The Death of Audiophilia

The 2nd-class permit circulation statements, the page count, and the dearth of advertising tell me the specialty magazine business in many different industries is suffering badly. Camera magazines, stereo mags, photography mags, computer mags, even car mags are in big trouble. Big-city newsstands are about 1/4 the size they used to be. It's a very tough business.

I can remember a 10-year period where Stereophile was often 180-200+ pages every month. It's practically a pamphlet these days.

 

Couple of thoughts. First, there are more than twice as many people on the planet today as there were 50 years ago, so by simple addition the amount of crap has doubled. Second, people now have direct ways to get their crap out there, so it is more visible. That both of those things are true says nothing about whether the proportion of crap has increased.

John K.

 

I'm pretty sure a lot of equipment and speaker designers would disagree with you. Take, for example, John Curl, a respected component designer. He uses science and engineering to design the original circuit, but then tries different parts in the circuit and listens to their effect, choosing what gives the sound he wants. That's art.

John K.

 

If it's dying it's because hi-end is exponentially getting higher in price. $1,000+ (I've seen $9500 cartridges? ) $1000+ Tone Arms?! $1000+ pre-amps?! $10,000+ turntables? $10,000+ speakers? That is why there's any sort of death in audiophilia. Anyone getting an interest and wants the best sound and sees those prices? I've read where people have said you can't even have good vinyl sound without spending at least $1000 on a turntable and $200 for a cartridge! Yeah, that'll do wonders for the vinyl revival. We have the gall to criticize kids getting into vinyl using Crosley's? Yeah, let's see how many kids can afford that $1000 turntable and $200 cartridge. It makes sense why it's dying. You can't have a good or great system without paying as much or close to as much as a car. That's wrong. It never used to have to cost an arm and a leg to have a decent sounding to great system.

 

There is definitely market for turntables in the sub 500$ region. Lets just hope the vinyl revival does not lose steam..

 

The millennials don't care for any sound systems that cannot be fitted into their shirt pockets ...

 

Right. As opposed to that era in the 80s, say, when audiophiles were a dime a dozen. Good grief, there has NEVER been a better time in the history of recorded music to enjoy everything from cost-no-object hi-end down to iPod and ear buds. Those of us who put in the effort that it takes to pursue the audiophile hobby will be hard pressed to find complaints. Niche passions are nearly always going to be niche passions. I have no clue where this notion that 'audiophilia' is dying is coming from, but it is delusional at best.

 

It has never cost less to achieve decent sound. Ever. If you want cost-no-object or else nothing at all, then that's your problem.

 

No. There's more gear then ever at all price points. More affordable made in China gear, and more hand-built-by-people-with-health-care-and-pensions gear. Everybody has choices. Like jh901 says, if you look at audio today and only see a choice between $15 chip amps and Lamm monoblocks that's on you.

 

Going back to the original topic....depends on what one calls "audiophilia". As jh901 mentioned, the price points are likely lower now that they used to be. Is a Pono Player + a good set of headphones good enough? Or a FiiO? That's within the range of many people (just think how much is spent on XBOX's and iPhones).

I'm generally budget conscious and I think my bang-for-the-buck is much higher now than 25 years ago. Content / mastering is probably the bigger issue - the hardware is only as good as what you're feeding it.

 

As for content/mastering, well, there are more choices than ever before. We are in a GOLDEN ERA even if there are any number of concerns remaining to be addressed. I could put together a pretty good complaint list, but I don't have time for all the CDs and SACDs on my wanted list.

I agree with you on budget conscious hardware. Many of us are budget conscious, but for some that means wringing every last dollar out of a $75,000 system budget. And hey, if I ever get to that point, then I'll have earned it and I will be able to respect what I've got.

 

Grant, the very definition of art of any kind is subjective, not objective.

 

What a ridiculous leap! The man used this thread as a platform to wedge in his hatred of the music genre. I don't care if he owns two albums. That's like when a racist says he has two friends of another race to validate his otherwise racist views. (I'm not saying the guy's a racist, just using it as an example, so I don't want you guys accusing me of playing a "race card".)

If the guy would have left out specifically mentioning rap music, it would have been better.

That's the problem with this forum: we aren't allowed to challenge or "educate" someone who is wrong, which renders a lot of conversation useless. In that respect, I think they go too far with the rules, although they are there to prevent nasty arguments and getting personal.

This Audio Hardware thread has been hijacked enough.

 

IMO: This indicates a paradigm shift in print media that was predicted at the beginning of the "digital" era.
I now receive most music and audio news digitally and there's plenty of it to be had.
In fact, there may be more audio and music articles and reviews available now than ever before.
My point is only that the dearth of audio print media does not necessarily mean that audio is dead.

 

Best time ever to be into music and into hifi IMO. Great audio has never been more accessible, for relatively little cost and for use in the home, or out and about. Whether you use a top of the line Astell and Kern, Sony or Pono players in the middle bracket or Fiio and Apple's multi-purpose Touch, all of them offer great sound quality and even DSD playback in some cases. Just add some good headphones (and even these are offering more for low cost these days) and you're good to go. An AK120-II and Sennheiser 650s? Sure. An iPod Touch with some modest Skullcandys? Go right ahead. They both work well.

And so on!

 

He stated an opinion that made you react. This is more about you and your response than his statement. If he was trolling you took it hook line and sinker with your immoderate response. If he mentioned any other genre I doubt you would have bothered posting. Could he mention any other genre but rap? Now rap is somehow protected? And somehow I'm not surprised to find you adding racism to this exchange no matter how obliquely. And just because he doesn't adhere to your world view you want to challenge him? I agree with you, your contribution to this thread has been useless.

 

He could have, but my point is that he didn't have to bring it up at all! His dislike of any specific genre of music is immaterial to the thread. That fact that he named rap music specifically looks like he has an agenda, or that he was trolling. Remember that this is a summer holiday weekend, and the forum experiences these types of posts more often than at other times, except when school starts in the late summer and fall.

Somehow I knew you wanted to say I was playing a "card". That is very intellectually lazy and very inaccurate! You are added to my ignore list, not because you have a different view than I do, but because you are insulting and wrong.

 

No, I stated you brought it up, if anyone is lazy it's you. And I knew at some point you would go there. Time to leave your anger and rage behind you; its a big diverse world and not everyone is going to share your sentiments.

He offered rap as proof of something. And he may have been trolling, but who are you to tell anyone what they can and can't post? When you have a problem contact a Gort.

So go run away then.

 

An observation -

I started reading this thread yesterday. I started at the beginning. I found the comments very interesting. I was quite enjoying the read.

At page 11 the comments from 2009 had stopped.

At page 12 the thread was picked up in 2015.

The tone changed along with the subject(s) of the thread. It only took one post to get this going. I am not really enjoying reading this thread now.

That is all I have to say about that.

 

Let's agree to disagree and be civilized. We are all subjective to some degree. I readily admit I do not buy Chinese-made audio equipments because I want to support North American companies and that does not make me a bad person. We all have our beliefs and can we leave it at that ...

 

I disagree with agreeing to disagree.

 

If you look at the number of stores, I think you'll get a different sense of the success or lack of success of the industry at the moment. I can recall attending seminars at CES in the late 1990s that were titled "How to Rebuild High-End Audio Sales," so they were aware of the trend even 15-16 years ago. And Stereophile routinely printed editorials about the decline in sales and dealers as well.

I'm not saying the bottom is falling out, merely that I would bet the sales today aren't even half of what they were in the 1980s.

 

It's as if you don't even realize you're the one who took the wheel and drove the thread over the cliff.

 

The new generation, i.e. the millennials do not listen to music like we do. In fact, I don't even know what kind of music they listen to since I have no children in my family ...

 

I've tried to get my niece and nephew (10 & 12) interested in music, but they kinda yawn and turn back to their video games and the internet.