You were chuggin' back some Bud's when you wrote that weren't you Slappy!? I don't know if I fall into any of your categories, but I am white, live on the edge of our continent, enjoy red wine, don't like scotch at all, like all kinds of music, will refrain from putting myself in a 'class' (upper/middle/lower). I like your idea....maybe Plato could do a "Trailer Trash" column (no offense intended whatsoever).....seriously, you are quite right; all kinds of folks enjoy music. Where I differ in opinion is why Bose does so well. It is certainly not because it markets to everyone, it is simply because it MARKETS BIG TIME, putting a huge emphasis on advertising and marketing and cutting corners when it comes to the final product. It is clearly not targeting the high-end market, as it is simply not a high-end product. The majority of white, middle-American, Bud-swilling males buy into that advertising shit BIG TIME! Advertising moves Widgets in America, no ifs ands or buts about it! The other primary component of their success is they make an inexpensive product that the common-man can afford that does the job at hand. Lets face it, most folks simply don't give a rats-ass about soundstage, bloom and transient decay (whatever that is)! They just wanna listen to the music they like, have it sound reasonably well, and they don't want to pay a lot of money and they don't want to spend any time researching their purchase... They've got TV shows to watch, Bud to chug down, and 87 Billion in aid to Iraq to pay off!!! The challenge with smaller manufacturers who are doing it from the heart, as you are clearly aspiring to with your speaker-building idea, is that as soon as they have to start paying for marketing and advertising space it means the price of their product will need to go up in order to pay for it. You can then have the choice of becoming good at doing just that (marketing) and passing on the marketing costs to the consumer (as they must be in order to stay in business), or you can start to cut corners in your products to make a better profit to try to juggle the mark-up/marketing costs. That's why some of the best bargains in the high end are small manufacturers, doing it for the passion they have for it, and not putting a lot into advertising (i.e. Quicksilver, Homegrown, DH Labs, etc.). It is the beauty of Plato's idea, as it was the beauty of Listener magazine. Plato knows better than anyone whether it is realistic from an insiders perspective. I'd buy it and support it as I have Motorcycle Consumer News (no advertising there either though I'm not liking the direction that publication has been headed lately). So can it work Plato? I think it's a great idea, but what are the numbers you're talking about and how do you think you can make it work? It's a noble undertaking for sure. I already know way more than I need to about $30K turntables and DAC's, but I'm sure that even if I had that kind of money where it didn't mean that much to me, I don't think I'd spend it that way, as much as I do LOVE to listen to music at home, the margins of improvement I've heard in systems like that just don't justify the costs when I think of how much good that money could do elsewhere. I also know that, per what I responded to you Chris, that the vast majority of Americans would say the exact same thing and put that price tag a whole lot lower inclusive of some of the prices I've paid for components. It's all relative. So the short answer is, yes Plato, I'd be part of your target market that would be willing to support such an effort.
Marco
Marco