I don't like it when the word meme is used to describe behavior that is more likely to be a matter of choice. For that reason I doubt people's like for all things Schiit is mass hysteria, meme or whatever kind of mindless behavior some would attribute to it. Perhaps less than perfect sounds good to some.
I can share my experience as one of the earliest customers of Schiit (4 to 5 years ago). I heard about the company and thought anyone calling a company that, must be straight shooters and build good quality, no nonsense product. So when my son came to me and complained that his current sound card was transmitting noise to his headphones, I suggested he buy Schiit. He proceeded to buy the Schiit BiFrost, Magni and an RCA interconnect.
The gear arrives and he calls me again and says he still hears computer noise through all of this after spending $1,000! I go there and lecture him that this is not possible and that he must be imagining it. Just in case, I put it on bench and measure it and fall off my chair when I confirm the same. And I measure the worst Jitter of any product I had ever tested -- then or now.
While testing, all of a sudden one channel went out. After a bunch of troubleshooting I found out it was the RCA cables he had bought from them! I open it and the center pin had broken off at the solder point due to lack of strain relief and shoddy soldering.
He returned the DAC, and cables and got his money back. I told him in there to tell them that I had measured it and found these problems. I expected them to care and want to contact me. But no one did.
In summary, I and I think countless people have given them the benefit of doubt. They are masterful at using the social media as a marketing tool. For just a few dollars in sponsorship on head-fi, they got their own threads and became folk heroes due to absence of other designers and manufacturers being so active. Combine that with our hearing not be so good and people buy the stuff and hugely so.
What has happened now is that they have become complacent. They think they are so powerful socially that they can paper over any fault with impunity. They stomped on my feet so hard when I went to head-fi to chat with them that blew my mind. They have been able to shrug off any criticism with incredible amount of power and freedom.
With advent of ASR Forum and crazy guy like me at the helm
, the dynamics are changed and they are slowly learning to adapt. No longer can they take away the oxygen from someone saying something is not right about their product.
I expect longer term they will improve what they are doing. It is just that they are aimless in the short-term, not realizing that the best path forward is full transparency, professionalism and cooperation.