For the International Year of Astronomy, Celestron developed its FirstScope, a commendable achievement at the advertized price. However all the adverts in Astronomy and S&T show a owl, the moon and a Hubble quality picture of Jupiter right next to the telescope. The first two are realistic, but the picture of Jupiter is a disgrace. Many many kids will be bitterly disappointed that they cannot get such a picture, as well as many confused non astronomy savvy parents. I have tried to get some sort of response from both mags, to no avail. There should be a standard to advertizing. I wrote to International Year of Astronomy organizers, who actually came back saying that Celestron has warnings on its product boxes that images are not to be taken as "achievable" I have no axe to grid with Celestron, I have a fantastic APO of theirs, but feel that there should be some action on this issue John Fourie Johannesburg South Africa

I see your point and can agree that there should be some kind of standard putting a halt to such misleading marketing ploys. IMHO, there should be strict laws and costly punishments for the manufacture and advertising outlets that do and or allow for that kind of deceit.

Small print disclaimers are not satisfactory as far as I am concerned. The first thing and often the only thing a person sees on the packaging is a picture of the telescope next to those nice planetary or Deep Sky images. Right there the consumer has been purposely mislead. It's a common subliminal marketing strategy found everywhere to include the restaurant menu you look at when you go out to dinner. Magazines follow right in the footsteps of the manufacture because it's either publish what the manufacture says to publish or don't receive those advertising dollars. Integrity, honesty and morals are three virtues or traits that marketing and advertising staff and executives do not have. It is up to us who have been in that situation to spread the word as much as we can to make the consumer aware of the truth. It is forums like this and others like it that can be a great help to the naive consumer looking for their first telescope. I have even stopped sales of cheap department store telescopes in person at places like Wal Mart.

However, with that being said perhaps you should have posted your inquiry in the feedback forum if your intention is to get the attention of the Astronomy magazine editorial staff.

 Haha I just got the firstscope a last Wednesday. Although bad skies and a mixed up work schedule have prevented me from getting to use it...

Thanks for the support Tim. I regret to say that I have spent the last 4 months or so writing to editors etc of both magazines. My comments are not even worthy of a reply even though I used very polite language If I lived in the US, I see that your Federal Trade Commission would sort this out https://www.ftccomplaintassistant.gov/. Down her we have no change as 93% of 50 000 annual murders are not even solved, and feeling sore about this as a good friend was gunned down two days ago in front of his 11 year old kid. John

Actually the FTC doesn't do anything about it. As long as that small print is there whether the consumer sees it and reads it or not, they are covered. They can use all the nice colorful pictures they want on their packaging, as long as they are not telling you that is what you will really see then they are free to get away with it. . Heck they even did a documentary which included how to effectively use subliminal marketing by design with pictures.

Then one gets back to the responsibility of the magazine editors. Ads that blatantly overstate the capability of the equipment should be sent back for redrafting, or have they all joined the oldest profession. John

tkerr:

IMHO, there should be strict laws and costly punishments for the manufacture and advertising outlets that do and or allow for that kind of deceit.

IMHO, there's already too many laws, mandates and rules.  The public needs to be more responsible for themselves.  Investigation, research and regaining some common sense pertaining to many aspects of daily life would greatly diminish the felt need by policy-makers to establish laws which mandate how the rest of us should live our lives.  In short, we all have brains, use them.

tkerr:

Small print disclaimers are not satisfactory as far as I am concerned. The first thing and often the only thing a person sees on the packaging is a picture of the telescope next to those nice planetary or Deep Sky images. Right there the consumer has been purposely mislead.

Sure it's a sad state of affairs, but that's what the manufacturer and marketing people are counting on.  They ARE wanting to mislead the consumer.  They are trying to get an ill-informed, common-sense lacking public to purchase their substandard merchandise.  I won't lie.  I almost became one that bought a Wal-Mart cheapy.  But, I don't have a bunch of money and didn't want to take a chance on buying a piece of equipment for $100 when I had the feeling that a telescope really should cost a bit more than that if you wanted a "useful" rig.  So, quite a bit of time went into research.  The local astronomy guru was talked to, my daughter and I went to his observatory, the web was endlessly surfed, magazines were read and I found this site and asked many of the questions that I know are tedious and redundant.  The outcome from all of this, we got a nice scope we can use for years for just a couple of hundred dollars more than a department store purchase.  I'm not saying I'm so smart!!!  I'm saying I just thought that $100 for a telescope, tripod, three eyepieces, a barlow and a moon filter should probably carry a bit more of a greater price tag.  Point is, use your head.  If something doesn't smell right, you may want to think about it before dropping some hard earned dinero.

tkerr:

Integrity, honesty and morals are three virtues or traits that marketing and advertising staff and executives do not have.

You are very right.  But these people aren't hired for their values and morals.  In fact, they're hired for just the opposite.  They are hired to manipulate the public in hopes of getting unsuspecting individuals suckered into a purchase of, oftentimes, junk.  That's their job.  And here again, it's our job as consumers to sort through the "bull" and hopefully make an informed decision concerning what we buy.  Sure, we've all been duped at one time or another.  Chalk it up to "them" doing their job and we did not.  However, after a duping, a consumer should become more wary.

tkerr:

It is up to us who have been in that situation to spread the word as much as we can to make the consumer aware of the truth. It is forums like this and others like it that can be a great help to the naive consumer looking for their first telescope. I have even stopped sales of cheap department store telescopes in person at places like Wal Mart.

These interventions will do a better job of educating than any law has the chance of accomplishing.  With many laws, there is no outstanding reasoning.  The law was made and passed down and we don't have a real good idea as to why this is.  I think this would be the case if laws were passed pertaining to the situation of this discussion.  A manufacturer packages a telescope in a box adorned with pictures exemplifying what the user might see.  One of the pictures is a somewhat fuzzy bicolored circle.  Unless the law states that the pictures be labeled, the word "Jupiter" is nowhere to be found telling the consumer what the picture is.  Even if the image were labeled, I personally don't think the consumer would think twice of the purchase just because Jupiter might look a little fuzzy.  In his/her mind, they'll probably just think that most any scope will show Jupiter as only a whispy blob.  Any scope they could conceivably afford anyway.

So, now a law has been passed to further "protect" the consumer.  Thus, making some people feel better about the world we live in.  But, in probably a very small number of instances will this particular law really do it's job.  As for the images of food on menus, a law saying that the food they bring you has to look just like the picture on the menu will lead to menus with no pictures.  I don't see where it would raise the standard or appearance of the served dish.  And after all of this, we will have another "empty" law on the books.   

But, you're absolutely correct, Mr. t.  It is our collective job as "informed" users of astronomy equipment to pass along the word of any equipment that might not work.  Just as it is anyone's job to inform possible buyers of an item that one has already had the misfortune of buying into the misleading advertising or hype.  I don't see that yet another law needs inacted, in this case.

Laws lead to higher prices and/or higher taxes in many cases.  More money is needed for a manufacturer or vendor to set up procedures and a protocol in order to follow a law or regulation and more taxes are needed by the government so it can police the law.  In both cases, the extra money isn't picked from the money tree in the backyard.  It's obtained from us, the consumers.

O.K.  With all that said, I'm not saying that we should live in a lawless, gun-toting, the consumer be "darned" society.  There are some laws concerning our free enterprise system that are needed.  However, yes, placing misleading images on telescope boxes isn't a nice thing for marketers to do, but another law is not needed. 

BUYER BEWARE!!

 

johnfgf:

Then one gets back to the responsibility of the magazine editors.

Yes, I'll agree that magazine editors, in this case, do somewhat have a responsibility not to out and out blatantly lie.  But whose to say that one of these scopes, at one fleeting moment when the conditions were absolutely perfect, didn't give the observer an exceptional view of whatever pictures they put on the box?  You and I both know this is probably not the case.  But if we were to put it before a "jury of our peers", could anyone say that there couldn't have been just one time when the scope performed as advertised?  I'm afraid it would be a hung jury.

Ultimately, the consumer is responsible for his or her own actions.  No, a merchandiser or marketing firm shouldn't advertise a bold-faced lie in order to deceive the consumer.  But if that does happen, the consumer should have the wherewithal to smell something funny in the water and not make the purchase without further research.

Again, BUYER BEWARE!!