Why are audiophiles perceived as being wackos?


I have been pursuing this wonderful hobby of high end stereo equipment and music for almost 30 years. I do consider myself a passionate audiophile who loves to listen to music on a daily basis. The reason for this post is because it has been my experience that the great majority of people who do not pursue this hobby think of audiophiles as being wackos/screwballs because of the amount of time, money, and passion they put towards their systems. I find it very interesting that individuals who spend tremendous amounts of money and time pursuing esoteric tastes such as wines, watches, coins, etc, are considered connoisseurs or aficionados with a serious passion that is often respected even if it is not the other person's cup of tea. Another example would be people who love high end cars/boats who read all the magazines, go to the shows and invest large sums of money to purchase and tweak their cars or boats to get the last bit of ultimate performance out of their prized possessions. So I don't believe the negative viewpoint towards passionate audiophiles revolves around the amount of money that they can invest in their equipment. So my question for all you GON members is what would be your explanation for people outside our hobby having such a negative or condescending attitude towards our passion, where they infrequently would not have the same attitude towards other people's hobbies and passionate but unique pursuits? It would be a pleasure to hear about your experiences and what your explanation would be for this phenomena towards our hobby.
teajay

Showing 6 responses by cwlondon

There are two reasons:

1) unlike wine, watches, bespoke clothing, high end boats, designer mineral water, italian sheets, sub zero refrigerators, viking stoves, modern art, luxury automobiles, dualit toasters, cashmere blankets and expensive coffee - just to name a few things...

...high end audio is marketed BY geeky audiophiles and TO geeky audiophiles

(God love "geeky" audiophiles, by the way. I have been one for 25 years now.)

Our hobby has not been successfully marketed to affluent people who simply appreciate fine things.

I continue to have an obviously contrarian view that a $30,000 CD player, for example, is more of a luxury item than say, a hobbyist's necessity.

But there is no luxury goods cachet associated with audio.

2) Also, this hobby requires some degree of cultural literacy.

And people who don't really care about music (a growing segment of the population?) are unlikely to prioritize a big investment in audio.

Of course, genuinely appreciating impressionist pictures (and even enjoying good wine) also requires a degree of cultural literacy, but even if you really dont understand it, you can still hang it on your wall (or serve it at your dinner parties) and show your friends how rich you are.

This could happen to audio one day, but not until someone changes the model.

In the meantime, we are all weird.

God bless audiophiles and have a nice day.
Quadophile

You are making the assumption that anyone who buys high end audio gear has to take the time to set it up themselves, work at tweaking it etc.

Here in the Big Apple, I know non drinkers who collect wine, non drivers who buy Porsches, and I have at least one ex girlfriend who pays people to DRY HER HAIR every morning.

Correct me if I am wrong, but I don't think concerns about wasting a weekend terminating the ends of speaker cables and tweaking tube traps is what keeps them from rushing out and buying Magneplanars.

I have discussed this concept with certain members of this forum, and maintain my stance that high end audio should be no different from any other luxury item, and it is only so because of marketing and sales failure.

To review, I respectfully suggest that a $30,000 audio component might best be defined as a "luxury" -- regardless of the owners' underlying enthusiasm or experience with our hobby.

But no, for some reason, none of this is luxurious, it's simply "wacko".

A few questions for you to ponder: Do poseurs who order "Supple Leather" "tiptronic transmissions" and cup holders in their Porsche 911 Turbos even know what a "heel/toe" downshift is?

The London market has one of the highest per capita sales of cabriolet cars and Ferraris and Porsches are everywhere in South Kensington, an area where the it OFTEN RAINS and traffic averages 3 MPH?!?!?

But who cares!! ITS A PORSCHE, or a FERRARI, or an ASTON MARTIN.

How many Manhattan kitchens, buffed out with $50,000 of Viking ranges, Sub zero fridges, Thermidor Double Convection ovens, and authentic "Boos" butcher block counters never see any more "cooking" by their owners than opening a paper bag of chinese food? MANY, I can assure you.

But WHO CARES?! Because the place LOOKS amazing and fills its owner with pride and joy when they reach into their 8 foot stainless steel fridge for a mineral water when their neighbor drops by after her Pilates classes.

How many Rolex "Sea Dweller" wearers dive any deeper than their 4 foot deep, "infinity" lap pools?

Or indeed swim any deeper than their glass and polished nickel showers? I have one friend who wont even do that because he hates to clean soap out of the clasp?!

If you don't believe me, just ask the next Rolex Submariner wearer you see, how often he goes spear fishing or something and see what kind of a look that you get.

I have never met Albertporter, but from his posts I consider him to be a leading light in this obsession and a rare individual that is trying to make a change, reaching out to audiophiles and non audiophiles alike and promoting our hobby in a sophisticated and gentlemanly way.

Most of the audio industry, however, couldn't market its way out of a paper bag, except perhaps for the snake oil selling sharks who lurk in the shadows, prey on our endless fascination for all of this and who could never build a high quality, long term, repeat business market.

Most audio businesses are hopelessly stuck in the old model -- wackos selling to wackos.

Or even worse -- eccentric, condescending wackos arrogantly trying to convince affluent non wackos to BECOME wackos.

History has proven that trying to incubate audiophiles from American Express Black Cardholders who might wander into your emporium is a lousy business.

But year after year after year after year after year, the wacko lemmings trek to CES and stereophile shows, delicately placing a single long stem red rose on top of a mini monitor in an ugly hotel room, perhaps while letting their aesthetically challenged wife or girlfriend pursue her dream of becoming a "model" in their brochure, while at the same time desperately trying to convince fickle, sophisticated and not necessarily even rich enough to buy their product wackos like ourselves that their latest offering "blows away" yesterdays state of the art.

It is really, really sad.

This - and NOT the publics indifference to expensive, high performance products - is at the root of why most audio salesman don't drive Ferraris and why we are all considered weird.

If I sound pissed, it is because I am. Music and audio are wonderful, joyful things that everyone should enjoy and incorporate into their lives.

And in the meantime, BOSE and MP3 are taking over the world and moving us in the direction of the dinosaurs, not because they are any good, but because they are marketed by smart, tough businessmen who try to think like their customers -- however uneducated and misguided they might be -- and don't waste time trying to convince Mr and Mrs Rich and Glamourous that they should study up on the finer points of power cables.

If a high end audio "businessman" was somehow recruited to become the Chairman of Rolex, he would probably suggest revamping -- better yet perhaps cryoing (?) -- the swiss movements to improve the accuracy of the time 1/10000th of a second -- thereby "blowing away" last years model and competing watch manufacturers and diminishing their trade in value by 80%. Who in their right mind would even THINK of buying a Patek Phillippe ever again, when they improved it even more?!?!?

Another great idea -- the audiophile CEO of Rolex could offer their customers seminars and demonstrations on SCUBA diving. Surely this would increase the sales of Submariners and Sea Dwellers when 9 out of 10 of their customers become avid SCUBA enthusiasts.

Another essential, he could add disclosure documents inside every Rolex green leather and wood presentation box, explaining that all Rolexes require a "break in" period (typically a day or two longer than the warrantee period) before you should really judge whether or not its cryoed movement keeps time to within 1/10000th of a second. The boys in the returns and accounting departments will surely applaud that one.

Well, guess what? It's NOT about the TIME?!?! folks. And it's not about the number of feet that the a Submariner can be submerged under water.

It's about STATUS and BRANDING and LUXURY and QUALITY and PERCEIVED VALUE and FUN and STYLE and PRIDE OF OWNERSHIP and KEEPING UP WITH THE ZETA-JONES.

Now we wackos know that all of these things can be found by digging into the wonderful and quirky universe of high end audio products, but thanks to the elegant, charismatic geniuses running this industry, the public has NO IDEA and therefore could care less.

For years, I have been thinking about giving up my day job to correct this issue in the universe, and would therefore welcome ideas or private emails from any of you who might be interested in the subject or in getting involved.

OK, I feel better now.

Thank you for your time, thank you for listening and best wishes to all of you.
Brucegel

Oh my god! The veil has been ripped away?!

There is nothing more to discuss in this thread.

We are, in fact, "wackos".
CDC

In my view, people who can't cook but still spend $50,000 on a kitchen, or people who can't drive but still order Porsches with "Tiptronic" transmissions -- they are no more and no less sane than audiophiles who spend thousands speaker cables.

(If anything, I might argue that they are LESS sane, because in my thesis that only audiophiles care about audio, we assume that the audiophile, at least to some degree, USES the equipment.)

In the end, whether or not Mr and Mrs Super Rich Famous and Glamorous care about high end, I will still obsess over it, contribute to this forum and tweak the placement of my speakers into perfect equilateral triangles until I am dead and buried.

However, I maintain my position that audiophiles are "perceived as being wackos" (remember why we started this thread?) for no other reason other than wackos are the marketing face of the industry and have failed to create or associate any luxury goods cachet with their products.

I think this is unfortunate because it keeps the market small and contributes to the prejudices that started this thread.

Your comment about Marantz and Sony is a popular argument but here, too, I respectfully disagree.

GM may focus on minivans to the exclusion of 400 horsepower sports cars, but that doesn't negate Porsche's or Ferrari's ability to capture the imagination of the public, build genuine, successful businesses and/or become status symbols to aspirational, mass affluent consumers.

Like your $279.00 tuner, there are inexpensive Japanese cars that can be tweaked out to outperform a 911, but that fact isn't going to put Porsche out of business any time soon.

Oh...and one other thing: I was in SONY Style the other day on Madison Avenue and it seems that they, in fact, are catching on to this idea.

In the back of their showroom, in boutiquey little rooms, they now have insanely expensive, limited production headphones, digital cameras and other quirky overpriced and completely unnecessary products, far beyond the reach of our grubby wacko hands, displayed in huge vault like glass cases and marketing as their luxury sub brand: Sony Qualia.

Again, only the wackos have made this wacko.

Because actually, it is a joy, a luxury, and something that no one who can afford it should be without.
Brucegel

I give both my wife and son a hug at and tell them I love them as much as I possibly can.

If "wackos" weren't running the hi fi industry, then I might be the one getting more hugs and reassurance from my wife, despite the fact that there are six foot Magneplanar Tympani panels dominating our living room.
CWlondon, do you have any ideas how audio should be marketed?

(Yes, I do. Which I why I continue to contribute to this thread. And I could be available for consulting, if anyone would like some help. I am very expensive but I continue to give away some of my best ideas here for free.)

I'm commonly asked by non-audiophiles "Do you REALLY hear the differences?" or "How can you be so sure of what you're hearing?"

(Great audio is not for everyone. But it should be for a lot more people than the audio wackos reach.)

Just off the top of my head, how do you legitimize:
1) A $5,000 CDP that can't read a CD but a $70 Sanyo boombox can. Deal went nuts trying to find a reason to blame me.
- A $1,500 CDP that failed during demo - on 2 separate occasions.

(You can't, you shouldn't and you don't need to. Sell something else.)

2) One guy uses "garden hose" size speaker wire then you've got Mapleshade wire that's 1/16" dia. How can both be the best when they are such polar opposites?

(Some sports cars use V-8s, others turbo charge much smaller engines. They can all be great.)

3) Companies who put together garbage with no engineering background with serious design flaws that Stereo mags rave about. There are too many companies who ride the high price wave with just fancy packaging because most people don't know the difference. If you want audio jewelry fine but if you're buying for sound, how do you really know?

(This is another example still stuck in the old model. The audio mags trash Bose, but they still sell like hotcakes. Again, its about MARKETING)

I remember one salesman saying on line that if he had product he wanted to move, he would set it up real good in his store. He had othere stuff that sounded better but not when he set up the "bad" stuff well. How can you trust a industry like this?

(He sounds like a creep, and you are correct, you cannot necessarily trust an industry like this. If the industry became more sophisticated and trustworthy, these used car sales style prejudices would fade over time.)

Another example, I had a defective preamp. Fortunately I could compare to a good one soon thereafter. I don't think I could've heard the sonic degradation unless I had a good one to compare to, the differences were so small. Otherwise I'd still be happily listening to my defective preamp and never know it. I'm not saying only specs matter but at least it's a good place to start. You've got to have some kind of solid foundation to build upon. Subjective opinion is fine for one individual with one stereo but not for mass market, IMHO.

(Think more about the performance of sports cars, the differences in high priced kitchen appliances and the subtlety of wine, yet there are still powerful brands in all of these businesses.)

4) A 40 year old McIntosh 275 amp being close to state of the art even today. All the while stereo mags are finding big improvements in power amps every month. How can this be?

(It cannot be. I agree that not much is new - check out my "latest" system -- most of it is 20 years old. Your point about the mags is yet another example of how the industry sells BS instead of quality, while shooting themselves in the foot. This is why they are not succesful.)

5) I had a dealer tell me how the speakers he stopped selling last year sounded like crap (very highly regarded, well engineered, strong audiophile following) but his new line is great. Do you think he told people they were crap when he was selling the line a year ago? Should I believe that he won't be calling the new line crap when it doesn't sell and he dumps it for something else next year?

(You shouldnt believe anything he says. He is another example of why this industry is hopelessly stuck as a cottage industry, lousy business, run and promoted by wackos.)

I know people who would love to have a nice stereo but the risks are way too high. And you will lose thousands if you guess wrong. Unless you can solidly define what is out there and the differences between stuff, very few people are going to buy into it.

(I agree that the differences should be clear. But the differences are not what we debate in our geeked out forum. These products could be differentiated by a long list of things, many of which have nothing to do with how it sounds.)

Best of luck

Cwlondon