Why Don't More People Love Audio?

WOW and for the same price as a gnu beemer ? Where do you shop and duh, what's a buell? (sounds Scandinavian, Viking sort of...)Forgive ye olde ignorance...

i shop at autogon, where else? ;~) the buell is my one concession to non-italian transportation (except for my craftsman garden-tractor, which i'd love to upgrade to a fiat/allis!). it's an american-made sport-bike w/a harley engine, but tuned to deliver 90hp/90ft-lbs torque at the rear wheel - not bad for a 450-lb machine... ;~)

regards, doug s.

Thanks Doug, you make me feel all nostalgic. The last time I sat on a bike was deep in the last century. It was a Brits Triumph, 200cc, I think. SIGH.

The question should be Why Do WE Love Audio? It's clear that everyone here has a passion for music, and takes no shortcuts when it comes to musical reproduction. If we allow others to see this passion, and we take the time to educate others, our hobby will grow. To the untrained ear a $200 system sounds as good as a $2000 system. When I first walked into a HiFi retailer, it was very intimidating. All the different components, high prices, and a salesman trying to explain DAC's, transports, and pre-amps, etc.. It took some effort on my part to do my homework and to go and listen to find my own definition of perfect sound. In todays fast paced world, few have the time. I am 22 years old, and a submariner in the navy. By displaying my love for high quality sound at work, I was able to raise an interest with several of my shipmates. We now have a seven speaker NHT home theater on our mess decks. Which now our whole crew enjoys. Since I work in a very stressful environment, nothing relieves that stress better than sitting in front of my system and truely enjoying a CD. I love Audio and am always up for talking about it and helping others learn more about it. Long live the AUDIOPHILE!!!

We share the "perfectionist" mindset and aren't ever going to be satisfied, that's why this is an equipment driven hobby. It also implies that we aren't afraid of equipment/technology, that we can hear and appreciate the differences in recordings, performances, and equipment and that finally, we place a high enough priority on the above to spend a fair amount of our income pursuing that perfection.

Add in the love for music and that makes us a very small subset of the population. In another thread I said that I'm a tortured soul (aka audiophile) because of the above items. But most people don't even think twice about them, that's what makes us different. Don't believe me? Just tell one of your civilian friends that you spend $1700 on an interconnect or $8,000 on an amp and watch their reaction . It's not that we have more money either, it's just that it's important enough for us to spend what money we have on the unobtainable pursuit of perfection (we chase the audiophile holy grail). Most people will always settle for mediocre, some will only be happy with a little extra, and still fewer will be "tortured souls," also known as audiophiles.

A splendid analysis, Wehamilton. How come you know me so well?!!

Limabean, my hat's off to you and your shipmates. Installing an audiophile system onboard a nuke is a 5.0 degree of difficulty- talk about tricky room acoustics! Hell, my hat's off to you guys everyday, anyway just for being there. At least now you have some good tunes to help with the tedium. I'm listening to Miles Davis right now and dedicating it to you and your shipmates. Hey, do you think the Russian submariners can hear your system too? They're probably happy to have some decent music for a change!

Detlof, from senior year in high school to senior year in college I had four completely different stereo systems even though I was a dirt poor student. That should have been a sign to my parents or someone, but it went undiagnosed (psychology wasn't as advanced back then). As a result I continue to suffer with no hope for a cure! Glad to know there are fellow travelers at least. Just think by the time we finally get our systems right our hearing will be shot. I sure hope the old folks home doesn't have a Bose system! Best regards to all.

Wehamilton, I was (self)diagnosed, but that did not help either. My system is more or less right now, but my ears are failing. So there you are...but I am still at it of course, thinking of tweaking hearing aids and how to find the sweat spot in my ears for them. Regards,

Wehamilton, thanks for the Miles Davis dedication. His "Kind of Blue" album is one of my favs!

For @ least the following reasons:
1. Very few people know how to listen to music.
2. Very few people will take the time to listen.
3. Very few people discuss music just as music.
4. There's little status in it.
5. Music has been, for the most part, reduced to furniture status and taken for granted.

Much of the above thread emphasizes a people are lazy-stupid-inbred-indifferent line of reasoning. While convenient to make, this argument is really a cop-out and probably misses the underlying causes for the growing lack of interest in high-end audio.

Consider that the number of consumers purchasing high-end gear has consistently declined, and by marked amounts, since the mid-90's. Are we to believe that there has been a dramatic acceleration in laziness, stupidity, indifference, and inbreeding in so short a span of time? If not, then something else must account for the rejection of the high-end by so many people. I can only give my experience and would not be so bold as to proffer that it is typical of everyone or even most.

My first brush with the high-end came in 1979 when I heard a reference rig consisting of KEF 105's, Crown reference amplification, and a Linn analog front end. The experience was magical, but the $8K-$10K price tag was well beyond my means at the time. I settled a few years later for Hafler amplification, an ADCOM pre, Maggies, and an early generation CD player.

Recently, I decided to completely replace the entire system and was delighted that I now had sufficient means to purchase a high-end setup. After extensive research and many trips to area audio salons, I am disappointed to say the least. First, the sound of the modern reference rigs is not fundamentally better than what I heard in 1979, period! But the price tag is now in the $100K+ range. Moreover, if anything has changed, it is not a marked improvement in the quality of the high-end, but rather the narrowing of the gap between the mid-fi/near-high-end and the "true high-end."

So you tell me, when I can buy a very respectable 2-channel rig for $6K or so, buy an Audi S8, spend two weeks cruising the Greek isles, and purchase $20K worth of art --- OR buy a $100K stereo system, which should I do? This is really a no-brainer.

Simply put, the high-end audio industry has failed miserably in innovating and developing new products that are substantially better in any significant sense. The value per dollar quotient has never looked poorer, and people are not so stupid that they are unaware of this.

Count me as another defector.

P.S. Would the last one out please remember to turn out the lights?

Although basically I would agree with you, that since the beginning of the eighties, the advances in the high end have mainly been prices and advertising skill, I would say that in dissolving such finer points as the various rythms inherent in the musical web and the widening of the dynamic scale, especially down in the ppp region have been considerable. Also the ability of creating a reasonable facsimile of the soundspace has improved . Especially the ability to better recreate the intricacies of the rythm element is an important factor to make a system seem more musical and closer to the truth. This ability has also begun to seep through to mid priced gear. So, though your point is partially valid, in defecting you are missing quite a bit in my opinion.
It will still take quite a time, if at all, until we turn out the light. I guess, you have gone to bed a bit too early. (-:, Regards,

I don't think the emphasis is so much on people being lazy or ignorant as it is on people not "caring" about better sound - it's (inexplicably to some of us) unimportant to them. This isn't the result of rapidly increasing laziness on the part of the population but, IMO, the combination of a rapidly increasing amount of stimuli in the world (which certainly has occurred over the past few decades) coupled with technological advancements that do put pretty good sound at such an affordable level that many don't think twice about ever spending more, and the stuff rarely breaks.

Trying to advance the sound quality of a system takes both time and money (basically synonymous for any adult), and there's only so much to go around and, as stated earlier, rapidly increasing amounts of things vying for both time and money. Depending on how one defines "high-end", it's somewhere between difficult and impossible to get most people to even fathom the concepts as important, much less act on them. Of all the people I know, there is only one who doesn't scratch their head if you talk about spending more than a few hundred bucks on any component. If somebody asked me for advice in purchasing a system, I'd be doing well to get them to appreciate what you can get for, say, $2K and, if they bought it, they'd probably think they'd blown their lifetime wad for equipment and, since it would never break, they'd never look to improve it. It would also sound markedly better than anything they'd ever owned before, better than anything they ever hear at a friends house, and there'll be a million other things banging at their door for their money and time.

I don't know how many people have to be "converted" to restore the high-end to "healthy", but I don't see it happening with what appears to currently be defined as high-end.

Kthomas, following on yr thread, audio is not (yet) a lifestyle option. HT sometimes is, and people get together to enjoy an evening before the screen. How many times do people invite others to an evening of music -- as an accepted, discussed and "conventionalised" past-time. By way of comparison, people purchase Ferraris; some owners cannot, or are not allowed to drive these autos to optimum speeds. But they still buy them. IMHO, that's a market. Audio is, at best, a cottage niche.
Unfortunately, this also means that gear is expensive (i.e., manufacturers' purchasing power???); can U imagine prices for large-scale production hi end gear manufactured by the likes of Siemens... No offence to Cos but, how can our "biggies" (say, Krell even Linn, a $~20 mil. company) compete with that: we have to pay for the R&D.
Regards

Home theatre better matches the "zeitgeist" of the times than high end audio. Previous posters have hit on a lot of the factors defining the current situation, let me put it a different way. For a number of years, going back at least to the mid-90's, society has been in a highly experiential phase. It has even been called the "Experience Economy" in business circles.

With this mindset, everything has to be "extreme" to even get noticed. Realtiy isn't good enough, it needs to be pumped up. From sports to movies to recreational activities it has to be more exagerated, more impactful and more staged than ever before just to get to leave an impression. You can't watch TV w/o loud intrusive sound effects inserted for no reason (You Are the Weakest Link or the NFL on Fox for example). Exagerated visual effects in movies have replaced plot lines and artistic cinematography. Even martial arts films (the original extreme genre) has had trouble being extreme enough. Now you have to fly as you beat the crap out of your opponent, or lacking flight capabilities, just add more blood. Best Picture, Gladiator & Titanic, you see where I'm going with this.

In the music world, you can't have a rock band with just four or five musicians anymore- now they need to be fronted by 8 choreographed dancers putting on a stage show that sometimes also claim to be the "singers." These muscial "acts" have replaced bands. In this environment, nobody even notices Jerry Springer anymore. You could call it the WWF'ing of America. Looked at cynically, you could say it's technology playing to the lowest common denominator across a wide range of activities. Another view might be we've been on a bit of a technology bender with lower prices bringing these gooodies into the realm of the average man.

In this period of exageration the home theatre "experience" with it's countless channels and audio processing and manipulation is giving people more of what they want. They don't want reality- the holy grail that has been fueling the audiophile quest for the last 40 years, they want to be dazzled with an enhanced, or pumped up version of reality. And they can be dazzled for a farily small amount of money (for those that aren't too discerning) or they can invest $50K in a home theatre for those that need to brag "mine is bigger than yours."

What is missing from all this is the appreciation ofthe art of music and the purity of it's reproduction that we audiophiles value. While critically listening to music is certainly experiential, it seems an almost quaint activity in a world that wants to be blown away by sensory overload.

No my friends, we are not living in a era that values or even understands subtlety or nuance of the type that makes art and it's reproduction an audiophile's passion. And until the pendulum starts swinging back the other way, don't be surprised if the totally awesome, extreme and radical audio video experience keeps the purist relegated to second class status.

Dude, did you hear that someone's comin' out with a 20 foot big screen with 10 channel make you puke and your ears bleed fully surround sound gut rumbling digisynthesizerprocessor? Awesome......

Wow Wehamilton, excellent! I wished, I would have been able to write that post. We are a bit behind here in continental Europe, but its coming fast and some high end stores are beginning to fold, others begin to diversify into HT. So your sociological analysis holds true also for us. We are not quite so far yet and analog\vinyl still thrives amongst the cognoscienti and in my generation, specialist stores, with above average vinyl setup service can still make a fairly good living. Unfortunatedly we are not so far as yet, where excellent high end stuff is thrown on the used market, because people want the raucus of HT. But it will come and be a feast for us, the old guard, like it was in those days, when digital started off in the market and people were getting rid of their LP's. Gosh what a feast that was!
So there are two sides to everything!

Wehamilton, your reference to people not wanting reality and Detlof's reference to Europe reminded me of a worrying issue IMHO: young people NOT even KNOWING what reality looks, sounds, or tastes like. In my six year-old daughter's class (in Europe) the kids were asked to draw the "little animal" they had for lunch (lunch was fish- sticks). Many drew fish-sticks with paws, some drew vegs, some a chicken... ofcourse some also drew a fish. Rest assured, this is just a piece of trivia, not the announcement of impending doom. But, as natural "reality" becomes more & more "bland", requiring more & more artificial enhancement, strange things can happen! Nevertheless, as Detlof intimates, there must be two sides to everything!

Wehamilton, interesting post and your analysis of our popular culture is spot-on. But to varying degrees, hasn't the popular culture of any era been mired in the banal? Is ours at the extreme in this regard, and if so, by what margin?

I can agree with the persepective that if tastes in our culture were more refined and discerning, then there would logically be a greater number of people interested in "audio as art." Remember, however, that the demand side is only part of the equation, and many would argue that it has a lesser influence than supply side effects. So in fairness, let's consider the supply side of this situation.

I have argued here, and in other threads, that the rate of significant innovation in high-end audio/music reproduction has been so glacially slow that relative to other consumer goods, high-end audio now offers extremely poor value for the consumer dollar. Relatively speaking, there has been significantly more innovation in the A/V, home-theater oriented segment of the market and this is where consumers have flocked with the dollars that they are willing to expend for this type of product. From a value-added perspective, their behavior is only "rational," whatever that means.

Understand that their choice doesn't reflect my values and I'm not arguing this from a HT enthusiast's point of view, I don't even have one and I too think that they're silly. But why is it so easy to demonize individual consumers, yet not look critically at the behavior of the firms that make up the high-end audio industry?

I suspect that there is more innovation in A/V gear because there is more demand thus more competition for the consumer dollar. Hi-End doesn't innovate because there isn't enough wide band interest. It seems many of the large hi-end firms have taken the marketing approach over real innovation. My take is audiophiles are as prone to marketing hoopla as the rest of the populace, I don't see much difference other than our interest is music and the A/V crowd is racous, bonerattling sensory meltdown. Remember that Opera was originally played to the masses 400 years ago. Times change, tastes change and the fringes left behind are always lamenting for the good ole days. Problem today is things are changing soooo fast that it is hard to imagine what the fallout will be. That is the scary part to me. Life in the chaos lane.

Isn't the basic question how the Hi-end defines itself, at least with respect to how wide a band of interest they can shoot for? There seems to be a pretty constant pressure from "the high-end" to define big chunks of stuff out of the picture - popular music, CDs, digital in general, interest in HT - all these things are kept at a distance, at least from high-end and/or audiophiles in the strictest sense which, by definition then, precludes the possibility that there will be a wide band interest.

The supply and demand question regarding A/V gear innovation is probably answered by "both" - people want it because it was created and marketed very effectively. But even here, the audio high-end goes to great lengths to distance themselves from this development. Why is the pursuit of movie replay at a high level of excellence any less worthwhile than the same pursuit of music replay? Sure, there's lots of garbage movies made every year, just like there's lots of garbage music made every year. But good and great movies (of which there are many) are greatly enhanced by playback on a good system, and the better the system, the better the experience, to the point that you can definitely create a better experience at home than you can get at all but the most modern cinemas. Certainly, what you can get for HT has advanced several magnitudes more in the past 15 years than home audio in the same time frame.

If what we mean when we wonder why more people don't love audio is why aren't more people spending money on dedicated equipment for audio reproduction and dedicated listening, I think we're limiting the question the same way the high-end limits how wide its own reach is.

There's no question the electronics industry is always looking for the next big thing. And when they find it, all the manufacturers seem to move in lock-step to saturate the segment with product as they push their mature product lines to the back burner. And we all know that high end audio equipment has reached the flat part of the curve where the law of diminishing returns starts to limit the size of the next incremental improvement. Still, having said that, the fact remains that audio today delivers a level of performance we only dreamed about 20 years ago. So if all else were equal, it should be enjoying an upsurge of interest due to the high level of performance and value that it now offers. Afterall, greater numbers of us listened to inferior equipment 20 years ago; yet interest in high end declines when in fact, the opposite should be true.

So getting back to the spirit of the original question, what has changed? Well the short answer is "we have." Getting back to my previous post, new products only take-off when there is a convergence of new technology with a receptive public. That receptivity is most dramatic when a product taps into the prevailing mindset of consumers. We all know of the stories of good technologies that failed to find a market because they were out of synch with the mood of market in one way or another. So while the manufacturers can offer a supply side push with an array of new products, they end up pushing on a rope if it isn't striking a resonating chord with the customer.

In the 60's, Marshall McCluhan wrote "The medium is the message." I would update that in 2001 by saying "the technology is the message." Getting back to my post of yesterday, the receptive chord that has been struck with today's consumer is the technology of home theatre delivering the desired heightened experience. The experience becomes more important than the programing, and as a result, the technology (or equipment) becomes the "message."

A previous poster raised the valid point that pop culture has always been banal, and the mass market will always be bigger, which is true. I was reminded of this watching Ken Burn's Jazz that Ella Fitzgerald's first big hit was "A Tisket A Tasket"- not much better than the Spice Girls when you get right down to it. But I think one thing that is different now in various aspects of society is the switch in influence from a "top down" to "bottom up" paradigm.

This really started in the 60's. Prior to that trends in fashion or most anything else filtered down from the top- rich people, jet setters etc. But since the 60's the dominante influences in society have been "bottom up." Now you could say, "Well wasn't jazz the classic bottom up influence?" And I would say absolutely it was, but they were all wearing suits and ties while they were playing it- just like the upperclass people they were playing for. When the Beatles quit wearing their short jacketed suits in 1964 that was about the last vestige of any pop culture personalities still influenced by the top down paradigm. And not insignificantly, they then proceeded to blow it into oblivion.

So what's the point of all this? In the bottom-up paradigm we now live in, the influence of the banal pop culture is greater than ever before. When combined with greater disposable income than every before it is little wonder that the taste of the common man now dominates the Board Room when product decisions are being made. So it's not our imagination that there has been a lowering of the bar in a lot of areas, music and audio being on top of the list of casualties. The "mass market" no longer aspires to the same things as the high end market in many areas, and audio is the classic example.

Uh-oh, I see a chicken versus the egg argument starting. Nonetheless, I don't think that demand for HT caused the innovation in that segment of the market, but the other way around. People saw and heard the new boom and sizzle setups and said "eh-eh, eh-eh, eh-eh, that rocks!" (Sorry for the gratuitous Beavis and Butthead reference).

I remember reading an interview with Bob Stemple, then CEO of General Motors, in the late 1980's. He said problem was stupid Japanese consumers wouldn't buy GM vehicles because the steering wheel was on the wrong side, and poor GM couldn't put them in the right place because of the low volume. Apparently the braintrust at GM didn't/still doesn't understand the difference between cause and effect. The problem is that GM made cars that didn't meet Japanese consumers' needs (steering wheel in correct place), thus they would never/never will achieve any volume in Japan. What a vicious cycle.

But isn't this what we face in the high-end? Can't innovate because there isn't enough demand/market is too narrow. Or is demand low (and falling) precisely because the manufacturers don't innovate? And if they did, wouldn't people say "eh-eh, eh-eh, eh-eh, that sounds cool ... gotta have one"?

There's no question the electronics industry is always looking for the next big thing. And when they find it, all the manufacturers seem to move in lock-step to saturate the segment with product as they push their mature product lines to the back burner. And we all know that high end audio equipment has reached the flat part of the curve where the law of diminishing returns starts to limit the size of the next incremental improvement. Still, having said that, the fact remains that audio today delivers a level of performance we only dreamed about 20 years ago. So if all else were equal, it should be enjoying an upsurge of interest due to the high level of performance and value that it now offers. Afterall, greater numbers of us listened to inferior equipment 20 years ago; yet interest in high end declines when in fact, the opposite should be true.

So getting back to the spirit of the original question, what has changed? Well the short answer is "we have." Getting back to my previous post, new products only take-off when there is a convergence of new technology with a receptive public. That receptivity is most dramatic when a product taps into the prevailing mindset of consumers. We all know of the stories of good technologies that failed to find a market because they were out of synch with the mood of market in one way or another. So while the manufacturers can offer a supply side push with an array of new products, they end up pushing on a rope if it isn't striking a resonating chord with the customer.

In the 60's, Marshall McCluhan wrote "The medium is the message." I would update that in 2001 by saying "the technology is the message." Getting back to my post of yesterday, the receptive chord that has been struck with today's consumer is the technology of home theatre delivering the desired heightened experience. The experience becomes more important than the programing, and as a result, the technology (or equipment) becomes the "message."

A previous poster raised the valid point that pop culture has always been banal, and the mass market will always be bigger, which is true. I was reminded of this watching Ken Burn's Jazz that Ella Fitzgerald's first big hit was "A Tisket A Tasket"- not much better than the Spice Girls when you get right down to it. But I think one thing that is different now in various aspects of society is the switch in influence from a "top down" to "bottom up" paradigm.

This really started in the 60's. Prior to that trends in fashion or most anything else filtered down from the top- rich people, jet setters etc. But since the 60's the dominante influences in society have been "bottom up." Now you could say, "Well wasn't jazz the classic bottom up influence?" And I would say absolutely it was, but they were all wearing suits and ties while they were playing it- just like the upperclass people they were playing for. When the Beatles quit wearing their short jacketed suits in 1964 that was about the last vestige of any pop culture personalities still influenced by the top down paradigm. And not insignificantly, they then proceeded to blow it into oblivion.

So what's the point of all this? In the bottom-up paradigm we now live in, the influence of the banal pop culture is greater than ever before. When combined with greater disposable income than every before it is little wonder that the taste of the common man now dominates the Board Room when product decisions are being made. So it's not our imagination that there has been a lowering of the bar in a lot of areas, music and audio being on top of the list of casualties. The "mass market" no longer aspires to the same things as the high end market in many areas, and audio is the classic example.

Docwarnock, I agree - HT as a phenomena exists because of the classic marketing of creating a solution to a problem that didn't necessarily exist. Show people something cool, and sell them on how there life would be better if they owned one, and they'll want one / buy one. It's all been done very successfully.

To give you my answer to your question in your final paragraph, I think the lack of innovation in the high-end is based on a failure by the high-end in general to recreate (redefine) itself. Read any book on successful companies in today's economy, and they'll stress the need to be constantly recreating yourself, constantly making obsolete old concepts / products and creating the new. Recognize the next "wave", that time when things have undoubtedly and irrevocably changed and that you need to change or die (or, in this case, become extremely niche). The changes are there, and have been occurring for at least a decade, in how home electronics are used for entertainment, how music and movies are "consumed", but the high-end still has many of the same mantras and, in general, rejects most of the new.

Mind you, I have no problem with the high-end staying true to the course - I just am not surprised that fewer people are signing on, and that high-end manufacturers are experiencing lack of growth or worse. I think you're exactly right - innovate in a way that gets people to say "Whoa!!!! Cool!" and they'd decide they had to have one. Better yet, put it on display where a large number of people might actually see it / hear it, and you might really attract people (Out of every 100 people I know, I'd venture that fewer than five have even been in a high-end audio store). In other words, put quality audio sound in products that more people might experience and desire, and there's a great likelihood that people would come to appreciate it more.

Those of us interested in high-end do say "Whoa!!!! Cool!" on a regular basis. However, for the most part, the things that make us say this are not appreciated by the common audio consumer, e.g. soundstaging, accuracy, "you are there" reproduction.

Should we once again pander to the least common denominator? The average joe is almost always impressed by Bose's sizzle and boom. Should that be the sound for which struggling high-end manufacturers ought to be reaching? Many of us already have better sound quality than 99% of people have heard and yet the biggest question I get from non-knowing visitors is "How loud does it go?" If the HE manufacturers innovate to give even more realistic sound, will anyone other than us care?

Kthomas, you must live in an enlightened community because I would venture the number to be about 1 in 1000 that have been in a HE store.

I was going to say 1 in a 1000 but thought it might sound overly emphatic, despite the fact that it seems about right. It's probably slightly higher than that if you include the people I've drug in to one.

I'm not suggesting a need to pander, and certainly not suggesting a desire to court the LCD. What I'm suggesting is that to get more people to love quality audio reproduction is going to take a different approach than that which is currently offered by those who love it the most. I think a vast number of people, plopped down in front of an excellent system, can hear and, at least intellectually, appreciate the quality of the sound reproduction. But the time and $$ required to acquire it for themselves, and the education that leads to a set of reasoning that would justify such a purchase in their mind are all obstacles. Just take time for instance - very few people have the patience to sit and listen to even a couple of songs if that's all they're doing. I'm speaking from the experience of showing off my system to friends - no later than 1/2 way through the second song, they're talking, standing up, moving around.

So, if the question of "Why don't more people love audio" is meant to mean, "Why don't more people want good-quality, audio reproduction to pursue as a goal in and of itself, along with listening as a pursuit of it's own", then I think the answers about short attention span, changing culture, etc. work pretty well. But if the question is actually intended to say, "Why are people satisfied with Bose when they could have so much better for the same price or just a reasonable amount more," then I think it's because the obstacles of places to experience it and educate oneself, the lack of high-end innovation to accomodate this market segments "needs" (ie, not having the right products), and the distance the current high-end holds itself from this potential market are the reasons.

I have to disagree on your last statement. Almost nobody that listens to my system has ANY clue as to how much time and money it took to get it to sound as good as it does (IMHO). Although they almost all ask how much it costs, very few ask me where they could buy a similar system even if I don't tell them how much it costs. Mark Levinson's new gig (Red Rose) offers all in one packaged solutions. I doubt he will sell significantly more than other HE dealers selling the stuff under his name.

I do agree however with your and others assertions that the current cultural bias against listening as an end is what holds HE back.

kthomas sez:

"HT as a phenomena exists because of the classic marketing of creating a solution to a problem that didn't necessarily exist. Show people something cool, and sell them on how there life would be better if they owned one, and they'll want one / buy one. It's all been done very successfully.">>>
+++++++++++++
i must humbly beg to disagree. 12 years ago, when i lived yust south of hartford, ct, i couldn't figure out why, w/the exception of new haven, ct was such a dead place socially - especially hartford. then, one friday evening, around dinner-time, a neighbor asked me to drop off a video at a store near where i was going grocery shopping. well, i'm not into video now, certainly wasn't then. this was my 1st time in a place like this. ya couldn't get *near* the place - it was *packed*! in a nutshell, i figured it out. america loves movies, america loves to watch 'em at home even more than at the theatre. the marketing here is a no-brainer - get the sound in the home as good - or better - than that at the movies. most folks *will* go over to someone else's house to sit in front of a h-t set-up & watch a movie. not so w/audio. most folks couldn't give a rat's ass about listening to music, unless it's background, or they're alreddy occupied in some other manner - which is why car-stereo is so popular - yure stuck in the car, may as well pass the time listening to toons (instead of paying attention to driving?). i *rarely* listen to anything when driving, other than the engine. my daily-driver (90 mile commute) doesn't even have a radio in it. but, i'm in the minority - i like to sit in front of the stereo & listen to toons, i like to drive when i'm in the car, & i don't like to watch movies, at home or in the theatre.

as far as the hi-end goes, i don't really believe there were more folks interested in it 30 years ago as there are today - it's a lunatic-fringe kinda ting, always has been, always will be.

yust my opinion, of course! ;~) doug s.

Meta, the reason that people don't ask where they can get one is because they are being polite. After you tell them how much you paid, most of them are thinking that you are absolutely bonkers.

Also, Levinson is one of the few who is at least taking a stab at "thinking outside the box." In addition to Red Rose, Lexus now has Levinson audio systems in them. I haven't heard one, but maybe he'll be able to cross-sell home gear to Lexus owners; it will at least elevate awareness of the brand name. Like you, I'm not certain which way it will go, but at least they are trying something different.

As has been noted by many before, this is in marked contrast to the high-end establishment that superstitiously demonizes and avoids anything new or different (digital, HT, etc.).

People used to being hyper-stimulated don't like to sit in front of a stereo and just listen to music. I've had the same experience others have described- friends come over and listen to two songs on my system and say "Wow, I've never heard music like that" as they get up and walk away! I've never had anybody pulled into the experience and want to play more music.

Sedond is right, people "want to watch" because it (HT) adds another sense (to be stimulated) to the mix. This is what I meant further up the board when I said in today's social environment, listening to music (and nothing else) seems almost quaint. We've seen it even in pro sports. The drama of the competition alone isn't enough anymore, look at the Olympic coverage. Baseball and even football has to be boosted with all sorts of other bells and whistles- fireworks, Diamond Vision, cheerleaders/dancers, prizes/contests. And while the XFL may not make it, I can assure you the "model" will be copied and perfected. The execution was the problem, not the premise.

Frankly, in this environment, I'm surprised high end has as many product choices available as it does. But the original question was why is HE relegated to cottage industry status? My answer would be that it is dominated by individuals that are passionate about their business. This small group of talented people are the antithesis of the large corporation. They are making decisions because it's the right thing to do, or to pursue a personal objective etc., cost be damned.

These companies go out of business frequently as a result too. But if they are successful, inevitably the passion of the founder can never be matched or shared as a company grows. So if it prospers, it will eventually get to the size where the inevitable buisness trade-offs start shaping the decions ("Wouldn't we make more profit if we came out with a mid-fi line and doubled our sales potential?" or "Shoudln't we aim closer to the middle of the segment?". I've personally sat in hundreds of these meetings. The bigger the company, the more generic the products become because you can't be a big niche company. The product development costs are prohibitive. So big companies must always aim for a broad market segment. Smart ones still find a way to differentiate their products, but they will never be thrive living off just HE profits.

So high end will always remain a cottage industry and banruptcy and mergers will be common; not only because of the small market, but because of the nature of the people and the type of company required to create it.

There is one notable exception to the rule that audio gear is not status-related enough to attract the interest of non-audiophiles. B&O. Some people absolutely covet the stuff and I am sure none of them have ever heard a truly good Hi-Fi system. Or is it that most B&O showrooms don't have proper listening room to expose its flaws? A wise choice on B&O's part - because the stuff sounds incredibly mediocre for the price.

I agree that MOST music out there is pure pap with no worthwile musical content - but, anyone eager for creative inspired music can find it in abundance, and in many genres-you just have to look for it. If you can get CBC FM radio from Canada you will find an unlimited resource of well selected music with no prejudice - except that commercial music is ALL filtered out. check out cbc.ca and all of its radioshow playlists with ratings and recommendations that will keep you busy for a long, long time.

I think that most people are not experienced listeners.Whatever system they have is good enough for them.The high quality listening experience forces one to do two things,sit still for a time and appreciate what you are hearing, and spending more money than you may want to.
For me,high end listening is another way to "smell the roses".
johnny7

I feel that there are a lot of people who can afford excellent audio systems and would be very interested in them if they knew that they existed. The people in this country on the whole have little if any exposure to great audio compared with other countries that I have existed. In some parts of the world a great system is as much a status symbol as an exotic car is here(this is in response to the threads asking why people by Ferraris but not exotic audio....because they know that Ferraris exist!). I am sure that if there was a larger exposure true high-end audio be it an the form of $2K systems or $200K systems and a quick explanation of such things as staging and imaging, more people would buy into the hobby. I have had plenty of friends come over and listen to my reference rig that had not heard a real system before, most of them leave thinking that I am not the crazy person that they thought I was and as for tips on putting together a reasonable system. This hobby isn't just for us rapid electronic nuts but anyone that can enjoy music and appriciate better playback quality.

hi audio-unlimited. ah, if only what ewe are saying were true! ;~) reality is that the usa is *not* other parts of the world. to take yer automotive reference - in the usa nascar is king, not formula one. even tho folks know what a ferrari is, most americans will be more impressed w/a '57 chebbie.

i too, have many friends who have heard my rig. and, for the most part, very few are even remotely interested in investing in even a modestly-priced rig - cuz they don't need anything more than a cheap rack system for background music. most folks yust aren't into listening to music for its own sake. and these folks are *far* from yer typical stereotyped bud-drinkin' nascar-lovin' fan. ;~) i know three people who are now interested in decent audio equipment since being exposed to my rig - that's it. and only two of 'em have done anyting about it. actually, it's only one of 'em that's done anyting about it - the second has yust benefitted from the leftovers of the 1st, cuz the 1st went so overboard! :>)

regards, doug s.

Because too many audiophiles listen to their equipment not their music. We turn people off by the way they see us listen to things. I've seen people with huge dollar systems listen to "music" they don't like because it sounds good. Where is the love of music in that???

They do; they just can't afford it.

There is the category of a rich guys that come to audio dealer and build the home theater in overall price of $35000 or more never knowing anything about high-end audio -- just simply by believing that it's good and modern...

Clearly there must be many in this category - during a recent visit to the one local audio shop worth visiting, they told me they had pre-sold about 10 of the upcoming Krell DVD players at $9K retail. They reiterated several times that they can't the new HTS2 fast enough to meet demand. They told me they were negotiating to sell their floor model Dynaudio Evidence's ($85K/pair) to a guy who is in the process of building a new listening room that measures 45x70 feet! Then he pointed out that this same guy was lending, since the room isn't ready yet, his Krell KPS-25sc and his $25K/pair speaker cables to the shop. He went on to say that the guy was thinking about doing HT by adding another pair of Evidences. Somewhere in that sequence I'm thinking, "this has nothing to do with loving music and everything to do with status"

My overriding impression of going into almost every high-end shop in my area is that it's this category that keeps them going, and several of them are doing VERY well. Anecdotally, it seems that the shops that are small and built a business by growing an evolving client base are getting hammered by the internet, etc., but that the places that move a lot of boxes to people who want something good and modern without the hassle of learning about high-end audio (or video for that matter) are doing very well. -Kirk

I think the ultra high end does market itself pretty well and attracts buyers into the yuppie market place. Fortunately, like us music lovers / audiophiles, even yuppies can hear the bad sound made by many of the exclusive products. Even if they can't hear it when they are told that cables and interconnect should cost about as much as a component the run for the door. People with lots of money aren't freekin stupid - the exclusive high end for stupid wannabees.

Because they just don't realize just how good it is!!! Lack of exposer.

Because you don't need anything better than a ghetto blaster for the crap which is playin out there. MP 3 is a good example. Listen to an MP3 file over a high end system and you know what I mean.
Good music - as an art - is elite stuff....so is high end gear.
Aida_w

I'm a recent convert to the high end. I think my conversion began the day I listened to and purchased a pair of Sennheiser HD600 headphones. For a few hundred dollars I owned audio gear that could be considered among the best in its class and far outperformed the speaker systems I'd heard in BestBuy and the like.

That purchase led me to websites like this one, where I learned about the many choices, cliques and nuances of audio gear. Granted, I am playing on a smaller scale, but I've just ordered my first SS headphone amp, and am looking into interconnects and powercables. In the future I'd like to experiment with an OTL headphone amp, and in my research I've become more interested in tubes.

Recently, I've seen Sennheiser advertisements in men's magazines. Perhaps readers will become interested and follow a path similar to the one I've found.

We're guilty of projection. Most of us are into gear as a means to the end of hearing moving, exhilirating music, on demand, in our homes (I actually believe this). We also tend to think that others want, or would want, the same experience. But they don't. Like one of the earlier posts, my wife knows good sound because we have it in our home, but she almost never goes to the big rig in the dedicated room. I have had many friends sit in my dedicated room and I have played music chosen by them on my $20k+ system. They say "WOW," sometimes genuinely amazed at the realism, power, intimacy, and immediacy of a good system, but none of them has changed their priorities to invest even a quarter of that amount in their own systems, even though they could. Music over my stereo is an ecstatic experience that gives me goose bumps and brings an occasional tear to my eye. I would never give it up! My conclusion about others, though, regretably, is that very few of them have ever been moved by music the way most audiophiles are on a regular basis, no matter how good the system. That's the main reason most people don't pursue hi-end audio, even inexpensive hi-end, which can be quite good; they just don't care that much about music. This is not elitist, it's just the way it is. The quality of their systems reflects the priority of music in their lives. High equipment prices and snobby dealers sure don't help, but they're not the main limiter of the appeal of hi-end audio. When I reluctantly came to this conclusion it saddened me, but now I don't worry about it, and instead focus on my own experience of music.

Because most people don't have the time to listen. From those who have, a bunch just don't get it (do you have to play it so loud? I have neighbours walk up to my door in broad daylight cmplaining, one telling my wife to turn down the system, they like Céline Dion on a ghetto blaster by the pool... the other telling me to lower the volume, he firmly belives, bless his religious heart, that the blues is the "Devil's music"... maybe I should move). This leaves another bunch who have the time but not the money (I think there's a song in there somewhere...)and then you get to those who really believe, like I do, that the whole thing really is an ends vs. means mixup. Focus on the music, get your system to a certain level of accuracy, competence then forget it and concentrate on buying recordings, reading about music, reading about recorded music and above all else listening to music, preferably live.

I have a couple of friends who make absolute nuisances of themselves hinting and hemming and hawing for invitations to come over and listen to my good system. They wanna bring stacks of their own CDs (and wow does one of them have terrible taste) and sit for hours in rapt attention to Sousa marches and tribal music from Outer Barudisplatt.

Now, both these guys have beaucoup bucks--helluva lot more than I do--yet they won't spend a dime on their own systems. One has little more than a Technics boombox while the other has some ancient electronics and a pair of Advent "bookshelf" speakers with the grill cloth literally rotting away from the frames.

Both these guys have healthy personalities and reasonably good ears. Neither is cheap. I think they are just daunted by snotty salesmen, incomprehensible jargon, and the challenge of struggling for that synergy we all keep talking about.

I think it would help a lot if we would try harder to introduce people to our hobby in ways that seem to them realistic. Help them to start with some just-above-entry-level gear and grow into the hobby, as most of us did.

Telling a newbie to budget as much for cables and ICs as for components is an utterly absurd thing to do. We wouldn't have believed it at that point in our own lives and many of our most golden-eared colleagues don't believe it now. Condescendingly referring to $3K speakers or $2K amplifiers as "mid-fi" doesn't help matters, either. One afile friend of mine told an enthusiastic newbie that if he didn't have ten grand to spend right off the bat he should just forget it and stick to his boombox.

That, brethren and sistren, is a big chunk of (1) why high end remains a niche market and (2) why people think we're nuts.

Have fun anyway.

Will

My personal feeling is.....there are not to many people loves audio( high end) because they were not expose to it.We kind of keep the good stuff within our community. If we look at the ads, it is only going in our own small world. Nobody did try to go out there and expose it and worst than that common people felt that going to a high end audio store is worst than going to a car dealer. We as audiophile needs to spread these hobby. Let us go out there and explain to our freinds that having a good equipments will really make the difference.
I know a guy that recently bought a lexus... He asked me if a Mark Levinson car stereo is better than the ones you can buy from the regular electronics store.I said to him. Go listen to it with me and I will let you know. Thanks.

Because the more revealing the hardware the less enjoyable the software. Since I have become involved in this hobby, 90% of my CD's are unlistenable. So now I sit in the dark and listen to Tubular Bells. !@#$%

Joekras, got to love'ya. Short, to the point. The undoing of this hobby lies in its very goal! As someone once put it, audiophiles upgrade their hardware until they can prove that all software is excrement. At least you have Tubular Bells. Maybe another thread could be started, something like: "How many recordings do you have that still remain enjoyable after your last upgrade". Whoever can honestly answer 0, should win the "Great Golden Ear Award" and retire to Arizona. Why so few people becoming audiophiles? Most people have lives to live and don't really enjoy obssessing over trivialities.

Will,
You hit the nail on the head. Audiophiles should do less overt projection of their sound systems and more subdued nuturing and education. My experience is to let my system do all the work. When my non-audiophile friends and family come over, I ask them to bring any new music they have purchased so I can experience their musical taste. This also broadens my musical exposure since I seldom listen to the radio. I'm a Jazz & Blues type of guy.

I don't talk about the cost or the time it took to get my system to its current state. What I do is ask them what exactly it is they like about the sound and then find out if they are interested in changing what they have. I ask their forcasted budget and then look for a good initial start-up system to match their current musical interest. A system that I could enjoy listening to when I visited them. Over the past 20+ years I have converted a couple of dozen Bose-slanted people to much better system (my % is about 80%).

Some of those people have gone on to the perverbial quest for "that perfect sound" and the others have been content with what I helped them purhase initially. One of my Uncles still has the Ohm F/Phase Linear 400/Conrad Johnson Pre/Denon TT & MMC we picked up many years ago and when I visit him it still sounds fantastic.

What I have learned to do is softly persuade those people who have asked for assistence towards the highend gear. Oh by the way, one of my nephews has surpassed me in the system he currently has. Oh to be young, single and wealthy.