The Harman In-Room Target Curve - why is it represented as a thin line?

[dasdoing]

I did use "similar", even if I was a bit moody in my post. Personally, I think that EQing anechoically flat speakers above the Schroeder frequency is useless, these curves just describe the outcome in some normalized conditions, not a target.

well, they always will be "similar", since the downslope is just a consequence of the reflected sound lossing energy the higher the frequency.
but I get your point.
if I had "the perfect speaker" above 800-1000Hz-ish I would left it untouched there, too.....altough I am not sure (percieved) direct sound in a room equals 100% anachoic meassurement

 

[Vini darko]

Because audiophiles want a single "best" community approved outcome to shoot for. Misguided for sure, but, as can be seen in the headphone PEQ obsession, they will use any number of filter combinations to desperately attempt to achieve someone else's arbitrary curved line.

I imagine the boss runs a whiteboard marker over the board and exclaims:

"This is the official company target line going forward!
Engineering: See how close you can get.
Marketing: Talk up this preference line as being gospel. I want it on brochures, packaging, websites and forums 24/7.
Research: Get some of those trained listeners, offer them some of our cheap speakers or free headphones as incentive, put them in a room, do some limited testing and find those extra votes. And get your secretaries to write up some whitepapers!
Get to it guys"

Savage m8

 

[markanini]

they are pretty diferent actualy

Your graph showing 1dB grid lines says otherwise.

 

[Feelas]

let's not get emotional.

they are pretty diferent actualy

Let's remember that B&K made assumptions in how rooms were built in 60s/70s. Also it was explicitly made to "replicate the hall experience", as can be read on the original B&K leaflet/paper.

I just saw this and not sure I'm completely following what you're trying to say.
The ability to measure "direct sound" (if you're referring to the anechoic on-axis response) predates this study. I also would interpret the graphs to refer to how a loudspeaker with "flat direct sound" measures when considering a typical reflective room. Even "treated" rooms will have some degree of reflections (otherwise they would be anechoic chambers).

If I understand the reasoning correctly, it is due to not assuming the listener being in any specific place in typical listening conditions (e.g. bumping around the house), thus the diffused-field-alike averaging.

FWIW all of the curves show that some kind of bass shelving helps. It seems that the biggest point of upset is the non-trivial and seemingly controversial, unintiuitive perhaps, notion that clarity and naturality of sound is not the same as shelved treble...