AUDIOPHILES: Are We Buying "THINGS" or "EXPERIENCES?"

[Timcognito]

Please, if you buy things, buy charity too. Almost everywhere there are those who are struggling to get by. I live in a fishing and farming community where there is a contrast between those whose large houses dot cliffs over looking the Pacific and those who pick the vegetables or eek out living from the sea. My wive and I are active in many local charities we give money and time to help the less fortunate. It very satisfying to work in or give to a school lunch program or senior center, charitable food distribution center, paying to repave the the basketball court at the local park, or teaching someone to read, all of which I've done. Those guilty pleasures, like a new pair speakers, feel less decadent and more rewarding for the charitable time and money well spent. For me those experiences, give perspective on just how lucky I am to have means to indulge in my hobbies or a night on town up in the City.

Sorry if I was little preachy but I am proud to walk the walk helping the needy.

 

[egellings]

Is it? Or is it a different experience, more like buying a sculpture?

Maybe it's more an investment, where the car kept in pristine condition appreciates in value.

 

[pseudoid]

investment

Please don't use that word... unless you want one of the new hires in IRS come knocking...

 

[egellings]

Please don't use that word... unless you want one of the new hires in IRS come knocking...

I 'spoze. The car, being licensed, is traceable. Something like expensive audio gear isn't.

 

[Cassette]

I think right now I'm buying a little bit of both. Crappy gear makes you think you are just wasting your money but when you get the right equipment then it feels so good to be an audiophile.

 

[Rottmannash]

I think it leans heavily in the materialism direction. Like I said you cannot always be binary in such a classification.

I've seen one of the best motorcycle museums in the world. The owner regular has them rotated thru and most of them ridden on a track at times. He also has a restoration facility. I think he gets satisfaction sharing his obsession with two wheelers with the public. As well as restoring or being caretaker of important motorcycles. But I do believe it is something of an obsession. While not always true, for most people obsessions have a way of eating into enjoyment and satisfaction if one is not very careful.

Barber?

 

[Gringoaudio1]

Maybe it's more an investment, where the car kept in pristine condition appreciates in value.

What cars beside Italian exotics appreciate in value!!?? And even many of those don’t!

 

[Yuhasz01]

Collector Car Clubs maximize many types of experiences restoration, advice, events, comradery, as well as material ownership. My skills in woodworking often keep me busy, building skills and produce useful and decorative things. Most trips are satisfying but like my first girlfriend only a fading memory.

I enjoy my audio system because I can play music that moves me and approximates live music and venues I have heard over the years,ie, choir music recorded in churches and cathedrals…. Live acoustic jazz recordings, etc.
I see parallels to my digital photography hobby. I enjoy my cameras and lenses because of what I can create and experience—the image.

 

[smith007]

This is a wonderful thread MattHooper.

I would suspect that my point here has been expressed many times in many ways before, but perhaps the core thing that we all have available to recruit at any moment which enables us to have experience is our attention/awareness. Consciousness is one faculty of mind to be sure, but awareness is something else again, perhaps akin, in part, to greater hi res bandwidth.

How often might we eat something and utterly miss the entire sensory experience that was available? But if we pay careful attention while eating slowly, for example, a simple raisin, we can have a delicious and even a remarkable experience. And I hasten to say that this isn’t wooo, but instead that there exists a lot of research, neuroscientific, psychological… that attests to both how different bringing awareness is as well as it’s effects and affordances.

I think that when we listen to vinyl, for example, a part of why it is experienced differently is because we drop the conditioned opportunity costs of all the digital music that is available with the flick of a finger, and we instead just listen without that distraction and intrusion.

So it seems to me that the gear (or the scotch…) is important if you’ve learned to appreciate the granular detail of instruments and voices, soundstage…. and that to have richer experience we have to practice paying careful, relaxed attention and to not getting taken away so much by the standard issue busyness of mind.

 

[egellings]

What cars beside Italian exotics appreciate in value!!?? And even many of those don’t!

I'm not a car expert, so I just don't know. I drive around in used kadiddlehoppers.

 

[Mart68]

What cars beside Italian exotics appreciate in value!!?? And even many of those don’t!

Some 1970s and 1980s Fords have gone up massively in value last ten years. In the UK, anyway. Saw an Escort RS2000i go for £16K the other day and it was a ruin.

 

[Timcognito]

What cars beside Italian exotics appreciate in value!!?? And even many of those don’t!

Top 14 Cars That Cost More Used Than New, Even as Used Car Prices Decline - iSeeCars.com

The average lightly used car costs 8.1 percent less than its new counterpart, but several used hybrid and specialized models are priced above their new car...

www.iseecars.com

 

[pseudoid]

Barber?

I'm not a car expert, ...

I think he was looking for a "haircut"?

 

[Carlton80@0]

For the most part we are buying illusions.

 

[tuga]

Which gets me to wondering: Which of these are we buying when we put together our audio system, material things or experiences?

I would say that we are addicted consumers. Throughout our life most of us don't own 'a' system but what amounts to a dozen or two. Audiophilia is not about putting together 'a' system but an incessant vortex of box-swapping consumerism. Some of us have not one but several systems. Need is relative...
We buy the gear and 'a' system is an end in itself, it is trigered by our love of music but music is ultimately just a pretext, the system is for the sound.
No wonder normal music lovers think we're nuts.

 

[pseudoid]

For the most part we are buying illusions.

Even illusions have a price!
Which brings up the experience-ROI.
I rate buying those admissions things to live music events as one of the best ROI for experience!
[I just hit both birds with one stone!]

 

[Blumlein 88]

Barber?

Yes.

 

[audiofooled]

I'm sorry to say but I think for the most part we are just buying convenience. Even the "hardship" we go through just to make a decision on what should we buy sometimes is too much. Luckily, with more and more "smart" things around us, hopefully soon the fridge will order food by itself and surprise us with what we should eat for the day. Maybe even stuff would unbox themselves. Oh wait, unboxing is an experience and we are starting to get very good at it.

There are things such as "pride of ownership", but then someone else has the latest and greatest so we wish to be as proud as that person is. Consumerism teaches us we don't just experience it, we should own it. And then throw it away. Learning is hardship. Making an educated decision is hardship. DIY is hardship. And if the best experiences come for free, how do we put a value on them?

 

[kemmler3D]

I disagree on that audiophoolia as the way to "experience" more things.

enjoying what you already have and stop chasing the next big thing, being those acquired systems already good enough, brings about more opportunities to have meaningful "experiences" (know interpreted as in more music sessions, more actual listening) with what should matter: the enjoyment of audio.

Actually I agree with you, I was just pointing out that audiophools are chasing one experience after another via gear, which is interesting because we happen to know that a sizable subset of that gear actually doesn't do anything for the sound.

Most millenials want an experience to post it up and show the world they had an "experience"
In the world I live in, the millenials I raised and all there friends buy at an unrelenting pace

Please leave the generational stereotyping on the shelf with all the other stuff you mentioned. I'm a millennial, I rarely use social media, and buy everything I can secondhand, I have one snowboard, one snowboarding outfit, one stereo, (okay, two, but one is for the TV) one car I bought used, etc. Just because you happen to know a few young people who are irresponsible with money is really neither here nor there. I could level the same generalizations at GenX, Boomers or whoever else I wanted, if I was only concerned with personal anecdote.

 

[egellings]

I'm sorry to say but I think for the most part we are just buying convenience. Even the "hardship" we go through just to make a decision on what should we buy sometimes is too much. Luckily, with more and more "smart" things around us, hopefully soon the fridge will order food by itself and surprise us with what we should eat for the day. Maybe even stuff would unbox themselves. Oh wait, unboxing is an experience and we are starting to get very good at it.

There are things such as "pride of ownership", but then someone else has the latest and greatest so we wish to be as proud as that person is. Consumerism teaches us we don't just experience it, we should own it. And then throw it away. Learning is hardship. Making an educated decision is hardship. DIY is hardship. And if the best experiences come for free, how do we put a value on them?

Consume mass quantities, freely.