Critic's Corner: Agree... the seeds must be planted when they are very young by Ron W Discuss a review. Provide constructive feedback. Talk to the industry.

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Posted by Ron W (M ) on October 18, 2005 at 14:10:45

In Reply to: Re: Here's why posted by jamesgarvin on October 18, 2005 at 12:15:21:

When my kid's friends come over and see/hear my system they say "DUDE - THAT'S COOL!" The seed has been planted.

When my neighbors, wife's friends, etc. come over they say "wow, what are those things?" The seeds haven't been planted... it's usually too late.

The late Harvey Rosenberg and I once had a discussion about how to replace the old, white, bald guys with new young blood. Harvey wanted to do a road show hitting all of the universities with a high end system, topless girls and free beer (i'm sure it would have been a good time with Harvey). I told Harvey that would never work because the college students would just get shitfaced and the next day they'd only remember the naked girls and not the sound system. I opined that we had to plant the seeds even younger than college age (the Nintendo years). No, kids this age don't have any money but 10-15 years from now, after they have graduated from college with disposable income on their hands, when they are looking to purchase some tunes for their new apartment they will remember that really good stereo system they heard a decade ago. At least they will have been exposed, at some point in their lifetime, to something better than a TV or boombox and "know" that it's out there.

While I truly support an initiative to creative our own association, it's obviously going to cost money and manhours. Will the bigger players like Sony, JVC, Denon, etc. join in or will they snub their nose at the effort. IF they are not in, that leaves us "specialty audio" folks to carry the entire load. How many of us are there?

I find it interesting - I think it's obvious to most folks the high-end audio pie is getting smaller but yet I bet there are at least 50 or more new startup companies each year (Don't these people do any market research - Hah!). At this rate, 10 years from now, there will be 10,000 high-end audio companies all wooing a customer base of less than a 1000.

It's time to right the ship, jump ship or go down with the boat.

Ron

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