Ready, set, comment! Speaker cables don’t make a difference?

audition:
No assumption made--except ARC clearly considers cabling important. No lamp cord there.

The ARC observation prompted me to share a True story:

I once knew a guy locally who was a big cable hater. He was a custom installer, home theater stuff, and mostly Sonos. He would always say cables are useless, every single time he got the chance, very loudly. He still does the same, in all Facebook groups he is part of, and in local gatherings, to get business ala Audioholics style.

One day I bought something from him, and went to his house to pick it up (he did not have a retail store). I noticed some very thick, awesome looking speaker cables he had his floor standing speakers connected with. So I asked him something like “what’s up with these?”. He said... Oh... a customer gave them to him for free, and he was only using them because they looked good. Then he went on to “explain” why speaker cables don’t matter, blah, blah, blah. 😂😂🙄🙄

I’d just thought I’d share.

While a tired subject and well past ODing on analysis paralysis, what's important here extends beyond the subject matter itself and more about the abundance of irresponsible misinformation

We've got various paper tigers and YouTube alleged industry experts, that are somewhere between an audiophile and journalist, spewing their spin and shaping opinions and purchases of the uninformed with their misinformation

It's difficult to tell how much is an intentional attempt to mislead the general public and how much is something they just don't know

In all cases, we just don't know, what we don't - myself included

When you don't know, I'm quick to offer up the get out of jail free card but when you're intentionally being misleading it's import for those of us that do know the difference to call BS

In Gene's case, my guess is he knows the difference and is thus intentionally misleading the uninformed with irresponsible misinformation

And this where I want to call BS on Gene's, self proclaimed 'once and for all debunking the myth with armed to the teeth measurements'

What a crock of poo

I will provide my .02 cents in a follow up post, but I'm certain it will only be review for all of you that know the difference and thus will not waste anymore of your valuable time further extending this post

@stevewharton

what’s important here extends beyond the subject matter itself and more about the abundance of irresponsible misinformation....

We’ve got various paper tigers and YouTube alleged industry experts, that are somewhere between an audiophile and journalist, spewing their spin and shaping opinions and purchases of the uninformed with their misinformation

Thank you, thank you, thank you for seeing the point of my OP. However I feel about Gene or others on the internet spreading misinformation (intentionally or whatever), I feel some kinship with the novice hobbyist enthusiastic about the same hobby I’m into -- but has stumbled into a weird site like Gene’s. (And I’ve seen really good posts and videos there, so it really IS hard to sort wheat from chaff.) It doesn’t matter to me that they are over at Gene’s site -- if they’re being misinformed, it would be cool if somehow someone threw them a fact or two so they could see there is more to it. In the end, this is not about cable-haters vs. cable-converts; this is about adding signal to the noise and supporting the hobby (and other people) in an educative way.

I'll have some fun here and throw in my experience and opinion.  20 years ago I was living and working in Germany.  I left my stereo system behind in South Carolina.  It wasn't long before I was roaming the streets of Stuttgart looking for an audio fix.  I found a pair of demo B&W P6 floor standing speakers cheap in a shop there and put them in my flat paired with a modest receiver.  They sounded ok and that is what I had for a few years for music.  Got back to the US of A and my stereo.  It was AWESOME to hear my stereo system again.  The B&Ws took on HT duty.  One rainy day I wondered how the B&Ws, a modest speaker to be sure, would sound hooked up to my stereo.  They were ok sounding for the most part.  So I tried it.  I was surprised at the result.  The speakers sounded still just ok but now I realized they lacked detail and resolution.  No layered soundstage- it was just a superficial sound as the best way to describe it.  I learned something that day how much each component in my stereo system is a link in a chain.  The overall system performance will be only as good as the weakest link.  Each cable, source, preamp, amp, power cord, room, and shelf is a link in that chain.  Some would include the power receptacle and in-wall wiring as well.  While not always practical or easy to accomplish, the most efficient use of funds would be to insure every link in the stereo chain is equivalent.  In reality, we tend to see saw our way up the chain- so to speak.  It was obvious that expensive cables would be wasted on these modest speakers or even a hi end preamp/amp and source for that matter.  How can there be an audible difference if the speakers are not able to articulate it?  
I firmly believe that you get what you pay for in Audio.  Sure, one must always be on guard for the snake oil but we Audio hobbyists have been a tight knit community for decades and do a pretty fantastic job at sorting out the gold nuggets from the clunkers.