[Macworld]

Post your comments for A Tale of One Multifunction Printer here

[usagi73]

Why don't you just get an HP MFP? My HP 7210 came with WinXp, Vista and Mac OS X CDs. An updated Lepord version can be downloaded from their web site. The whole device just works. I don't think a couple dollars difference justifies the aggrevation.

[ibeetle]

Great follow-up (behind the scenes?) article. By the way, I would love for you guys to take a look at Canon scanners; it appears the similar is happening.

A few weeks ago I went to use my Canon LiDE 80 scanner. The first time sense upgrading to Leopard (10.5.2). It would not work. After visiting the Canon web site, downloading and installing a updated driver the scanner still did not function. After visiting Apples support forum, as well as MacOSXHints it seems that Canon does not currently support Intel Macs, although, with some limited functionality they do support Leopard (running on a PPC Mac).

Canon's story is claiming that they provided to Apple the drivers to be built into Leopard. Apple's is saying that only support for drivers are built into the new OS. However, that is only support. Canon has yet to provide the actual drivers them selfs.

To Canon's credit they have updated there website for all consumer scanners currently in production to reflect they do not fully support Leopard nor do they support in anyway Intel Macs. But it is a pain to have ones two (three?) year old scanner just stop working because of a OS upgrade.

So what is it with Leopard and scanners? It is the manufacture? The OS? or the Intel processors? All of these? None of these?

[heimdall]

"Besides, our job as journalists is not only to inform readers, but to influence positive change."

Say what?
No: your job as journalists is to report. Should a journalist reporting on global warming first lobby for a carbon tax before telling the story on TV? Should a reporter writing about unfair labor practices hold off on the story while he tries to convince the employer to properly pay overtime?
Journalists are not advocates; they are to describe what is, not how they made things be.

[fibercut]

Thanks Brian for being honest and forthright. I really like the blog like article to get the manufacture to really see that there stuff doesn't work.
It us almost beyond belief with the growing Mac market and the entrenchment of Macs with graphic oriented people and manufacture are STILL acting like it is 1997 again and thinking of Macs as a second thought. i say they don't even need the free publicity of an article and Mac user should shun the company all together.

[bousozoku]

+Canon's story is claiming that they provided to Apple the drivers to be
built into Leopard. Apple's is saying that only support for drivers are
built into the new OS. However, that is only support. Canon has yet to
provide the actual drivers them selfs.+



I wonder about things like this. My Canon MP600 worked right away with Leopard but my Canon i9900 did not and I had to download the printer driver that was Leopard-compatible to get things working. I'm using a PowerPC-based machine, so that wasn't a problem, thankfully.

Apple seems to make things so difficult for the customers with every major release that it seems $129 is a lot larger when testing isn't done properly.

[derekm]

heimdall said:

"Besides, our job as journalists is not only to inform readers, but to influence positive change."

Say what?
No: your job as journalists is to report. Should a journalist reporting on global warming first lobby for a carbon tax before telling the story on TV? Should a reporter writing about unfair labor practices hold off on the story while he tries to convince the employer to properly pay overtime?
Journalists are not advocates; they are to describe what is, not how they made things be.

You beat me to it heimdall. I couldn't believe a journalist would write something like that. Last time I checked the ethics code there was nothing there about influencing positive change. As for - "Diligently seek out subjects of news stories to give them the opportunity to respond to allegations of wrongdoing." - Yes, of course.
Change their mind about the crappy support they give the Mac? No, that's the job of an advocate or Mac-lovin' fanboi. And we, the readers, do appreciate this from you guys. Just don't go around calling that part of your job as journalists.

[hayesk]

I see nothing wrong with a journalist influencing positive change in this context. While strictly speaking, a journalist should just report on facts, but come on people, this is a consumer tech magazine, not the NYTimes. Would you rather Lexmark not update their drivers just so the reviewer can stick to core journalism values?

[dhanson]

I just want to thank you for providing such a great insight into how MacWorld handles reviews. This articles has seamlessly explained to me that there are only really 3 possible scores a product may receive:
3 Mice = Unacceptable and flaw (but we felt bad for the manufacture)
4 Mice = Acceptable with some flaws
5 Mice = Should be worth the time and money

Why not reduce the scale to only 3 mice? You'll save printing costs and the first two don't mean anything anyways!

[heimdall]

hayesk said:

I see nothing wrong with a journalist influencing positive change in this context. While strictly speaking, a journalist should just report on facts, but come on people, this is a consumer tech magazine, not the NYTimes. Would you rather Lexmark not update their drivers just so the reviewer can stick to core journalism values?

Then don't call it "journalism."

[horvatic]

HP isn't very friendly either. If something ever goes wrong with there multifunction printers you have to go through an agonizing manual remove process of there software and then re-install the software to get them to work. It can take up to an hour and if you miss just one thing it still won't work and you will have to go through the whole process again. A friend of mine has already gone through 2 HP printers which have died. He's on his third one now.

[heimdall]

horvatic said:

HP isn't very friendly either. If something ever goes wrong with there multifunction printers you have to go through an agonizing manual remove process of there software and then re-install the software to get them to work. It can take up to an hour and if you miss just one thing it still won't work and you will have to go through the whole process again. A friend of mine has already gone through 2 HP printers which have died. He's on his third one now.

So, then, who is good? I won't buy Epson because of similar experiences: two scanners died within a short period of time (are they designed to die within a month after the warranty ends), and my brother went through several printers in a similar period of time. The software for each was always pretty flaky.

[kresh]

While I absolutely agree with your sentiment I am appreciative of this particular journalist admitting he's part advocate. It's the main stream media and their denied bias and activism that really rips me.

[context]

A reviewer's obligation is to be honest, not "constructive." The review should reflect what buyers -- past, present, and future -- have and will encounter when trying to use the product. If the reviewer wants to run a follow-up article about working with the manufacturer to later resolve the problem, that's fine.
Should a reviewer of a play or movie sit down with the producer to recommend changes before writing his review? Should dialog be rewritten and cast members replaced at the reviewer's suggestion?
This sort of interaction between reviewer and manufacturer is ill-advised, if not downright unethical.