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...and THAT is the rest of the story...

Good Day!

Time to wake up from your years long sleep.

The WSJ, just like biased, propaganda-spewing, democracy-mocking Fox News, is foreign-owned by the Murdochs' News Corp. The same Murdochs whose tightly-controlled companies have been found guilty of crimes of corruption in countries that still have a semblance of democracy and a working, credible, independent judiciary such as the UK.

Those who still respect the WSJ haven't taken the time to inform themselves.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wall_Street_Journal

Q1: And how does this differ from the radical-left socialist, democracy-hating, propagandist MSNBC news?
A1: MSNBC is not owned by Murdoch.
I cannot trust or accept anything in the mass media. Anything lacking analysis and referenced sources is always suspect.Q2: How is a WSJ article relevant here?
A2: It isn't. You might as well seek a cure for arthritis by reading People magazine, or seek home-decorating tips in Teen Beat.

Guys, you need to go outside a tad more.

I just passed on this news clipping since Google News automatically calls my attention to any article using the word AvantGrand.

When it comes to any piano, I always make my own judgment. I don't care who likes the piano or who doesn't, my opinion counts more to me.

I wish it were not so, but I fear dewster & the Journey are right - you must be suspicious of all news sources; even fine ones with an honourable heritage like the WSJ. Exactly the same goes for the Times and Sunday Times of London which have been owned by News Corps since the early 80's. The biases are subtle and difficult to define but they are there in the editorial stance.

But whether the above article is just somewhat ill informed reporting or something more sinister like tie in, it's difficult to say. It looks to me that what you see is what you get, and the pianist was giving a straightforward account of her experiences testing DPs for the first time. And, to the general public, Yamaha does indeed have by far the strongest reputation in electronics and music, doesn't it?

....if it was a placement feature for Yamaha, then heaven help us....but I doubt it.

Meh, The Journey's paranoia notwithstanding, there's nothing special about news corp in terms of political bias. All news sources are biased on way or another--they are written and edited by humans, all of whom have biases. If the particular direction of the bias isn't what you have, then you tend to get crazy with conspiracy theories.

But really none of that's relevant to the article on the N2 (or other popular press articles on digital pianos), which is politically neutral. The fact is that all publications writing about new technology have a bias toward making that technology look good. Positive reviews of new products are the norm in every media. There are two reasons for this. One is that those companies are advertisers and the media don't want to tick them off. I think the more important one is that people overall just aren't interested in reading that a new product on the market is only a very mild improvement over the previous generation. It's much more interesting to read about new and exciting technology.

If then new model is just a repainted version of the old model with some tiny tweaks, as most digital pianos are, it's not really news. Actually, what surprises me about this article is how many negative comments it makes about various digitals that were discussed. That is by no means common.

I agree.

I once read a book* on the tobacco industry. In it IIRC a fairly neutral seeming magazine was doing an article on health. Their largest advertiser was a cigarette company, who naturally had clout and therefore some editorial input. In a list of healthy things to do, the article had "stop smoking" at the top - which makes sense as it is statistically the single most health damaging behavior you can engage in. The cigarette company suggested they move it to second or third place and they did. It's subtle yet powerful cues like this allow a smoker's head play to mind games with itself and thus enable the addiction (and the deadly revenue stream) to continue.

It's one thing to mess with rather jaded adult heads, it's quite another to target young impressionable minds. If you haven't seen the documentary "Consuming Kids" I recommend it. It's a marketing free-for-all when it comes to our future generations.

The world doesn't have to be this way.

[EDIT]

*"Merchants of Death" by Larry C, White. The censorship described in the book is actually worse than I related above.

Fun fact: If you smoke cigarettes you are likely freebasing nicotine - no wonder the first one of the day is a headbuster, and no wonder you can't quit!

There is no doubt that advertising and promotion have crept into every form of media. Even so-called "news" programs have all kinds of news "stories" about charity events, police dictums about drunk driving and driving while distracted, events promoting everything from domestic tranquility to anti-bullying campaigns, etc. Then we have the "news" of the latest Apple device and the long lines of people at stores to buy them. One doesn't know if the produceers of this stuff are getting paid to run it or not, but I for one would sure like to. In short, in many ways, even news programming is degenerating into infomercials of one sort or another. (Not to mention the non-existent Iraqi WMDs and the run-up to the "war". Did anyone want to know the truth of the matter, let alone allow it to be broadcast? Did anyone have an agenda at that time? Do the controllers of the media have an agenda now?)

For a very short time I worked as a sales person in a piano retailer who sold, let's put it this way, the highest end pianos. The one thing I learned very early on is that the piano business is a very cutthroat, no-holds-barred business. So add this to the above deterioration of unbiased "news" reporting and it's easy to be skeptical of just about anything one reads or hears in "the media".

Finally to the WSK article.

First, it would be interesting to speculate on whether the article would have appeared at all if say Steinway was a big advertiser in the WSJ. I would imagine that acoustic piano manufacturers, or the people employed in the acoustic piano divisions of Yamaha or Kawai, were not too pleased with an article in such as "reputable" publication whose effect may be to reduce the number of acoustic instruments that will be sold in their increasingly-precarious future.

Second, I wish that the pianist had had the opportunity to play more of the top-of-the-line, all-in-one-box digital instruments, including the V-piano grand, CA65, etc.

Third, IMO, there should have been at least some attempt made to explore a pull-out-all-the-stops digital-piano "system", such as MP-10 stage piano with high-end sound amplification; a VPC1 with high-end "peripherals"; maybe even some of the all-in-ones with high end add-ons, etc. I mean, after all, these digital pianos are trying to "compete" with 9 and even 10 foot pianos with huge sound boards. That pianist should have been allowed to experience what digital pianos, tone generators and amplification/reproduction systems are ultimately capable of. If the producers of the article had really wanted to find out what "digital" is capable of, they should have hired someone to arrange for the pianist to experience that.

(After all, I understand that a 10-foot Fazioli is fairly expensive. Why would anyone pay such a price? I assume it's because it plays and sounds pretty good to the pianist, and just the latter for the audience. Now, just for the fun of it, let's spend the same amount of money on a digital system and see what we can come up with. How does that system compare with the Fazioli? After that we should find out what a system that costs 1/10th of the money can do. I believe that there is demand for such a high-end system, because at least some pianists are also audiophiles and audiophiles are willing to spend a big pile of money on their audio systems. Domestic and social tranquility are important, even to rich folks. Spouses and family members don't like hearing the same phrase played 10,00o times, even from a 10-foot Fazioli.)

Fourth, I'd like to know just a few things about the origin of the article. For example, the article appears in the "tech" section. Somebody had to originally decide the "need" of the piece and the public's likely interest in it, and likely somebody else had to approve of that idea. Were these people piano onwers who were so impressed with the advance in digital technology that they felt compelled to do that? Did a representative of any manufacturer or store contact the paper and propose such an "investigation" and article?

How many retail stores did the pianist visit, and is she (or was she made, or deliberately not made) aware of other models of digital pianos that may or may not be better replacements for an acoustic grand?

Was the pianist paid? If so, who paid her? Theoretially, at leaast, if she had thought that any of the pianos that she had played were actually "as good as" an acoustic grand, would she have felt free enough to say that?

Yes, one can see many angles and possible conspiracies with respect to the article, but I'm glad it was written, anyway. It's nice to be able to hear the impressions of a concert pianist.

Just maybe WSJ is read by many non-musicians and hearing about how technology has changed owning an acoustic monolith is interesting reading.

Now what kind of conspiracy theory can one gin out of THAT? C'mon... Work with us...

Whatever the sad state of the piano market today, it's clear that sales of tinfoil beanies remain brisk.

"Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they aren't after you"

― Joseph Heller, Catch-22

Quite to the contrary: while they are after you, they say you ARE paranoid!

If anyone needs me......

Looks good on the cat.

Ah yes, the last resort of those who can formulate no rational response to an argument, the ad hominem attack.

Observing reality, using one's head and thinking critically are not the same as being paranoid and seeing conspiracy theories. However, it is certainly easier to manipulate a passive and docile population, lulled into sleep to believe that everything in print from the classical canon of authority sources -- from the Bible to junior high school civics class indoctrination to the WSJ -- is to be accepted at face value as trusted fact.

There are some sad places in this world -- the closer you get to D.C. or into the Appalachian hills the more you tend to run into this -- where those who wish to apply the concept of critical thinking are actually mocked. Heck, the official 2012 (!) GOP political platform in Texas even went so far as to prohibit teaching critical thinking skills in public schools. Texas, you will of course remember, is the state that has a de facto role in determining the content of a majority of the textbooks used in American schools...

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs...s-really/2012/07/08/gJQAHNpFXW_blog.html

OR, it's called humor.

The Journey needs a chill pill today.

I would like to thank TheJourney for the plenty of solid informations and insights he provided - I hope this helps to chill him.

The cat has the part nailed, but you need a little more method-acting to really join the team.

Imagine, for example, that you come from a neighborhood where everyone has been stoned non-stop since the late 'sixties (not that there's anything wrong with that, of course). That should get you in the zone.