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You tube hifi influencers. Love them or hate them?

Not sure if I posted this in the right place but here goes. I've been an audiophile for over 50 years. Way back in the day, brick and mortar stores allowed for extensive auditioning and experienced reviewers  from the few established audio magazines gave fairly honest reviews of equipment. Now there is an army of tube influencers and online reviewers with varying degrees of experience/bias praising  their flavour of the month components that dominate the scene. What's a new audiophile to do? I trust the opinions of members of various forums more so than any of these influencers except for perhaps "The Audiophiliac", Guttenberg. How do you feel?

128x128alvinnir2
classicrockfan
165 posts
 

This forum is full of oily trolls aka influencers. .

...using multiple user names single person can play multiple roles in the same thread

hilde45's avatar
hilde45
4,974 posts
 

@chenry

I think it pays to have an open mind about "influencers." In this hobby, the numbers of brands, the flood of new products, the relatively fewer shops that carry any audio gear pretty much require a willingness to explore the web for information.

This is exactly right. And can people honestly tell me that their experiences with brick/mortar stores were not a mix of pressure/BS and honest assistance? Every store I ever visited has had an intense motive to sell the gear they chose and to discount or have no opinions about other gear. Of course they need to stay in business -- and that’s totally part of the game. But often they are not good people to look to for objectivity. YouTube and magazine have some advantages, there.

@cleeds

Most of the Youtubers seem to rely on drama, manufactured conflict and artificial "excitement" to create clicks. They’re easy to ignore.

Not my experience. In my opinion, this is a misuse of the word "most." There are quite a few which do not rely on drama:

  • Currawong
  • Passion for Sound
  • Tarun a British Audiophile
  • Hans Beekhuyzen
  • Darko
  • Ken Micallef
  • Joshua Valour
  • Pearl Acoustics
  • Zero Fidelity
rlj
60 posts
 

I listen to multiple reviews and put more weight on the reviewer who seems more reliable.    Consider this review of the Borrenson x3 speaker.   The absolute Sound reviewer says you have to “crank it up” to get the speaker to sound its best.

 

 

Whereas The Audiophiliac says just the opposite.  

 

mesonto
89 posts
 

The only one I remotely trust is Tarun, A British Audiophile. All the others I take with a grain of salt.

larsman's avatar
larsman
1,931 posts
 

I don't hate or love any of them. If they're talking about something of interest to me, I'll generally watch, and if not, I generally don't. Same with vinyl community or any other channels.

And I don't 'trust' any of them more or less than I would somebody commenting on a forum; it's not like people on forums never have agendas. 

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