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In the Forum: Playback Listening
In the Thread: The “Inverted High End Audio” ™
Post Subject: Re: the bigiining of the high-end marketPosted by clarkjohnsen on: 10/16/2006
Yoshi wrote: I did some reserch sometime ago on how the current high-end market started. In the 60's, stereo gears were sold at electrical stores along with other electrical items. Some people had seen a possibility of specialty streo market and started so-called high-end salon in late 60's to early 70's. J.G. Holt declared the establishment of high-end market in Stereophile on 1970 or 1971.
Beg to differ. There were many "hi-fi stores" in the Fifties and Sixties, back when Radio Shack had two locations (both in Boston) and many ordered cheaper stuff through the mail from Allied (Chicago) and Lafayette (NY). Some record stores and department stores also sold audio gear, but not the component brands -- more like console stuff. Mono was the game, and the specialty stores introduced stereo.
Gordon Holt was a breakaway reviewer; he first plied his trade in High Fidelity magazine in the mid-Fifties but tired of the corporate pressures and thus founded Stereophile.
The "high end" was always there, even in the Thirties, but unnamed as such until Harry Pearson came along.
Like Jesus swept the 2000 years of western culture with the idea of "sin", the idea of high-end reproduction after 70's seems to have swept by the way those two reviewers saw fit.
Beg to differ. The concept of "sin" had been around for a while. In the Christian version of repentance, however, one no longer had to do 100,000 obeisances to the master, or whatever; a simple acknowledgement to the Lord that one has strayed from the Path is sufficient for Him.
clark
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