Rerurn to Romy the Cat's Site

There was some anniversary issue of TAS recently where the editor praised Pearson for his contributions to audio criticism, citing his creation of a standard vocabulary as a highlight.

WHAT?! What better way to emaciate any independent thought on the matter? Gives people with nothing original to say, or who lack the confidence to say something new the ability to belong to the club. Was Groucho ever right...

Worse, half of these terms, well, I still have no idea what they mean. And I suspect there are all sorts out for whom terms like "speed" or "transparency" mean different things, not that I've ever used these terms meself. If you are describing sound in language that a normal, uncorrupted person couldn't understand then what's the point?

I also find it disturbing when otherwise intelligent people lap this BS up and adopt it as mantra. Disturbing because if you listen intently, you can hear the faint echo of the times when the herd went fully mad. This is where I can see Romy's point about audio being about people. 

I suspect the most *dangerous* ones are the ones could spend 2 years on Dr Melfi's couch, run through 500 pages of Rorschach splatters and get a clean bill of health before going home to listen to a system littered with GHz ultratweeters, intelligent chips and the like... 

Then again, that's probably what most people would think if confronted with any of the systems here :-)

cheers
cv

Rerurn to Romy the Cat's Site