I'll note that the loader speed test that I did for WARPIG, which was a head to head performance test, resulted in no gain or loss of WARPIG sponsors.

Similarly, when I did a comparison between an original VL Revolution, and the 2000 Revy that showed computer sensor data proving that there was a delay in the 2000 Revy electronics causing them to not perform as well as the previous models, WARPIG did not lose any of BE/VL's sponsorship. When the X-Board came out, several samples were rushed to me, because they knew that a thorough review by me, published on WARPIG would show with similar test data how they had improved their product.

See you on the field,
-Bill Mills

[Kevmaster]

Bill, the pleasure was all mine, Im sure.

It's clear that my first statement was far fetched and now that I read the original question: off topic. I read the issue back 3 months ago when it came out, mainly beacuse it had a little correction putting my name in it, but didnt take much time to read through all of it. Stumbled over the letters and remembered a much more inflamitory statement than John actually made (something along the lines of nps pays the bills around here...which high end gun do you think we like the best) however when I went back a couple of nights ago, to make that post, I was off by quite a bit

What intruiges me is the discrepancy between your experience running warpig and john's doing pb2x.

you obviosuly feel that you can make a claim about a marker (assuming its factual) and not lose any finances from the company. thats great. thats how it should be. i really mean that.

However, the PB2X staff obviously feels differently. It seems they must give positive reviews of ALL products. They dont want to give head to head comparasons because all but one must lose and someone must be last.


as a side note, I see a couple of internet sites doing gun tests where they test the accuracy. This of course means nothing because anyone with a functioning brain knows that the barrel and paint are the two largest factors in the test.

really, Id love to see Josh2Xtremes or John (I think he has an AO account) come on here and post what they think on the matter. A review site that can operate and give "fair and balanced" (OK, so I watch too much fox news) opinions on a a marker is a great thing...the best of things

anyways, as always, keep up the good work -- i'll come back to ya every day hoping there is a new feature :)

[hitech]

Originally posted by billmi
As for a consumer reports style magazine, I don't think there are enough critical thinking paintballers out there to support it.

Ahmen!

[einhander619]

I've seen Paintball Sports International give what I thought was a bad review of the vertabrate cocker. Of course, the gun came to them with some rusty parts, and not timed in the least. I'd say that warranted a bad review.

[Featherlite 80]

I have concluded a short while ago, that most paintball magazines suck. At one point, I used to get the 3 magazines available to me, APG, Paintball Magazine, and PB2X. Eventually, I got sick of the APG and paintball. I was tired of all the hype. I never saw a bad review of a product. Every one they say the same thing, very accurate, hyped up ROF, and extremely reliable. How reliable can the sheridan jackal be. The kingman EM1, I mean that was one of the worst markers made, Almost no one bought one. Not to mention all the articals are irritatingly(sp) catered to newbs, all of them. I have no problem with newbs, when I see them at the field and such, but other people read the magazines too. All the articals are about senario games, again, I have no problem with these, but a little tourney coverage would be nice. Or every month the usual "how not to look like a newb" or "typical newb mistakes to avoid". PB2X is not really that bad, APG and paintball are clearly the worst.

-side note- yes I know why the reviews are so biased, and why there are so many newb articals, but its agrivating none the less, and thus I have given up on such magazines. I would much rather go online to a forum such as AO, and here from actual paintballers, who dont care if they give a negative review.

[Bucky]

well, in apg's 888 paintball ad, the one in the back i believe, they sell the "WDP ANGLE" and no -I- didnt spell it wrong...

[paint magnet]

As far as ads go, I think one of the worst was the old Bushmaster ad, the one where the guy is in the woods and it has the whole slogan of 'field domination', and he doesn't even have a tank on the gun... or a hose going into the reg or anything. I've seen some other manufacturer ads where it looks like the guy is playing a game when there is no hose going from his tank to the gun. Then there are the countless ones featuring Tippmanns with bolt handles on the right side, Angels with the LCD display on the right hand side of the grip, and numerous backwards photos.

[i like tictacs]

I've always wondered about the proffesionalism of paintball magazines. The two closest that I can think of that would be anywhere near professional are PGI and Facefull. They have the least typos, best content, best photos etc. etc.

And some of the ads are fricken atrocious. They can't even spell a gun right, or mislabel a gun, or a product, or blah blah blah. Imagine if you saw an ad like that in Time magazine or something.