[JamminVMI]

Tonight’s random album pick outta CD book 12, rendered masterfully via Urd and (of course) Vali 3 (1962 RCA). I love this “hobby”.

 

[adias]

 

[JamminVMI]

Well... I won't make the decision lightly ...the learning curve looks quite steep

As someone said recently, we’re all here to “help”…


…spend your money.

 

[Ohno Schiitizen]

As someone said recently, we’re all here to “help”…


…spend your money.

FTFY ..... we’re all here to “push”…

 

[Plautus001]

Great photo!!!!

That's how he watches TV... it's actually "my spot", but he always "nudges" me out of the way or takes it when I get up... best sound

 

[Slackaveli]

What a Trip!

 

[Timster]

It is getting a little out of hand, though.

Hear me out…

This thread was, of course, originally about Jason musing over his experiences with this little garage hustle of his. But over the years, it has evolved into Schiit's official Stammtisch on the internet. Sorry for using a German word here. But I'm actually not sure if there's a proper English equivalent for that term, let alone the concept. A "Stammtisch" is a special table at your local watering hole. This table is not only special because it's usually the largest and often also the nicest one in the room, but especially because it's permanently reserved for regulars. It's the place where you meet for an informal get-together with your buddies after work or church, where you discuss local, national, and world politics and develop solutions for the world's problems. Solutions so much more reasonable and practicable than those higher-ups in Berlin or Washington ever could come up with themselves. It's where you analyze, in excruciating detail, the recent performances of the local sports team, where you complain to receptive and understanding ears about "that old ball and chain back home" (that you're actually very much looking forward to come home to after you're done with the next beer, or maybe two — but don't let the other guys know that lest they'll never let you hear the end of it), and where you proudly inform everybody about that new trick your dachshund learned the other day, who is not only your absolute pride and joy and obviously smarter than your no-goodnik son, but who is also coming from a long lineage of award-winning sires and dames, you'll have me know.

Think Cheers, but around a table in pretty much every German and Austrian corner bar; that's a Stammtisch. Sounds familiar?

So, yeah. This thread is Schiit's official Stammtisch. It didn't start out this way, but that's what it has organically grown into. And I think that's a good thing, for obvious reasons.

But the problem with this is that, as with any other Stammtisch, there's a certain signal to noise ratio beyond which the whole thing starts to fall apart.

If there are just five people sitting around that Stammtisch, things are fine. You're easily able to follow all the different topics and threads, and even if you missed a few things because you've already had three beers and you had to step out for a few minutes to heed nature's call, it doesn't take much effort to find your way back into the conversation. Smooth sailing, even if you're already on beer five of the night.
With ten people around the table, things start to get a bit more involved, but you manage. After all, you're with your buddies, so all is well.
But with a hundred people around the Stammtisch, it gets dizzying quickly. Even if you were able to follow just a small handful of those dozens of conversations that are happening simultaneously all around you, you'd be completely lost if you had to step away for a second. Worse, you come back tomorrow, but now you're faced with dozens of new discussions that are all in full swing already, and there's no chance for you to ever properly catch up so that you can feel like you're actually part of that conversation. And what's with all the new faces that popped up since last night that you now have to get to learn the names for, and, more importantly, what sports teams they hate so that you have something to bond with them over?

It's that kind of small beer tent sized happening that this Stammtisch has grown into, with all the noise that naturally comes with it.

And for the most part, I think that's great! The more, the merrier, I say.

But at some point, you reach a level where even the most invested of Schiitizens have a hard time keeping up. More and more you begin to feel like just some common patron, less like a regular. No longer are you just meeting a few buddies for an after work beer at the pub. Now, keeping up with the group has turned into yet another chore you have to do every day. And if you don't, you're afraid to eventually lose your chair at the table.

So, yeah. It's getting a little out of hand.

That's par for the course, though. Schiit isn't going to become any less popular. They're only going to grow even more from here, and as a logical inevitability this thread will only become busier yet. That's just how it works.

The problem is that I don't know what could be done to keep this Stammtisch alive and thriving the way it did for the past few years, yet have it remain an open and welcoming community for new folks to join.
You can mute some people, sure. But with this forum software, the result is a messy thread that gets unnecessarily hard to navigate and to stay on top of, with all that "someone you ignore wrote…" noise strewn in between.
You'd also be muting people, not topics, and so you wouldn't just suppress the stuff you're not interested in, but everything your friends talk about. And muting topics isn't a thing. Not here, not anywhere. (Business opportunity for an AI-based browser plugin, anybody?)
You could also split this thread up in multiple sister- or sub threads. Like a separate thread where the Schiitizenry can discuss woodworking, another one where they can discuss beverages, and a third one where they can discuss music recommendations. Not interested in woodworking? Great, don't add that thread to your watchlist. But that would also, to a degree, tear the community apart. Now you have some of the people you enjoy chatting with spend most of their time in one thread, while others prefer another one. Instead of one massive but at least somewhat coherent thread you now have to keep track of half a dozen separate threads. That's not any less annoying and involved than keeping track of this here thread is.

So, what do you do?! Beats me. Maybe we (and that absolutely includes myself, just to be clear) just need to accept that things change, and stop complaining. Or maybe the complaining is part of the (bonding) experience? Who knows.

I only know that nothing ever stays the same. This thread will only keep growing. It will only keep getting faster. And eventually, I will be even less able to keep up with it as I already am. But because this experience will change in much the same way for everyone, it will organically transform itself into something new eventually. Something different. Something less noisy, or at least something where the high signal to noise ratio no longer matters as much. It probably won't resemble a Stammtisch anymore, but it'll be useful in a different way.

But in the meantime; here's a cat pic. Because he knows what really counts in life: dozing off next to a pile of awesome sounding Schiit.

.... aaaaaandddd! He's back!
Longest post from @ArmchairPhilosopher is a while!

Personally I enjoy it all, and so far am keeping up, with nothing on ignore. I do however temper my responses sometimes, lest I get really caught up in it.
I'm also lucky to have some time most days to read, if not contribute something.

 

[Timster]

I'd love to start getting 'Made in Texas' stickers with the bigger products.

It makes sense, because everything is bigger in Tx, right?

 

[KoshNaranek]

Sure it was! All of his "story of yggdrasil" posts were great.

I stand corrected

 

[Ohno Schiitizen]

Dusk (Far-east time), some Jazz ......

 

[mystaiced]

Sure it was! All of his "story of yggdrasil" posts were great.

So good, I had to bookmark them and read them again. They should be added as appendices(? Maybe appendages is more fitting) to Jason's book.

Saga of Yggy part 1 by MM

Saga of Yggy part 2 by MM

Saga of Yggy part 3 by MM

Saga of Yggy part 4 by MM

 

[Balthazar B]

without the schiit there'd be no need for a schiitr!

In which case there'd be nothing left but the Shinola.

 

[sam6550a]

Every year of 25+ years.

Every year of 52 years. It is perpetual.

 

[sam6550a]

Yep. Bill's been officially kicked out of the closet.

Bill came out of the closet?

 

[Derrick Swart]

I concur with your Freya S and ATC active observations. Freya S is great value, to do perceptively better one needs to spend 4-5x its retail value. As for ATC SCMnnA, I have a setup with SCM40As that I'm very fond of, even though they lack by design the lowest bass. But ATC has some tempting subs...

Or build your own sub