JimH,

I would tell you that the post was on topic, and was also a very effective
troll for Karen. ; )

But it still provided the NG with some interesting reading and more
importantly. a valuable lesson. As far as I am concerned the number one
lesson to learn are boating reviews in magazines are not boating reviews,
and one should not put any credence to the excellent review that one reads
in any boating magazine. Those "articles" are a vehicle to get potential
boat buyers and current boaters to buy the magazine. The more readers the
magazine the more they will be able to charge for their ads.

There is a quid pro quo relationship between the magazine and potential
advertisers. Many magazine will agree to review a product in agreement for
ad revenues. Many times you will find the product ad convinently located
next to "article". Since no advertiser is going to spend money with a
magazine that "bad mouthed" their product, you will never hear one give an
honest review of the product.

Since most regular readers of these magazine understand this, yet they still
buy the magazines it shows that there is a segment of the rec.boaters who
enjoy reading these fluff pieces.

Since Gould's little cut and paste encouraged such an in depth discussion in
rec.boats, it shows that this is a topic of interest to those who read
rec.boats. ; )



"JimH" wrote in message
...

"Dr. Dr. K.G. Sherlock" wrote in message
...
JimH,

If we agree that the boat "review" is strictly a PR advertisement, i.e.
an article disguised as a review, that is actually an ad for the boat,
don't you agree that the "ad" was well written, on topic and interesting
even if you have no plans on buying a 2.2 million dollar boat?

Since the idea of rec.boats is to discuss boats, doesn't Gould's post
qualify as an excellent post that help to encourage boating discussions?

If you think about SPAM as something an individual or company profits
from posting in a NG, don't you agree that Gould, the magazine or the
boat builder will not profit from the post. It might be considered SPAM
if the article posted was for a $20,000 - $100,000 boat, because the boat
builder might profit from the publication in the NG, but I would still
think it would be appropriate for rec.boats because it would encourage
boating discussions.

But that is just my opinion.

1. We do not know if Chuck wrote the review.

2. The post of the Somers Insurance Agency is well written. Does that
make it OK then?

3. Chuck posted his as a troll. His opening sentence made that clear.
There was no other reason for the post.

4. He did not have to post the name and phone number of the yacht broker
selling those boats.

5. The review was conveniently void of any negative remarks about the
boat. No boat is perfect.

6. There are some folks here who could afford such a boat. So to say
that Chuck, his magazine or the boat builder would not profit is sheer
speculation.

I see his post no different than this insurance agency post, although I
guess I should have started it out by saying "dedicated to my special
friend"...that would certainly have made it better....eh?

If it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck and looks like a duck....it is
a duck.

Quack, quack. ;-)