I don’t care if some or even most audiophile products are snake oil. I trust my ears.

I don’t care if a lot of audiophile products are overpriced. I have a budget.

I don’t care if a lot of audiophile products are marketed as status symbols or eye candy. I am interested in sound quality and, when I find it, a high bang for the buck.

I don’t care if there is a market for stratospherically priced audio equipment in which bang for the buck, or even sound quality, is irrelevant. I had a friend who asked me 40 years or so ago to help her buy a stereo. She was awash in dough and could afford all but the most highly priced components. As we were driving to the first audio store we visited, she told me she wanted a really good stereo, “you know, one that looks really sexy.” She spent a lot of money, and got just what she wanted, a sexy looking system that I thought sounded mediocre. Her criteria were different from mine, but totally valid. I don’t see any reason why I should suffer the fact that her criteria are different from mine. And, I don’t see any reason why any of us on this forum should suffer that that market exists.

It you can afford it and you value for whatever reason its contribution to your quality of of life, knock yourself out: buy the $90k PC. It’s presence in the market and the presence of consumers who will buy it bears no implications for me. I’m neither embarrassed nor humiliated by it.

I know some of you think this point ridiculous, but what offends me about Mr Too Much Dough spending $90K on a power cord is that it seems obscene when so many of our neighbors and compatriots can’t feed their families today.  I am disturbed by the unbridled capitalist impulses that drive our culture today and advocate every day for a more equitable distribution of resources. But, as long as we live under the current rules and incentives, let the ultra rich spend their money as they will, as long as they don’t hurt anyone in the process.

I recognize that the OP is making the case that the marketing and purchase of a $90,000 power cord does hurt us, the audiophile community, by perpetuating an image of the audiophile as an audiofool. I simply do not agree.

The US Justice Dept. should investigate Ansuz Cable Co. for wire fraud. :-)

@hce1 

@kerrybh 

Good posts, but you guys leave out the most important point, which is not so much the cost of the object as the claims to sound quality. 

In other words, anyone should be free to spend, say, $8,000 on a couple of Ethernet cables if they wish. It’s still a free country, after all, for the most part.

Maybe their kids will put them under conservatorship if they find out, but that’s ok.

The problem starts when some of these people come on here and start making grandiose, absurd claims of HUGE sonic improvements due to the Audiophile CAT-6 cables.

Worse, when highly educated folks with careers in computer science-related fields make polite attempts to gently educate them as to why that’s just not possible, these people get all hissy and start assailing the so-called "naysayers" with charges of subpar hearing; mediocre, non-resolving systems; and more generally blinkered ignorance of "science" that conveniently has yet to be discovered.

Calling these people "idiots" is both hyperbolic and medically incorrect. Most of them seem to possess average intelligence; and, in reality, the reasons why they propagate false claims and sow division are far more complex than just idiocy, but that’s another conversation.

Suffice it to say that we should probably refrain from just calling them idiots. We can, and should, be more inclusive than that.

devinplombier

... The problem starts when some of these people come on here and start making grandiose, absurd claims of HUGE sonic improvements ...

Why is that such a problem? This is an audio forum. Why shouldn't people here be able to discuss what we hear on our systems?