Audiophile Style State of the Union

3 minutes ago, Allan F said:

 

Sadly, you and others who have posted similar comments just don't get it. It has nothing to do with winning. The "undesirables" are the are the product of their own behaviour in hijacking threads where it has been made very clear that their "contributions" and challenges are unwelcome.

Right.

I think it's all about respect.

If the OP believes that USB cables or network switches can make a difference and wants to talk about that, and specifically requests that nonbelievers sit this one out, why can't this be respected? 

Is the perceived calling to be an audio savior (see Peter Aczel quote) too much to overcome?  Is the urge to come across to others as a brilliant person of science so strong that it overrides common decency?  

I personally enjoy reading what I consider to be "controversial" posts.  To me, they are entertaining.  But when it is clear that the originator of a thread is already a believer and isn't interested in being converted within that thread, it would be nice if those wishes were respected.

As an aisde...to the multitudes that have heard differences for themselves (in things like USB cables and network switches, for example), do you know how incredibly silly it is to read comments like snake oil, laughing stock, or your DAC or the cable must be broken for the sound of zeroes and ones to change?  The hubris involved in making statements like that is both staggering and ironic.  

Meanwhile, if you don't hear differences in things like USB cables or network switches, I am cool with that.  I believe you.  I am happy for you.  That means you can theoretically spend more money on things like speakers or room treatments or music or whatever.  What I don't do, though, is extrapolate my experience to your situation and your equipment and conclude that somehow you must be mistaken or imagining things.

47 minutes ago, Jud said:

 

Unfortunately no one did. Because this wasn't some battle or contest, it was a bunch of folks trying to enjoy their music more who couldn't get along well enough to learn from each other and make it work.

The bs and the money won.  Chris won. Makers of make believe won. Hard to be genuinely helpful in such an environment. Easy to spin the fanciful tale.

53 minutes ago, Iving said:

 

Well - I wouldn't agree with the last bit.

The reality is that the folks that you all consider the most disruptive are also the ones with the most technical skills and knowledge.

Once Chris has driven these folks off, the technical core of this place will be gone and what will be left?

A bunch of guys sitting around sharing stories about which ethernet cable sounds the best.

In other words, a shell of what this place was and could still be.

It appears that the high water mark of this place will be the MQA vaporware thread. 

I ask others to reflect on what happened in that thread.

Was the real value that that thread provided created through making this is a "fun place" or by breaking a few (dozen) eggs and pissing more than a few people off?

I apologize in advance for the length; please simply ignore if it is too much for you.

I previously asked Chris to inactivate my account as I wanted to discipline myself from posting.  I have continued to lurk but been selective (want to follow the Audirvana thread, enjoy Miska's DAC evals, etc.).  I was feeling more discouraged than uplifted and don't need that in a hobby/avocation/love.  And frankly, I was approaching a "GFYM" moment (though would never use that phrase).  I wasn't blameless.

Already in this thread we have seen the troublesome words/phrases crop up: "silly, delusional," "pathetic," "miserable visage," "lame," "are you a plant(?)," "no claim however daft," "Jewish ghettos," etc.

I loved the reference to diyaudio.com, a site also densely populated with very intelligent people with serious engineering chops.  Man it feels better there.  Always fun and educational, minimal snark or belittling, no "contests."  Allow an example of when a neophyte asked about expensive resistors as a grid stopper.  This was answered "it is only important that this resistor is non-inductive.  An exotic one is not needed and is not a good use of your money as it is working into the nearly infinite impedance of the grid and therefore passes no current that would generate noise."  Great! I used a carbon comp resistor when I built a vacuum tube guitar amp.

I suspect most here are not hardcore objectivists or subjectivists, though there are some.  I sold off my system before I went overseas.  When back I re-built it, using information from many sources- a Benchmark amp informed by KR's subjective impressions and JA's measurements in Stereophile; an RME DAC that I learned about on this site; star quad interconnects as I understand and believe in the physics; Kimber speaker cables for the same reason, and that I like the way they sound into JBL professional monitors.

I would like to think that objective elements could be inserted into any thread and believe we all could learn.  It is not the content, it is the tone.  I would be happy to read the very smart mansr write that "there is no physics that I am aware of that could explain how an ethernet switch could affect sound quality or ground plane noise or whatever because of galvanic isolation or XYZ."  Or, "I don't think the current data supports the necessity of higher sample rates."  Even "I am concerned that you may be being affected by confirmation bias."  NOT "you are delusional or silly and must do a DBT."  Heck, there could even be a civil discussion on the merits of blind testing and neuroscience.

I wish success to Chris on his site and again apologize for my loquaciousness.

Bill

4 hours ago, pkane2001 said:

I'm for free exchange of opinion. I prefer to hear opinions other than my own, because that's how I learn. I guess CA/AS is no longer the place for open discussion. Sad but true.

Free exchange of opinion and genuine open discussion can only happen in an atmosphere of respect and civility. Not sad, but true.

Just now, esldude said:

The bs and the money won.  Chris won. Makers of make believe won. Hard to be genuinely helpful in such an environment. Easy to spin the fanciful tale.

I've seen you being genuinely helpful (and seen you being criticized unfairly for it, and responded to the critics that they were in the wrong, as you may recall). Sincerely hope you won't give up trying.

Saw you disagreed with my other post, or at least some portion of it. I really do think this is a matter of being able to play well with others - that's everyone. I think, very sadly, that we may have shown we can't. I hope everyone here proves me wrong.

11 minutes ago, kumakuma said:

The reality is that the folks that you all consider the most disruptive are also the ones with the most technical skills and knowledge.

In at least some cases, yes. The fact that a person has technical skills and knowledge doesn't prevent that person from also being disruptive.

Did you have professors in college who were accomplished but jerks? How easy was it to learn from them?

A big part of my reason for being here is to learn. In order to teach effectively, you must not only know the material, you must communicate effectively, and if the people you're communicating with know you don't respect them, that's going to interfere with learning.

If some folks simply refuse to learn, there's little you, I or anyone can do about it. (I'm thinking of the guy who insisted in the face of dozens of replies that he could only get the best sound with six different USB reclockers/regenerators in front of his DAC.) But you can work with the ones who will learn - notice that's *work with* them, not ridicule them.

3 minutes ago, Jim Sylva said:

Free exchange of opinion and genuine open discussion can only happen in an atmosphere of respect and civility. Not sad, but true.

I don't think I've disrespected or attacked anyone, although I've been attacked many times in the past. I can't help it if rational thinking and objective, experimental approach are considered a personal attack by others. Civility must go both ways, and current winds seem to be mightily one-sided to me. Maybe, like @firedog said, I'm making a mountain out of a molehill. We'll see.

1 hour ago, Jud said:

Head-Fi has a similar arrangement. 

Agree with you, Jud. Head-Fi is one of the, if not THE, most successful audio sites out there. I'm sure Chris would be delighted for AS to achieve that level of traffic. It goes to show that you don't need argument and conflict to run a successful audio site.

1 hour ago, Tone Deaf said:

Head-Fi's Sound Science forum does keep most of these "issues" bottled up inside it. 

Interestingly - but not surprisingly - it's a low activity forum. 

It's Chris' forum and obviously his rules.  What's to discuss?  Read and post if you like; if your don't like the forum or its rules, don't read and post.   

5 minutes ago, pkane2001 said:

I don't think I've disrespected or attacked anyone, although I've been attacked many times in the past.

I would agree.

5 minutes ago, pkane2001 said:

Civility must go both ways, and current winds seem to be mightily one-sided to me.

You're very likely correct about this too, it seems to me, just because there are far more subjectively oriented people here. That's why when I'm saying people must play well with others, I'm not intending to be at all one-sided about it. It has to go for everyone.

16 minutes ago, austinpop said:

Interestingly - but not surprisingly - it's a low activity forum. 

But also surprising if you take objectivists at their word of wanting to better the audio world and leave lasting information for newbies. I guess without the satisfaction of pissing in someone’s punch bowl, the altruism is gone. 

1 minute ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

But also surprising if you take objectivists at their word of wanting to better the audio world and leave lasting information for newbies. I guess without the satisfaction of pissing in someone’s punch bowl, the altruism is gone. 

I think it's more than understandable these goings-on haven't left you in a great mood, but with respect, I do think this is unfair. People post more in the heat of an argument. If there's "lasting information for newbies" that's correct and sufficient, what need to post more?

3 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

But also surprising if you take objectivists at their word of wanting to better the audio world and leave lasting information for newbies. I guess without the satisfaction of pissing in someone’s punch bowl, the altruism is gone. 

Is this stereotyping and labeling of others truly necessary?

No doubt some will disagree, but MQA just got a huge boost from Audiophile Style.  Gone now is the venue that dared challenge the Old Guard of the Audiophile Elders.  Gone now is the irreverence that made Computer Audiophile Style what it is today.

I understand the business need to bow to the market.  But the "subjectivists" just won the lottery here.  As more time passes, it will become more and more indistinguishable from forums like Hoffman.

A truly sad day.

To lighten the mood, here's one way to bridge the subjective-objective divide.  

http://www.moviequotedb.com/movies/my-cousin-vinny/quote_15938.html

My favorite part:

Vinny: How can you be sure you used 16 foot pounds of torque?
Mona Lisa: Because I used a Craftsman model 1019 Laboratory edition, signature series torque wrench. The kind used by Cal Tech High Energy physicists, and NASA engineers.
Vinny: In that case, how can you be sure THAT'S accurate?
Mona Lisa: Because a split second before the torque wrench was applied to the faucet handle, it had been calibrated by top members of the state and federal Departments of Weights and Measures, to be dead-on balls accurate. Here's the certificate of validation!
Vinny: "Dead-on balls accurate"?
Mona Lisa: It's an industry term.

I guess the gloating and victory laps by the subjectivists are inevitable.  Sigh. 

I think placing the blame on objectivist/subjectivist topics is incorrect. The focus should be on tone. I see no reason why an objective forum should be such a big deal unless there is a desire to "save us from ourselves."

Who cares?

The example above of how this site took on MQA and how that won't happen anymore is complete baloney. There is still a place for that here, the problem is the people who it is for don't want to use it. The real question you need to ask is why do they not want to use it?

I quite like the set up on UK forum "Hifi Wigwam".  They have a sub-forum called "Public Bar", and another called the "Pub Car park".  Now for those not familiar with UK culture, it is acceptable to discuss pretty much anything in a Pub or public bar, politics, religion, matters of the heart, even cables.  However, if things get out of hand and folk cannot behave themselves, matters can then be taken to the Pub Car Park.  In the real world, this is likely to result in one person ending up needing to visit the emergency room of the local hospital, the other person vanishing when the police arrive, and there being a curious lack of witnesses among the Pub regulars once the police start asking questions.  Back in the virtual world, Hifi Wigwam's "Pub Car Park" cannot be accessed unless you are actually logged into the site, or in other words, nothing that happens in the Pub Car park can be accessed and read as a result of a Google search by someone causally browsing on line.

To me the problem on AS is when an otherwise interesting thread gets derailed by two or maybe three posters arguing and point scoring in an endless debate and argument that has no chance of resolution.  This occurs irrespective of subjective / objective leanings, it is universal.  So when a thread starts to get derailed, perhaps we just need to send the culprits to the pub car park and let them sort things out, the rest of us can then stay in the public bar a continue a civilized conversation.

4 minutes ago, AudioDoctor said:

The example above of how this site took on MQA and how that won't happen anymore is complete baloney. There is still a place for that here, the problem is the people who it is for don't want to use it. The real question you need to ask is why do they not want to use it?

Mans has already left and I expect most of the other folks with technical chops to either leave soon or scale back their participation in this site.

Will you be stepping in to fill their shoes?