HibyPrime
New Head-Fier
- Joined
- Jul 5, 2010
- Posts
- 31
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- 0
Too much bashing going on, I really feel the need to make a point I'm not sure most people realize. I'm going to make this a bit of a story, don't hate me.
It wasn't very long ago at all, where I would bet you 50% of the headphones being used in north america were the buds that came with everyone's ipod. ipod buds break easily. People need new headphones, so they go pick up some 4.99 sony ear buds.
Fast forward a couple years (lets say 2007 or so), now when people need new headphones, they see the skullcandy's and go "ooh those look awesome, and they're expensive so they must be good!" Any self respecting audio engineer, producer etc. takes one listen of the headphones and goes back to their Senns (or insert hifi headphone co here).
Well guess what Dr. Dre does for a living (minus his 2 solo albums). He sees all the kids that are willing to spend more than $4.99 on headphones for ones that look good, and sees a market opportunity. Being a hip hop artist and a producer, he obviously wants to make them look good, and sound at least decent. Voila, Beats by Dre.
Kid's skullcandy headphones break (cause they have no better build quality than the ipod buds), and go back to best buy. They see these unique looking headphones that are five times more expensive than the skullcandy's they just bought, and say to themselves "these are more expensive, they should last longer. the looks dont hurt either."
Kid takes beats home, listens to them, notices they sound 'different.' A month later he puts on his friends skullcandy's and says to himself 'these sound like crap,' and recommends his friend buy the beats. Cycle continues, dre and monster get rich.
Fast forward 2012-2015. High profile musician/producer X gets fed up with the Beats and their sub-par sound quality. He creates Headphone X. Headphone X has excellent sound quality and also have a unique look.
Kid's beats are now broken (probably replaced more than once, their build quality sucks pretty bad for the price), he goes into best buy and see's the Beats Super-Duper edition at $299, and Headphone X at $199. He says to himself 'these both look good, those beats keep breaking on me, and I can't afford to buy them anymore, I should get Headphone X.'
Kid takes headphone home, hears awesome SQ, tells friends. We now have a world full of 18 year old audiophiles, and what does that mean? Mass producing audiophile equipment, makes prices fall (they will rise at first, but then fall even more as the market fills out), and makes audiophiles less of an ugly-duckling.
End story.
It wasn't very long ago at all, where I would bet you 50% of the headphones being used in north america were the buds that came with everyone's ipod. ipod buds break easily. People need new headphones, so they go pick up some 4.99 sony ear buds.
Fast forward a couple years (lets say 2007 or so), now when people need new headphones, they see the skullcandy's and go "ooh those look awesome, and they're expensive so they must be good!" Any self respecting audio engineer, producer etc. takes one listen of the headphones and goes back to their Senns (or insert hifi headphone co here).
Well guess what Dr. Dre does for a living (minus his 2 solo albums). He sees all the kids that are willing to spend more than $4.99 on headphones for ones that look good, and sees a market opportunity. Being a hip hop artist and a producer, he obviously wants to make them look good, and sound at least decent. Voila, Beats by Dre.
Kid's skullcandy headphones break (cause they have no better build quality than the ipod buds), and go back to best buy. They see these unique looking headphones that are five times more expensive than the skullcandy's they just bought, and say to themselves "these are more expensive, they should last longer. the looks dont hurt either."
Kid takes beats home, listens to them, notices they sound 'different.' A month later he puts on his friends skullcandy's and says to himself 'these sound like crap,' and recommends his friend buy the beats. Cycle continues, dre and monster get rich.
Fast forward 2012-2015. High profile musician/producer X gets fed up with the Beats and their sub-par sound quality. He creates Headphone X. Headphone X has excellent sound quality and also have a unique look.
Kid's beats are now broken (probably replaced more than once, their build quality sucks pretty bad for the price), he goes into best buy and see's the Beats Super-Duper edition at $299, and Headphone X at $199. He says to himself 'these both look good, those beats keep breaking on me, and I can't afford to buy them anymore, I should get Headphone X.'
Kid takes headphone home, hears awesome SQ, tells friends. We now have a world full of 18 year old audiophiles, and what does that mean? Mass producing audiophile equipment, makes prices fall (they will rise at first, but then fall even more as the market fills out), and makes audiophiles less of an ugly-duckling.
End story.
