It took dcs two years to complain. The blogger offered to change anything that was factually incorrect. He did make an error which he confessed to and changed. He sought tech guidance on some of the digital engineering aspects and was shown to be correct in his assertions.
I won’t be troubling dcs anytime soon
It’s not so much Streisand as Bud Light, not good either way!
So in other words, if we buy a dCS product we can only get the best out of it if the manufacturer comes around and sets it up for us? Hard pass…
And in fact I think a manufacturer setting up a review piece, at lots of time, trouble and cost to them, unless that is how it’s explicitly sold to the customer, is a huge source of potential bias/influence (“Bob from ___ flew all the way out with his gear and got a hotel and bought us dinner and everything and so I guess I’d better give it a glowing review even thought it sounds and looks like ■■■■ for the $$$ it costs”). But reading much of the hifi press, that worry seems to have been thrown out the window a long time ago…
This happens with speakers all the time. You dont think a manufacturer should be able to provide guidance on the optimal setup?
As long as it is the same service that is offered the customer, either directly or via a dealer. If a reviewer can’t figure something out, someone with a long sufficient knowledge of audio gear, how would a customer? And if the (should be) supplied instruction manual doesn’t explain it properly, then that’s on the manufacturer. Of course for speakers, the reviewer should have the ability to change the room to a degree depending on the type of speakers, and make that known.
My quick take is never air dirty laundry in public. GS would have been better served with an anonymizing dCS for their video, and pointing out bad practice within the industry. Getting in touch with the MD directly might have cleared things up quickly as well. dCS on their part should have just ignored the review (beyond any spec typos, etc), though it sounds like the (American?) guy got a wee obsessed. Grow some skin.
There’s so much bespoke hifi out there, much of it ridiculously priced (who knew there were so many multi-millionaires in the world?) that you can’t always be the ‘best.’ What is that? What is perfect? Did they sell ten less Bartok’s last quarter because of this review? Or perhaps it’s because less people are spending $20k on a headphone DAC? Or perhaps the thought of having to rely on internet bloggers for free publicity because they can’t think of anything themselves keeps them up at night?
I’m sorry but DCS is completely full of it. Other than a recitation of the technical specs, a review is almost entirely the opinion of the reviewer. Opinions are not capable of being proven to be true or false. They are therefore not actionable as libel, period. So threats of litigation can be deposited right into the circular file. And if a review says that there are 6 filters and there are really 10, OK, that is a mistake, but cannot be proven to have caused any sort of legally cognizable harm to the company other than by pure speculation. Those types of mistakes are typically corrected by a disclaimer on the article or in an amended article. Disagreement over testing methodology is also not actionable. If a company believes that one testing method makes their product look crappy while another doesn’t, is too bad. The company is free to run its own test and point out in a comment that their test is more accurate than the reviewer’s. Again, not actionable defamation. So if Cameron had contacted me, he would not have lost any sleep at all because I would have laughed and told him to forget about it — a lawsuit would have zero chance.
I also have to laugh at DCS’s response that they did not threaten the reviewer and that the word “litigation” was never mentioned in their letter. Let’s see . … (1) the letter is from a lawyer, (2) it claims that DCS was harmed by false statements, and (3) the letter threatens to seek damages, including punitive damages from the reviewer. I would like DCS to explain to me how they would propose to obtain damages and punitive damages if not through the filing of a lawsuit. That is just a plain old lie. The letter is obviously a threat of litigation, albeit a frivolous one. The fact that DCS would lie about that in its response shows that they are simply attempting to intimidate the reviewer into withdrawing a negative review.
Now, I think that we all know how unusual it is to see a negative review about any $$ product. Every product reviewed in Stereophile, TAS and other mainstream publications is routinely so much better than the last product or the reviewer’s “reference product, that you would be a fool not to spend thousands of dollars for the new and improved version since the old one, which was the greatest thing since sliced bread last year is suddenly old and crappy technology. Private reviews are more likely to be honest. In this case, the reviewer borrowed the test sample. He was beholden to no one. He double-checked his test methodology with third parties. How DCS could ever show that the review was intentionally false, and maliciously made, assuming that DCS could be considered a “public figure,”is beyond me.
I also laughed at DCS’ complaint that the test unit was not “professionally set up” by DCS for the review. Are you kidding me? So now, if I purchase a DCS unit, I need someone from DCS to come to my house to set it up correctly? Give me a break. The reviewer borrowed a unit and set it up per the owner’s manual. If that is insufficient, that is DCS’ problem, not the reviewer’s, and potential buyers have a right to know that that is DCS’ position. For example, Wilson clearly states that set-up of their speakers is very important — so much so that professional set-up by a trained dealer is included in the purchase of their speakers. Whether that is truly required or not is up for debate, but it is plainly disclosed. If a reviewer (who presumably understands speaker placement as part of their work) slams a Wilson speaker, Wilson would be entirely justified in pointing out that it was not professionally set up by Wilson, and offer to come set it up and see if the reviewer reaches a different conclusion. But that is not what happened here. DCS is just trying to retreat from a ridiculous and untenable position that unfortunately for them is in writing and not capable of dispute over what was actually said.
Bottom line, DCS likes to think that it is a top tier product. To bitch about a video review from “headphone.com” is hardly the kind of behavior one would expect from a top tier company, confident in its product. To threaten a lawsuit that any reasonable lawyer with experience in the field knows is complete ■■ just shows that they don’t like it when the mumbo jumbo sales nonsense is pierced and an unvarnished opinion published. How many times do we see ridiculous and literally unsupported claims made to sell products, such as how the magic ebony record clamp soaked in ancient swamps in Africa does magical things? I want more honest reviews and not just shills. If I wanted shills, I could read the company’s own literature. This type of conduct must be discouraged in the strongest way possible. I would expose all of DCS’ ■■, make no apologies whatsoever, and send that stupid lawyer a laughing 
emoji as the response to his asinine letter.
Cameron, I have 35 years of high profile litigation experience in the defamation area and I’ll defend you for free if they sued. Tell DCS to pound sand.
Although I am not in the market for a DAC (will soon pick up a new TT and SUT), or speakers for that matter, ∂ç$ and T3kt0n have been purged from my vocabulary. The ad hominem against Cameron was beyond the pale.
I bought a Holoaudio May L2 DAC based on Goldensound’s recommendation, so like his approach. Best of luck to Cameron!
Perfect comments. Sums it all up very well.
dCS clearly did not approach this correctly. They would have been wiser to coordinate with the reviewer to identify shortcomings and fix them to improve the product. Reminds me of Monster Cable threatening litigation against Blue Jeans Cable over design issues. BJC is owned by an attorney, and he told Monster in a detailed letter, to knock themselves out, he wasn’t going to bullied, and Monster Cable abandoned the threats.
Reading today’s Archimago‘s Musings blog about the matter, I feel it very handsomely expresses my view in a way I wouldn‘t have been able to formulate.
Speaking of threats, I’d be curious to know what a lawyer’s take is on the claim that copyright law might prevent the sharing of private correspondance to the employer of someone you’re making litigation threats against, as expressed here.
I’d love to read the signature to see what it says, can you copyright any and all of your general conversations? An NDA could cover this if it extended to correspondence, but not sure.
Confidentiality is the usual basis for imposing limitations on sharing information. A letter or email can be a literary work for copyright purposes, but you can convey the information within the letter using different words or expressions without breaching copyright. It might be a breach to copy the letter to someone (depending on any implied licence), but unless you are in the business of selling your correspondence to others you won’t usually suffer any damage from such breach.
Its the kind of threat that might sound impressive to lay people, but it is laughable to lawyers with some knowledge of copyright.
Thanks… pretty much what I thought. Given that the individual who sent that email was apparently awarded a JD at one point in their lives, I was curious if the logic they were exhibiting had any standing at all.
Another company to avoid IMHO.
Absolutely agree. And one aspect in this comment really made me think: The hypothetical Ferrari review episode.
Really failed to understand why this 2.5 yrs old YT video caused such an escalation. We are talking about a review on a channel which supposedly was not very influential back then, making some subjective remarks that he found the sound of an expensive product overly smooth and not annoying/aggressive enough. A product which was already discontinued at the times escalating mails have been exchanged.
Much ado about nothing?
I find it all a little overblown, but there‘s no such thing as bad publicity. Perhaps that was the plan?
Note: Any opinions expressed are my own and do not reflect the views of my former or current employer.
Hey Y’all,
John here, former Hardware Ecosystem Expert/Partner Program Manager at Roon Labs.
For five years I was responsible for testing all Roon Ready and Roon Tested devices. If anyone has gone hands on with more HiFi in a five year period, I would like to meet them.
During this time I was lucky enough to have in-depth conversations with many of the most respected designers and engineers in the industry. They are a passionate bunch with thick skin. I learned a lot.
I can say this with confidence—Goldensound doesn’t know what he’s talking about.
He’s is the most dangerous type of influencer—one who knows enough to be dangerous, but not enough to truly understand the material.
I was going to a preface this post by stating that I think he simply gets out over his skis when it comes to advanced concepts, and that he doesn’t mean any harm. However, I then stumbled on this post by Amir on ASR and it confirmed all my worst instincts about this guy.
His popularity is an indictment on the state of the discourse in this hobby. A tidal wave of amateurs equipped with THD+N graphs upvoting each other in endless groupthink over how their “objective” approach makes them a part of the enlightened class while having little understanding of the fundamentals of sound reproduction and psychoacoustics.
Reddit is ground zero for this—go look at the number of comments recommending room treatments to people building systems without any consideration given to the fact there’s considerable evidence that most listeners prefer listening to music in a room with normal levels of room reflections. I thought this was the objectivist camp?
Goldensound sure sounds convincing here clapping in his room showing off those RT60 graphs in REW!
What makes Goldensound’s particular brand of ■■■■■■■■ so hard to pin down is that he makes an effort to split the objective and subjective parts of his content, but then cleverly uses terminology from objective world to give credence to his subjective opinions without drawing direct connections to give himself the ability to wiggle in defense. I don’t think he does this consciously—he just really thinks he understands all this stuff and can speak to it like an expert.
Fwiw, I don’t want to excuse dCS’s behavior here, they obviously overstepped their bounds and are paying a price for it. There’s room for reasonable people to disagree on points they brought up in GS’ review.
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@John_Iburg - here!
Very important take on the matter, and I am agreeing with you on most aspects, certainly not on all.
Sure, from a technical point his claims are baseless, purely subjective and not backed by any measurements or specs. But that does not make it much different from most of reviews purely based on subjective listening tests.
I rather have a problem with him formulating pseudo-objective and fundamental claims based on his expectation like ´this component sounds inferior´, ´this is not how it should sound´ or ´this component is not worth its price tag´. That is problematic as it is leaving the field of complete subjectiveness. And I can very well understand some people at dCS going ape when hearing such statements.
I agree that his verdicts might be misleading people, but I would not call that dangerous. People who are in the market for a $20k DAC should recognize the obvious contradiction in his verdicts complaining about the product never sounding aggressive and annoying and ´that is not how is should be´.
If people do not recognize this, they stand a pretty good chance of believing any high end gossip talker which usually leads to confusion and people buying new equipment every few months whenever they encountered a new ´guru of the moment´.
This diagnosis sounds more applicable to the ASRntology church preaching their objectivists´ ideology, claiming only their measurements are right and tell the whole pravda about sound quality and acoustics.
I thought Cameron was rather promoting the opposite religion of total subjectivity while using the measurements as a hollow shield to set himself apart from people not doing such. And that is nothing new to the high end scene, such priests have been around for 30 or 40 years being even more popular back in the days.
If I have learned anything in all these years with hi-fi trying to understand both sides, it is the strong persuasion that both extreme positions are equally wrong ultimately leading to everlasting dissatisfaction of people who just want to listen to music.
Certainly true, but if he makes bold claims about a component sounding ´wrong´ not being worth its price tag, every reasonable listener might want to ask for an explanation or a proof, solely based on his subjective impression. And there is none with measurements even hinting that something is deeply flawed in his assessment process.
Making it that big was the decision of one guy at dCS. If there would have been no lawyer and Cameron’s new boss drawn into it, the whole 2021 YT review covering a discontinued product would have been long forgotten and people from time to time would have a good laugh at a reviewer complaining about an expensive DAC not sounding as annoying and aggressive as he was desiring it to sound.
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What’s worse is that the polarized opinions from both the subjectivists and the objectivists seems to pull them apart rather than learn from one another. And the dogmatic approach from ASR only ridicules that parish as much any marketing material from manufacturers of hifi fuses and cables etc.
