As a rule of thumb, ninety percent of the content on most major bike outlets – road.cc, Pinkbike, GCN, singletrack, enduro-mtb, velonews (the list goes on) is a thinly veiled advert. Press releases from manufacturers copied post so as to appear as news (same wording used across multiple sites).

How come James may can get away with saying x car is garbage, and 44teeth berate the latest awkward bike – but nothing but vomiting garbage praise comes when we talk about the human powered interests?

Because “Free Member”

If you want writers to have the ability to go against potential advertisers, start paying for the content.

S’not just bicycles though – go on a tech website or pick up Stuff magazine, or some house/home magazines – they’re even worse. I think you’ve picked out the exceptions to the rule with your examples above. I get Top Gear magazine and I can’t think of the last time they scored a car less than 6/10.

James May can get away with it because he doesn’t need to rely on advertising revenue. I don’t know anything about 44teeth to be fair.

You have an option, walk away.

Its not a new thing. Was it MBR who years back had a Trek on test which actually snapped and they still gave it a 7/10 followed by a double page advert for Trek?

Because “Free Member”

If you want writers to have the ability to go against potential advertisers, start paying for the content.

Fair point.

At least some magazines highlight what freebies or inducements have changed hands.

Or maybe there aren’t as many rubbish bikes nowadays? There shouldn’t be, given the prices. They may not be suited for a particular type of riding, but that doesn’t make the a bad bike.

I seem to recall the mag associated with this here forum testing a prototype that was built with the incorrect geometry due to manufacturers error and gave it an appropriately stinking review.

Isn’t stuff generally pretty good and more or less works pretty well these days? There actually aren’t that many properly bad products and if there are they they aren’t the products from the mainstream companies that are getting reviewed. Couple that with these channels basically being mouth pieces for the cycling industry. I’m not totally against that. I don’t go and look for press releases to read so I don’t mind them reading a curated set to me.

Or maybe there aren’t as many rubbish bikes nowadays?

I think that definitely applies to the car world cited above. Theres the odd exception it must be far more difficult to buy a bad car today than a good one.

I actually find Pinkbike relatively fair in some of their reviews. They certainly don’t hold back with some of them but I never read their reviews of bikes from major companies, it tends to be the smaller niche players who I guess generate zero ad revenue etc.

nothing but vomiting garbage praise comes when we talk about the human powered interests?

This is bullshit, plain and simple.

**** drama queen.

**** drama queen.

You need to add ‘freeloading’ to that.

Why don’t you start your own online magazine where you’re brutally honest about the shortcomings of modern MTB components. Let’s see how much product gets sent your way.

Or maybe there aren’t as many rubbish bikes nowadays?

Isn’t stuff generally pretty good and more or less works pretty well these days?

There’s definitely some absolute stinkers out there. It’s infinitely better than it was in the 90’s and 00’s but there’s so much crap that hits the market accompanied by an avalanche of marketing waffle and bro-science.

I don’t believe there’s any single piece of a bicycle which couldn’t be improved but we still get forks and shocks and brakes full of fragile plastic internals.

I don’t watch Guy Kesteven videos but has he ever really slated a bike? I imagine his career would come to an abrupt end if he did.

As above, most of the things described in the op have developed to a stage where they are almost all pretty good, and the different manufacturers model ranges are generally pretty similar. I am in the market for a new enduro / trail type bike at the moment. In common with most enthusiasts I have too high a budget, look at all the intricacies & specs of everything available, look for advice from other riders, do some demo days etc. However I could fairly safely ignore all that, walk in to any boutique bike shop, pick something I liked the look of and it would be a really good bike suited to my intended use.
Also true of cars. James May etc can call a car terrible because it isn’t much good for hooning around an airfield or closed road, but in reality any normal person* would be hard pushed to describe a car as being genuinely bad as a vehicle. Boring perhaps, or not something that interests you but not bad.

*In the west at least. No doubt there are still plenty of actively dangerous, ill conceived but cheap locally made vehicles available in less developed parts of the world.

Basically bike/stuff journo’s are just influencers really. If you’re gonna sell people’s shit, you better make it sound decent otherwise you ain’t getting paid.

Even if every member on here was fully paid up, they still wouldn’t be able to review and be totally honest as they wouldn’t get anything to review!

Because they want to be invited to the press camps in the future.

From another angle… even bikes and bike kit that “I don’t like”, or isn’t my preference, are in the main more than acceptable, they’re damn good. Journalists that just rubbish a product because they prefer the alternatives, rather than being objective about the quality and merits of what they are reviewing, and which riders might appreciate what they as a reviewer don’t in the product, aren’t worth reading.

And press releases used for a daily news feed are fair game as well. Not pretending to be reviews of course, just telling us what’s being announced and going on. Seems fair to me. Mixed in with original content as well, of course. Plus some reporting from press camps and trade shows and events (we’ve had less of this in Covid times, and more reliance on at a distance PR, for obvious reasons). And the odd sponsored story if labelled as such, they can be a good read/scan/look as well.

I think it’s a mix of lazy journalism (how many times have you come across “articles” regarding a new product that sound identical to the press release which accompanied them), and as others have said, how the bike industry works. FWIW I find Seth (he of the bike hacking) manages to strike a decent balance of bike industry patsy and honest journalist.

This is a big part of why I subscribe to STW and why am also considering geting signed up to Cranked as well. I know what products I need, and have a pretty decent idea of the ones I want. I don’t need a magazine to tell me what’s what, which I guess this explains why I have an old Kona in the garage for towpath duties, and not gravel bike laiden with custom-fit bags for all the bikepacking that I’ll never do. I’m more interested in the stories that make up our sport than the shiney-shiney.

In the main you need product to review and that’s not exactly easy.

Say shimano launch a new xtr tomorrow. First thing you see about it is the press release and photos.
Maybe in a few weeks/months you go to a press camp with 30 other journalists trying the same kit in the same day, you get half an hour to play with it, really the only thing you can come away with assuming it didn’t actually explode in a ball of fire is “the shifter felt good” “the one mechanic for two bikes meant everything was working really well” and shimano told us this so maybe 50 of your own words plus a lot of paraphrasing.
If you’re lucky, six months later you get a loaner set to review, if you’re unlucky it’s 12 months, it’s been in shops for three, and yours has been ragged to death by 6 other testers first. At this point you can actually review the kit but…

you’ve only got it for a month,
you’ve deadlines to meet
there are 6 other publications ahead of you with that review of exactly the same kit, except the chainring hadn’t done 3000mi of being ridden like it was going on the canal or being burned at the end of every ride so your audience has likely seen it already in better nick
The kit isn’t ground breaking.
the stuff it supercedes is already bloody good.
It didn’t break or misbehave.

What do you actually write?

Fwiw I think that the folks here do a bloody good job of not just copy pasting and actually finding something to write.

Hell huge amounts of actual news these days, in a world where things happen are just syndicated or cribs of twitter.

Why don’t you start your own online magazine where you’re brutally honest about the shortcomings of modern MTB components. Let’s see how much product gets sent your way

Yet to see “Fresh Goods Friday” dry up…….

What do you actually write?

More to the point though, does anyone really want to read it. You see thread after thread on here about constantly changing standards. Better kit’s good, and all. But I mostly just ride my kit until it wears out, explodes – at which point I’ll replace it with more of the same (see above re: standards). Or, if I feel it’s not keeping up with the sort of riding I’m doing I’ll probably seek the wisdom of user forums on what might suit my needs rather than rely on reviews from the mainstream.

Why don’t you start your own online magazine where you’re brutally honest about the shortcomings of modern MTB components. Let’s see how much product gets sent your way.

I think someone capable of doing this could do well and would get enough product in. You’d need to be able to back up your claims thoroughly – test the objectives and be both a skilled rider and have the ability to separate out what’s going on to work with the testing done to talk through the subjective stuff. I think there are far more with the former skills than the latter ability and to some extent the latter can make up for the former. You’d keep a 2-way dialogue going between you and the product designers and managers at the brand. Then slate the junk because you can say why it’s junk, and praise the great products. If sparing with that praise your reviews become valued and only the confident brands send anything your way to begin with.
Making a business plan from that could be a challenge but I expect many would pay for that content and advertising needn’t be excluded from the format.

Say shimano launch a new xtr tomorrow. First thing you see about it is the press release and photos.
Maybe in a few weeks/months you go to a press camp with 30 other journalists trying the same kit in the same day, you get half an hour to play with it, really the only thing you can come away with assuming it didn’t actually explode in a ball of fire is “the shifter felt good” “the one mechanic for two bikes meant everything was working really well” and shimano told us this so maybe 50 of your own words plus a lot of paraphrasing.
If you’re lucky, six months later you get a loaner set to review, if you’re unlucky it’s 12 months, it’s been in shops for three, and yours has been ragged to death by 6 other testers first. At this point you can actually review the kit but…

When you read about Shimano etc on here it was released to trade and press for months before and ridden and tested to some extent under embargo. Press can get brand new kit around the same time as all but the larger OEMS, some is pre-production, some production spec. Not saying they can all get whatever they want whenever they need it but the media release is just as well-planned as the OEM release.

As a rule of thumb, ninety percent of the content on most major bike outlets – road.cc, Pinkbike, GCN, singletrack, enduro-mtb, velonews (the list goes on) is a thinly veiled advert.

Perhaps fair to say product review media is part of the marketing and sales cycle of any brand and some media and journalists manage that dilemma better than others like some seem to have 10x the technical appreciation of others, etc. The more mainstream the less I’d trust them initially, like any media (edit to add, I realise there’s no logic in that – and anti-msm attitudes get us conspiracy theory idiots), but that doesn’t mean a mainstream review can’t be good or trusted.

Why don’t you start your own online magazine where you’re brutally honest about the shortcomings of modern MTB components. Let’s see how much product gets sent your way.

I think this already exists in YouTube form: https://www.youtube.com/c/hambini

Because not enough people buy the magazine/subscription to website and they need to make enough money to pay the staff, etc.
As long as they say it’s sponsored content and the reviews are unbiased then fair enough

There seems to be a few YouTubers who have a Patreon for buying stuff to review and then the ads on the video are for stuff unrelated to the product. Not sure if the cost of bike bits would make this approach realistic or not (I’ve only seen it for coffee stuff and computer stuff).

The best reviews come out of the field test/group test type arrangement. Enduromag do it, pinkbike do it in video form, STW do it for components but can’t recall it being done for full bikes.

Basically telling manufacturers that they want a trail bike that retails for less than $5k, which then goes head to head with other bikes thath fit the same criteria. If someone sends you a 2k enduro bike that comparitivley climbs like crap and has cheese wheels it gets called out as such.

To paraphrase what someone said above, there are no bad bikes, but there are many wrong bikes

How much stuff that Hambini gets sent comes from pissed off punters and how much is from distributors/manufacturers?

Paul Aston has started posting YouTube videos where he’s reviewing bikes that he’s bought. He’s very honest and was when he was at Pinkbike too (see Enve wheels review).

I actually find Pinkbike relatively fair in some of their reviews.

I find the trick with Pinkbike is to actually read the review, not skip to the final remarks (which are almost always very positive).

They’ll often say things like: “This bike gets to the top of hills without too much fuss, though it’s no race thoroughbred. The suspension remains active at all times but a small flick of the pro-pedal lever tames the bob. Meanwhile, on the downhills, it’s very lively. It’s not one for just ploughing through chunder, you have to work hard to stay on line. It rewards the skilful rider with a poppy character which makes for a lively ride. This is not a bike that will flatten your local trails.

9/10”

Which is translated as: “This bike is a bit rubbish up hills, it bobs all the time and relies on the shock to keep things controlled. Then when you go downhill, it’s hard work and it isn’t even that fast.”

Bike reviews =/= journalism

It’s nothing new. I think my eyes were opened when MBUK rated a Pace suspension fork as being better than the Bomber Z1.

the trick with Pinkbike is to actually read the review

But why do that when you can spout naive, ill-informed bullshit on the internet instead?

That’s much more fun.

But why do that when you can spout naive, ill-informed bullshit on the internet instead?

That’s much more fun

It’s also the only bit anyone reads isn’t it? After all, the articles on pinkbike are really just headers for the comments aren’t they.

Yeah, perhaps they think that by writing truth in the full body of an article they are maintaining a degree of journalistic integrity while still pandering the bill-payers by gushing in the TL;DR section.

I suppose it’s better than straight-up lying the whole time.

To be fair I think that some journalism is better than others. However, mags need to sell to make money but a few (like singletrack) tell you what features/reviews have been ‘benefited’ by a company/someone so you know it could be a skewed angle of print.

If I really want a honest(ish) review I’ll look up the forum and what that says, loads of different views that I just have to sort out for myself (and again, I know not all of them will be honest)

I think someone capable of doing this could do well and would get enough product in. You’d need to be able to back up your claims thoroughly – test the objectives and be both a skilled rider and have the ability to separate out what’s going on to work with the testing done to talk through the subjective stuff. I think there are far more with the former skills than the latter ability and to some extent the latter can make up for the former. You’d keep a 2-way dialogue going between you and the product designers and managers at the brand. Then slate the junk because you can say why it’s junk, and praise the great products. If sparing with that praise your reviews become valued and only the confident brands send anything your way to begin with.
Making a business plan from that could be a challenge but I expect many would pay for that content and advertising needn’t be excluded from the format.

This makes me think of DC rainmaker’s site testing GPS watches/headunits, power meters and indoor trainers. Of course the stuff he tests is much more conducive to objective review than bike components/frames, but he certainly has the 2-way dialogue with the designers and has both credibility and things to test in spades.

I think this already exists in YouTube form:

Telling the people who make the stuff you have in your hand to go kill themselves isn’t great for building a relationship.

The correct answer to OPs question is of course the “free member” response. Independent minded critical journalism is expensive. If you “really” want it, stump up some hard earned or STFU

@continuity as OP, how do you respond to some of the thread?

The correct answer to OPs question is of course the “free member” response. Independent minded critical journalism is expensive. If you “really” want it, stump up some hard earned or STFU

Strangely enough a lot of the advertorial reviews are open access

Go figure

Could be that I’m the product

Telling the people who make the stuff you have in your hand to go kill themselves isn’t great for building a relationship.

He needs to clam down as it makes him more interesting

Peak Torque is similar but without the swearing and frame repairs

@Matt_outandabout

The counterargument to the “free rider” accusation has already been widely debunked on here with examples of good, critical tech journalism – DCRainmaker is a perfect example.

That said, I think it’s a funny perversion of reality to think that someone being advertised to and sold things should pay for the priviledge of honesty – but maybe you work in advertising.