feedback on av xpress

it has been a week since its launch and the overall (verbal) feedback we have got is that av xpress shows great promise. let me summarize some of the points raised. let's start with the negative ones:

[it's too thin]
well, it is the 1st issue, and we have got a deadline to meet, plus the fact that for stitch binding (as opposed to perfect binding), you can't go more than 50 pages. having said that, we promise that the next issue (in april) will be substantially thicker.

[so many ads]
we don't call it an adzine for no reasons! av xpress is primarily an advertisement magazine but we are going to gauge - if most readers prefer articles more than ads then we would beef up the contents in due course. it is a tricky balance. bear in mind that we can't be a full-fledged magazine if we were to keep it FREE forever. it would be too costly to produce a full-fledged magazine.

[questionable english]
this is definitely nit-picking as we believe our english is good, although our editing is not the best. c'mon, we are not editors by training and profession - we write because we are passionate about this hobby, not that we want to win any literary awards or nobel prize. if you think your english is better, we would gladly welcome you to be our contributor or even editor.

[too commercialized]
again, we don't call it an adzine for no reasons. this is a commercial publication and a free one, no less. we need advertisements to survive!

[cd review too sonic-centric]
no apologies here. we recommended the cds because they sound good and the music is good. because we are an audio publication, naturally the focus will be on the recording and sonic attributes.

and now, the positive ones....

[top-notch printing]
thank you very much. we pay so much attention to our printing so much so that we monitored the printing process throughout the 5 days that av xpress was being printed. there are still blemishes here and there but we are going to improve, that's our promise to you readers.

[very interesting advertorials]
to me, that's the main draw of av xpress. the advertorials are informative and affordable to most dealers. we hope to have many more of these advertorials in future issues.

some suggestions by dealers...

[to go bilingual]
yes, it is being considered at the moment. we realize that many audiophiles, especially those in ipoh and penang are chinese literate. we may start with some chinese article next issue.

[don't make it a free magazine!]
no, that's not the spirits by which av xpress is founded. we want more people to explore hifi. but asking readers to pay, we may restrict a large population of readers who are borderline audiophiles/music lovers. so we will make av xpress a free publicaton as long as our costs allow us to do so.

[don't need such quality paper]
again, we don't skimp on quality. audiophiles are a fussy lot. they demand quality. a free magazine doesn't mean it has to be substandard in printing and paper quality. we would insist on good quality paper for av xpress.