HiFi is a hobby which is going to be in serious trouble in the next 10 or so years when most of its customer base (old men) die off. Although there are younger people taking up the hobby, there is not going to be enough of them to stave off a drastic change in the fortunes of high end audio companies. HiFi just isn't all that compelling a hobby to the average person today.
With a falloff of the hobby, Stereophile and its ilk are doomed.
I'm curious, are there studies out there that validate this?
For example, although the boomers are going to die off, their millenial children are an even bigger cohort, and will be reaching their peak earning years (perhaps belatedly) starting in the late 2020's. Will that help offset the outflow? I don't know, just asking.
Also, taking in the field as a whole, suppose it is true that there will be less interest in megabuck equipment. (I don;t know that; this is a hypothetical.) The contrary trend is that it has never been cheaper to become an audiophile.
I used to spend $1000's in the 1980's-90's for LP's and then CD's. Now I have 95 million lossless recordings available for $7.99/month on Amazon HD, and many (if not all) are as good or better than the original CD's or LP's.
Since when could you get low distortion, straight-wire-with-gain dac's and amps for less money? So much improvement.
And markets are now not just USA and Europe, they are global, with billions (yes with a "b") of people gradually upgrading their living standards toward and into the consumer class. (This research I'm more familiar with.) Is it possible that many of them will enjoy recorded music well enough to look beyond their phones? And will some of them become hobbyists, or status conscious?
(For example, did the emergence of Chi-Fi happen because of Western markets? Topping doesn't even have a service presence here. But they sure do in the Far East.)
Again, I'm just asking, is there some useful research on this out there? Is there some evidence that today's kids don't take up an interest in hi-fi once they establish careers and start nesting? I'm just not familiar with it and I'm curious.