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Subject: Re: Junior6a - Gambit-Tiger, PGN's

Author: Mogens Larsen

Date: 17:02:13 11/14/00

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On November 14, 2000 at 19:33:24, Ed Schröder wrote:

>You can not be blamed liking a program. Objective vs Subjective. Nobody
>is objective once you fall in love with a program and I don't see any
>bad in that as long as you were objective and reserved before the program
>came.

The inability to recognize that your objectivity is failing low :o) is one of
the hazards when you test a program. The credibility before and after is very
important and "losing" your objectivity too many times won't help keeping the
credibility intact.

>Missed chance? I hear Gandalf is good. Why not write about it?

I've written about the program when there have been questions or if someone
posted highly inaccurate information in all the relevant fora. That is fair IMHO
as long as the term inaccurate is an objective criteria and not a personal
opinion. I've most likely posted a few subjective comments along the way as
well.

>Not true. Note that many of the Rebel beta-testers a) also beta-test other
>programs b) are as positive on other products as well.

If beta testers circulate from program to program credibility is undermined.
Someone could easily argue that they just want free programs and praise every
product because of that.

>Also you forget a main important point, from the beginning we (Christophe
>and I) have told the beta-team: no secrecy you can write about the beta's
>in public forums. That is quite risky don't you think?

Not really. I think you underestimate the element of gratitude as in "Yes! I got
selected! I won't disappoint them". At some point most of the beta testers will
identify themselves with the product and take defeat and victory of the given
program personally. There are plenty of examples from this forum and not just
Rebel. Or maybe I'm just a cynic :o).

>What if Rebel 11.0
>would have been a product they disliked? And if a review comes in I dislike
>it will be published too. Beta-testers have the freedom to include their
>dislikes as a matter of fact I have pointed to an old review of Rebel8 at:

I'm glad to hear that, but I doubt it'll be a common occurance unless the
program is really awful. A couple of the reviews are quite good, but they still
lack what characterizes a real review, ie. both sides of the coin.

>But the beta-testers go their own way and I am not going to censor them.

Of course not. I never implied that you would.

Mogens.



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