The Insane World of High End Audio! Is it All a Scam?

Some ’boutique’ euro backwater crap brand he touts never had any design/manufacturing clout..I would bet my hat that all of it is subcontracted to China and the final 2 screws get tightened down in Europe.. to make audiophiles feel real special that they got something ’made in europe’ or something. I would rather buy chifi instead in such instances, give credit where its due.

The upper echelon Technics, Marantz, Yamaha, Sony, etc will be made in Japan and have some high iq engineering.. apparently it’s not special/elusive enough for some low iq OCD used car dealer.

I’ve watched a few of his videos. I think he’s just looking for clicks. The scam is his content to get subscribers using clickbait titles. He’s a good entertainer though.

Having experienced the difference between proper acoustics with really great gear then gear costing 10% in the same exact space and still having a great system I am a firm believer it is the most important aspect in audio.

In business I used to sell a dang fine automotive sound deadening product and did quite well at it, growing monthly for years in a row and without advertising. I hired a new web designer and he kept after me for months to significantly raise my prices though I had a really decent profit margin I felt it was wrong to do so. Of course it involved fancier packaging and a new name but I finally gave in and the business grew 4 fold in months. I never really liked doing so but I still had what I felt was the best product for the money available and more got to get in on it.

I came up with some ideas for a very dynamic website, had not seen some of those used before, spent a lot of money and a lot of time waiting for it. In the end the guy used my money and ideas to develop a competing product, quite good, tiny bits of product, very slick marketing and charged a huge price for it and sold a lot of it. In reality it was not better than what I sold, just marketing BS.

That said, I think there is more than enough evidence to support claims that gear is being sold that is way over priced and just does not perform that much better than other quality gear to justify the prices. Mainly it just sounds different in some cases and in others goes with the system better than other gear and or the way the customer perceives how it sounds can be related to our differences in taste and preference or just simply how our individual hearing works.

BUT, it does keep more money in circulation, not a bad thing for the rest of us that do not have the budget or do have the budget but choose to be happy with "lessor" systems.

Rick

I'm glad to see someone on YouTube finally gathered the courage to critique high end audio. Those fat cats have put one over on us proles for way too long.

Audiophile market is based on mass ignorance about audio and acoustics, it is not just about good or bad gear design, good or bad pricing...

Be it cheapaudioman selling low cost products or Jay selling very high end products,

they are legitimate reviewers with their style as any others ..

I dont want to criticize them and their character... It is useless and meaningless because we like someone style or not... So what!

But it is impossible to see through our own personal self deception, self scamming so to speak by the power of our ignorance if we do not inform ourselves about acoustics concepts and meanings in direct experiments ( there is very simple one even for a living room )...

It is because people dont do this that they delude themselves by taking the wrong choices for them...

It is not the reviewers the problem but ourselves...I refuse to makes reviewers bad or good one, the scapegoat of our own ignorance..

i know what i spoke about because 12 years ago i was totally ignorant... I am no more... And i dont speak about the useless knowledge of branded names gear various offerings here, useless for everyone save a reviewer because his job is to sell this to you, good or bad... We have only one audio system to work with...At least only one at a time and we must learn how to work with it...

Once we had understood how to deal with one system at any price, the basic is the same for any other system/room...

Yes, the audiophile market thrives on widespread audio and acoustic ignorance, and true progress requires self-education through direct acoustic experiments, not solely relying on reviewers.

But the idea that we don’t benefit from reviewers is not something I agree with.

Many (not all) reviewers have spent more time and may have more expertise than the average listener. And can help educate what we hear by conveying their techniques for listening, positioning speakers, and use of vocabulary that helps manage confusing auditory experiences. I’ve benefited in my own listening by their help.