Uberwaltz, it’s a slippery slope.
(I think GK is a good cat, perhaps a bit eccentric!)
I’m not whining about different personalities- but meanness is a different kettle of fish.
Ideally, this should be a place to take a break from the grind, not bring it here. I always assumed that’s the purpose of hobbies, but then again, I’m not known for my keen reasoning skills.
I’m not pushing for a ‘safe place’, but we could take the edge off a little....
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Cal91, sorry about that, I hope you got what you needed. The knowledge is here, no doubt.
Almarg, who posted earlier, is a wealth of information - at least I think so. His expertise is way above my comprehension, but I can generally grasp the big picture. |
Wish there was a good simple answer to this increasingly depressing situation but I do not believe there is.
Teo May well have nailed it in his first few opening sentences.
There are so many online personas that are just a means of escape from the drudgery of real life for so many people nowadays.
in todays age I just am not sure it can be fixed even with a purge.
Just to prove it....... GK, at least I have a mother.......... |
Well said. I recently posted a request for help in choosing speakers that were considered strong in classical music, particularly string instruments. Many people were extremely helpful and pleasant, but some were downright viscous. Keeping things in perspective, we're talking about audio equipment. It's not really a topic that should elicit such visceral personal attacks. |
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thecarpathian
That was pretty awesome, well done!
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No offense taken, my apologies if I nipped at you for a well intentioned post.
I’ll dial back my inner crybaby a bit! |
Yes, a little civility goes a long way. Civility is not about dousing strongly held views. It’s about making sure that people are willing to respect other perspectives. No matter how stupid and wrong they are....:) |
Bsmg,
Thanks for the great example!
Well, if I have offended you in some way, I apologize. I have a rather irreverent sense of humor. |
Good post, Gary (UncleDemp). The response by Big_Greg, beginning with "unfortunately, it's the nature of internet platforms," is of course correct. But the degree to which that seems to be true here is especially disappointing, given that generally speaking those interested in high quality audio might be expected to be more mature and better educated than those participating in forums devoted to most other subjects.
Best regards,
-- Al
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Well, folks, in the future we will all be listening under water. The speed of sound in water (at 32 degrees F) is about 3,170mph. In air, it's only about 740mph. This means we will all hear things faster by a factor of more than 4. |
And my mother got a really good deal on those combat boots.
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What, its not dull enough already?
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I will read this when things get really dull maybe!! |
Bsmg,
Thanks for the great example!
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Your mother wears combat boots!
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This forum has become especially snarky with a lack of respect for members' thoughts and comments.
And then there are the trolls, the instigators, provocateurs.
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That should be "incidents" and participants "in". You're welcome |
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There is likely a high correlation between incident of mental health disorders and participants on any online community.
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Unfortunately, it's the nature of internet platforms. I belong to an in person audio club and we all have different gear, different approaches to getting the best sound, different tastes, etc., but other than some good natured ribbing everyone is respectful and considerate of each other. They are truly a super nice and helpful bunch of guys that I love spending time with.
It's so much easier to hide behind your keyboard in anonymity and drop whatever social filters you use in face to face communications. Try to act the same way here that you would in a face to face encounter. Also, just like "real life" you can choose not to associate with blowhards and know-it-alls. Ignore them and don't get sucked into their miserable world. They don't need to be censored, unless they're truly abusive or violating forum rules. |
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I'm elderly and suffer from who knows what and I love it. |
Thee would likely be more posting, more sane posting, more fun posting, more open posting, a better environment, etc..
..if...
...Those who are mean, had a ’cooler’ of a moderator come through and whittle the mean and demeaning types who cannot hold their tounge ---down to size.
I’ve seen forums do this. It takes time to recover afterward as it also took time for the forum to go bad.
Initially there is a dip in participation, as, prior..the meanness and the pettiness was integrated into the system so deeply that it made up the majority or a large part of the ebb and flow of the forum.
some forums never recover, they go dead, as the meanness and pettiness was the draw, or had become the draw.
The given forum had lost it’s soul, to become a caricature of a cage fight.
For audiogon, that’s not far from the truth. But it is happening at all forums, as we are not yet used to this written form of communication.
the world is a mess and the next shift/change has been artificially held back by the given mongers of power and control...... and the pressures are getting insane. This is reflected on the forums.
Here’s a post I wrote the other day, that dealt with this subject, to a large degree. It was a post following another... the prior being about how the difficult bits in audio seem to be the ultra expensive and ultra cheap.
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Yeah, this is especially true in the loudspeaker category. Money talks. A person with money can make an expensive speaker and then market it, and it will go well, at least at the beginning."The monkey in man", as they say, is what make it so.
Since it is all about satisfying the finicky bits inside the depths of humans..the lowest priced highest quality product has the tougher hill to climb.
The more expensive stuff will be looked up to and expected to sound good at the same time money does not equate to having a good ear. As a matter of fact, the more money the product is pitched to (sold into) the less likely the person buying..has the ear to evaluate the product. (these are generalizations, not rules, they are averages. One can always find an exception to the average, the reality is that the exception should not be misunderstood as the average or rule. Note that Geoff attempts to tell folks that all the time. If the outlier tries to make it's exception the rule, then he sets them straight on that, and delivers the punishment of a fully warranted smack down. Ie, don't bring your possessive projected emotions to a logic fight. If you do, it will cost you. Or cost everyone)
So the most expensive gear can end up being mediocre, and then the opposite is also true.
That those with the good ear can and generally don’t have all the money and then they pursue what they can with the money they have. But since the human ear is finicky and personally built and wired..the low priced excellent gear can have such a tough time..that it is ignored or treated the same as low priced gear with bad sound from bad parts.
Audio is a tough business. Drug running might be a better way to reach financial security, or maybe selling $8k toilet seats to the military. I’m almost thinking, not quite sarcastically..that if one can make it in audio, then they might be good enough to make it in any other field.
I mean, the market for Bugatti Veyrons is bigger than extreme audio. That the number of extreme audio makers very likely well exceeds the number of extreme automotive manufacturers. Yet the car market for such items likely exceeds the audio market (potential buyers) by a factor of 10 or more.
So, like the cars, sex sells, and the people can’t drive the cars (they bought the sex) and the people buying the audio (they bought the sex) can’t actually hear it all that well. One can use a stopwatch to calculate how fast a car is, a 5 year old can do it. In audio, it’s invisible and the measurement instruments to act as that stopwatch - are known to not correlate exactly to how the ear works. So the stopwatch is totally ineffective.
Which leaves the companies that ’try to do the right thing’ and not sell into the sexiness of it and just sell to the idea and expression of quality at the lowest price possible..it leaves them hanging ---with a small customer base, it they have any at all.
Then the other awful part. that the market has become one of opinionated old men, who fight to the death on forums to pronounce their view as the only reality possible (hanging on for dear life for some small comfort zone where the world is OK --in their projection of it), so the infighting and pettiness can and many times does overcome consensus and reason. It is made worse..by the data point that: reasonable people seldom post [no point!] - but the difficult people post far more often.
If people want audio to survive, then stop tearing it down on forums. a healthy market, will have lots of outliers, by definition. Ones that you nor I may never warm up to. To tear it down on forums, is to kill it off via bitterness and spite, as it will NEVER take the shape my ’inner old man hanging on’ will ever be comfortable with.
It’s so bad, I expect that someone will likely come along and even angrily post their disagreement of some or all that I say.
People don’t generally understand that this method of communication, it is about 5k or 10k years or more..behind..in the realm of human familiarity in communication methodology. Our human mind and body does not yet know how to work this internet communication thingy. It will take some time, if it even continues at all.
The future is likely similar to VR or VR via neural implants. This (what you read right now) is the low data flow intermediary stage of it all. The matrix is coming, and it is coming sooner than you think.
So yeah, to properly have a grasp on the thing takes far more musing than what I have laid out here. This is just one sliver of a take on the flow in a complex integrated multifaceted problem or equation.
Coming into the thread and saying ’kill all charlatans’ (if one felt possessed to do so), is not much in the way of a solution, and as close to a zero of an opinion as can be advertised to all...
Importantly, none of what I type here...I don’t think that any of it is written in stone and that all of it is subject to more analysis and shifting about. Forever. If my understandings are not shifting all the time, based on new data and then new thinking... then I’m dead in the water, IMO. Being sure in things and turning myself into a textbook repeat box is a excellent way to kill myself before I’m in my grave.
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Ha! Maybe so, but just online!
Or maybe this backbiting happens in the real world and I travel in different circles...,
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..sounds like you need a "protective space".
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It's all of us.
I'm trying to think about other palpable problems associated with aggressive demeaning comments.
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