[Note: This post has been updated (2) as of 6:48 AM Eastern on 2 May 2008. See below.]
And for good reason, too: it needs to stay alive until it's resolved properly, and can finally Rest In Peace.
Joel Flegler, editor of Fanfare, "The Magazine for Serious Record Collectors" as the subtitle proclaims, has been under fire since this report by music critic for The Orange County Register, Tim Mangan, on his blog, Classical Life, made public the, um, questionable review policy in place at Fanfare. We first made reference to this business here, and now point you to the latest skirmish in the ongoing back-and-forth. As in previous attempts, our comments on this latest attempt by Mr. Flegler to rationalize his magazine's questionable review policy are contained in the comments section of the linked post, and require no further elaboration here.
Update (4:19 PM Eastern on 21 Aug): Things are heating up in the comments section. Read it here.
Update 2 (6:48 AM Eastern on 2 May 2008): We today had occasion to revisit the above linked OC Register blog post, and noticed with surprise that two of our comments referred to above were severely truncated, the only comments in that long comments thread to be so handled. We don't know why that was done, but have our suspicions. In any case, we reprint in full the original texts of those truncated comments below, just for the record.
Comment #1:
Joel Flegler wrote: When the other classical CD review magazines begin providing their readers with honest stat[e]ments about their editorial/advertising policies, then I'll be glad to go on record in Fanfare about mine. Until then, please spare me your lessons about ethics.
It's quite remarkable, actually. The more you attempt rationalizing your ethically compromised review policy, the deeper the ethically compromised hole you dig for yourself.
What matter what other review periodicals do or don't do in respect of making public to their readers their review policies? It's either the ethical thing to do — most particularly when the ethics of one's own publication's review policy has been called into legitimate question — or it's not. If it's the ethical thing to do — and in the case of your publication's questionable review policy it's manifestly the only ethical thing to do, and there's not so much as a shadow of a legitimate argument that can be mounted against that assertion — then you, as an ethical editor, do it, regardless of what other review periodicals do or don't do in respect of such disclosure.
Period. Full stop.
One doesn't have to be a Solomon to understand that.
ACD
Comment #2:
John Mclaughlin Williams wrote: You all really need to let this go. Fanfare is an absolutely great publication and a one-of-a-kind resource. If you are so excercised by their employment of an industry standard policy, then just don't buy the magazine! Those of us back here on planet earth that care to will continue to support it.
Non sequitur, John (fancy meeting you here! [g]). Your above misses the point, not to speak of your error in calling Fanfare's review policy "an industry standard policy" (it's not).
The central question at issue here is one of publishing ethics (or lack of same) and its possible effect on editorial content. As editor of Fanfare — a magazine whose very raison d'être is as a journal of CD reviews — Mr. Flegler can ethically employ any review policy he feels best benefits or meets the needs of his magazine, provided only that he makes full public disclosure of that review policy within the pages of every issue of that magazine. In fact, the very thing — the only thing — that makes Fanfare's present review policy ethically questionable is the lack of such public disclosure.
To make my point, I offer an example absurd in the extreme.
Let's say Mr. Flegler unwisely, even mindlessly, determines that the best review policy for Fanfare is, in a nutshell, the following: You want your CD reviewed? Make a bid for the set-aside review space in issue #n. Whomever comes in with the highest dollar amount gets the review space. Losing bidders are simply S.O.L.
Unethical for a publication whose total editorial content is reviews of CDs? On its face, nothing could be more unethical, excepting only an additional promise of a favorable review to fill that bid-for space.
However, the instant Mr. Flegler makes that grossly unethical policy public within the pages of every issue of his magazine, all possible ethical objections to that policy are rendered null and void. By the very fact of the policy's regular public disclosure within the pages of the magazine itself, it ceases to be unethical, and its practice ethically unimpeachable. That it's an imbecile policy that once made public will in very short order force the magazine into bankruptcy is a different matter entirely, and entirely beside the point.
Get it now?
ACD
A Difficult Question (Not Mine)
Why is it I experience such an inordinate degree of pleasure when jack-of-all-arts, culture journalist and blogger Terry Teachout of About Last Night, writes that rare blog post I can consider link-worthy (with apologies to Seinfeld)?
The question is largely rhetorical, but I suspect part of the answer is because the man writes so bloody engagingly.
Witnesseth:
RTWT here.
Posted by A.C. Douglas on 22 August 2006 | Permalink