I think people take the negativity on T too personally. I loved Karen's swatches and her layout was awesome, but I still consider T to be the gold standard when it comes to photographing swatches and documenting the quality of a product. I don't take her word as gospel but I've agreed with her sentiment many times.
I like MAC, but I've definitely had a negative word to say in the past and agreed with many others in the past. I just feel like its not a commentators job to censor themselves, MAC has disappointed a lot of people in the past. Especially if you hopped on it earlier and you feel like you've seen a decline in the way they go about business (I feel that way). It's one thing if you were introduced in say the last year or two, because that's the quality you're used to.
For me...since being sold to Estee Lauder I just don't see ALL of the MAC I used to really respect. Like I said I still love them, but I also see a lot of stiff competition coming up in the makeup world and judge them on how they're responding to it as well as what their customers/clients want/need. I like both boards Specktra and Temptalia, and I've never let a negative comment keep me from getting my makeup love on
Talk mess all you want, it's all about the Q-U-A-L-I-T-Y baby!
Considering how MAC runs it's sales, promotions, answering customers (with 400 different answers) I don't think T even HAD to do anything. Lol, MAC loves the hype and mystery and getting people IN the store and ON the website. Better to have customers flying around and panicked and buying 4 of everything than have them analyze a picture, read a review, and make a calm informed decision. Ironically I bet if she stopped reviewing MAC completely without a PR sample they'd probably start sending her a ton, but hey...if someone's already putting THEIR money on the table to get a whole collection to review for the masses...again MAC knows what it's doing.