How rare is an audiophile

@searoll923 

main problem I've seen with my generation: they prioritize convenience over quality.

Unfortunately, as the pace of modern life increases our ability to evolve with it doesn't keep up.
With so many increasing demands upon people today, so many demands upon their attention, it would seem very few of us have the time to indulge in this, what can be a very time consuming passion.

Half a century of feminism has left many women now by necessity trying to do two roles (and paying taxes as they do) in the same time as their predecessors had to only do one.

Some get extra support from their partners, some don't. If they do, then those partners get less spare time. There has been a generational shift, and whether they like it or not, young men today are expected to contribute to household chores and child rearing to a far greater extent than previous generations.

No one, except the wealthy who can afford hired home help get more time today.

Therefore, given these extra demands on time, it's almost inevitable that convenience will always be more attractive to most of us.

@samureyex 

Good point.

Since most of us are male, that rules out half the potential candidates straight away.

The resurgence of vinyl, if it is maintained, might help somewhat I think. Fiddling around with cartridges, tracking weights, alignment, phono stages, isolation etc more or gets into the audiophile club automatically via the equipment route, doesn't it?

To gain access via with an interest in enhanced sound quality is very unlikely considering that digital has already levelled that particular playing field considerably.

If you want better sound quality, you will need to start off with better recordings - and that, given the priorities of the music industry is just not going to happen anytime soon.

I can listen to 3 or 4 versions of Who's Next and even on my system the differences are fairly marginal between the best and the worst.

How on earth could I make the average music listener see the point of doing this?

Especially when they can stream that album from a variety of sources that claim their offering is Super HD, or even Ultra Hd etc etc.

It might help if the streaming services were to state the provenance of the tracks they are offering, plus mastering credits, DR numbers etc but I can't see that happening anytime soon either.

Let's face, only folks like us care about such things, and most of us came from a time when there were such easily detectable differences in sound quality that we could care.

Half a century of feminism has left many women now by necessity trying to do two roles (and paying taxes as they do) in the same time as their predecessors had to only do one.

 Should have stayed barefoot, pregnant, and in the kitchen listening to the hubby's stereo playing in the other room?

All the best,
Nonoise

@nonoise - I might be mistaken, but I didn't see that as a criticism of feminism, but rather a statement about the lack of spare/recreational time and why there seems to be less of it... 

I miss the old days with women too!  So much less complicated and a lot less misinterpretation!  Alas!  

My experience is very similar to @dean_palmer. Gen X'er here---my friends and I spent much of the 80s experimenting with new gear, buying vinyl and CDs. There were several high-end stores we frequented and I still have some of my old gear (now vintage) with upgrades along the way. Now, I venture to audio shows with my husband and play music in my music room alone. I have a few friends that like vinyl but they aren't 'into' the whole audiophile experience. To them, high-end is Beats headphones and iPods. 

But I am also a 'rare' audiophile because I'm not into jazz and the usual music one hears at audio shows. If I had to compare my musical tastes, they would be like John Darko's music. Don't get me wrong, I love the classics, but my usual taste in music falls into the electronica spectrum.