Georgs -- A favorite subject of mine. To put it bluntly, the American public is too used to things being cheap, therefore magazines have to cater to the advertisers in order to get enough ad money to pay the bills. The low price we pay for a boating mag, $15-$20 annually, is about what it costs to package and mail the issues. All other income has to come from ads. I was five years with SEA during its heyday as a national magazine. As Technical Editor I did two Sea Trials, one equipment test and wrote a cruising yarn each month. I was in deep yogurt many times in trying to make an objective statement against a manufacturers claim. I caught hell from our Ad Dept for saying the forecastle of a Hans Christian looked like a dungeon! Anyone slightly claustrophobic would not last ten minutes in it. The radio industry challenged me when I told them their keyboards should be the same as telephones (did you kow that many tried a keyboard numbers arrangement at one time?) We did fuel flow tests on powerboats and got different rates which didn't go over well. On sailbaost we did turning tests and proved that a sailboat couldn't turn in its own length under its own momentum. That brought howls from ad departments. It was a constant battle between ad dept and editorial and I refused to write advertorials, which is what you are seeing now especially in boatreviews, few do any hands-on testing. The only way out was to not report negatives, only positives. Not exactly honest in my estimation, but it still goes on. The only way to get a magazine that we can believe in is to go the route of Practical Sailor and its Powerboat Reports sibling. No advertising, hence less vesting interests. Blue Water Sailing tried to do that and ran afoul of economics and had to turn to advertising. Too bad, I thought it was on the right track. The solution is to open up subscribers pocketbooks a little more. Buy fewer mags and pay more for each. Skip one attendance at a major sports event and you can buy a year's objectivity in a mag like PS. Books tend to be more objective than magazines. Enough rambling on this subject. Would make a good forum topic. Earl