February 28, 1996

Do You Get Moody Monthly?

One of our marketing managers just about hit me when I asked her this. But I was only inquiring if she was a subscriber to Moody magazine. I wanted to know if she'd seen the lousy job Moody did reviewing Bible software a couple years ago.

Once again this year Moody has made an ill-fated attempt to review Bible software. Once again we tried to bail them out before they embarrassed themselves in front of their readers. Once again they refused our help. So Craig mounts the Soapbox to clear things up.

Greek-Free Bible Scholarship

Moody concludes that PC Study Bible ranks second only to Logos for "appropriateness for scholarly use." Given that PC Study Bible doesn't contain the Greek New Testament, one would think that most scholars would find it lacking.

I guess the scholars at Moody don't bother with the Greek.

PC Study Bible gets the highest marks for "Logical Organization." Remember this is a Windows program with no Edit menu. Where the online help is always visible in a pane in the Bible window because none of the keys do normal Windows functions. Where it's a two-step process to first clear the contents of the clipboard, then copy new stuff into the clipboard every time you want to just copy and paste a verse.

I guess that's logical to the scholars at Moody.

"I" for "Incomplete"

To her credit, the reviewer said PC Bible Atlas was the best atlas reviewed. She also liked our "superior" online help. In fact she concludes by saying, "I liked it more as I continued to explore its features." Perhaps if she'd explore the features before she writes the review her readers could benefit from her experience.

As is becoming typical of Moody, the comparison charts left out lots of information. While other companies are credited for all the different Bible translations they offer, QuickVerse doesn't even get credit for the six translations that are located right on the CD she reviewed (only four are mentioned). QuickVerse offers more English translations (12) than any other company. I guess that's not a big deal at Moody (after all, if you've got the KJV what else do you need?).

Another typical characteristic of a Moody review seems to be the grading of products with no criteria offered, nor any justification of the grade. The products reviewed are graded on "Logical Organization" (1-10), "Home Use" (A-F), and "Scholarly Use" (A-F). No list of criteria are offered. No explanation of why Logos gets a "B" for home use and QuickVerse gets a "B+". (Unless those GPF's she mentioned in Logos had something to do with it.)

Let Us Help!

What's especially frustrating is that we offered to look over the article for technical correctness before it was published. We do this all the time for other magazines. We let them come to their own conclusions about the software - we just make sure that they got the prices, system requirements, and other factual information correct. Moody refused our help. They did the same thing last time and published similarly flawed reviews.

An interesting note: While Moody has been berating QuickVerse based on a few minutes of cursory evaluation, the readers of Christian Computing Magazine have rated it "Best Bible Software" three years in a row.

Yeah, I get moody monthly. Every time it comes out.