[swbf2cheater]

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While cigarettes can kill or seriously damage one's health, the thing about Beats Solo is that with it's bass heavy and muddy sound signature, it's probably less likely to cause loss of hearing than headphones with details and clarity. 

Loss of sanity? Surely that's a health risk?

 
+1
 
If normal people willing to shell out $150 for a set of ( insert X brand of headphones that are not so good ) and then realize there are sets for $30-50 that are much nicer, they are going to be very upset and stress can lead to anger, anger to hate, hate to suffering mhmm  giggles like yoda*
 

 

[Seamless Sounds]

 
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I've tried several skullcandy phones, from friends and a display or two.  All I have to say is they feel like something to wear, rather than to listen.  The freq. response on them feels like 100-1000.  Yet, everyone at my college wears them, or unusally shares them with one earbud per person.  How did they become popular, and why are there people hellbent on buying them and claiming they are the best.   Same goes with beats, however I will admit Beats headphones do sound good, not great, but good.  However the fact that the "good" Beats cost 400+ completely eliminates them.  And it's weird how everyone owns a Beats phone that cost a couple hundred dollars when they coulda bought headphones just as, or even better for less than $150.  The Senn HD 555s come to mind with regards to that price range.

"Best" as in what? Remember it isn't solely on sound quality to everyone. "Popular" I can understand.
 
Why do they buy them? Well it's all marketing. Once the message has been delivered, the person then makes a choice: either you research it, or you buy whatever they tell you. If it's the latter, this is usually a case of what's called the "rational ignorance effect." The benefits of not knowing or not becoming educated about it is higher than the costs (researching takes up your time). That means people choose to become uneducated about a product because it's quicker.
 
Several people believe the product is so good, they make an unedcuated review on it on (ie.) Amazon or through word-of-mouth. What happens next? Those who DO do light research will look up a lot of uneducated reviews on Amazon and justify it as proof it is a good product. You can imagine how many more uneducated people will follow suit because the # of good reviews said so. On the otherhand, we see a lesser degree of this rational ignorance effect. That is us, headfiers because we're putting so much time into researching and picking the right headphones. A person might not know anything about headphones, sees Beats on ads, but decides to do some research on headphones, discovers headfi, and becomes a better educated person. We all have a different degree of rational ignorance. Happens in politics too! but let's not go there.
 
Of course don't forget factors like style/fashion, brand preference, and bragging rights.
 
 
Believe me. If AKG, Sennheiser, Beyerdynamic, Audio Technica, etc. did a little more marketing, then they'll be "popular" as the rest. But marketing isn't free, I guess they're devoting that money to R&D? There's tradeoffs. Bose, SC, Beats focuses on marketing hype, while others focus on quality.

 

[ajreynol]

well said, Fanatic.

 

[khaos974]

So, I was shopping or a pair of jeans in a Beijing mall, and just on the side of the alley, I had a beautiful, magnificent vision, a stand dedicated to the most extraordinary headphones in the world, skullcandies.
It immediately attracted my undivided attention, so went to try them.
 
The first pair was fairly disappointing, plasticky and full of uncontrolled resonances, but I didn't despair, surely their excellent reputation had to come from somewhere, so I kept on trying other pairs until I tried the skullcrushers* on, and it was THE revelation, bass on the level I've never heard, an explosion of untamed and wild bass, +25 dB above flat level at 60/70 Hz, holy freaking s***!!!

Truly the skullcrushers are one of the most memorable pair of headphones around.
 
*The model with an extra little amp/equalizer attached to get skullcrushing bass, still plasticky though

 

[bcasey25raptor]

Quote:

So, I was shopping or a pair of jeans in a Beijing mall, and just on the side of the alley, I had a beautiful, magnificent vision, a stand dedicated to the most extraordinary headphones in the world, skullcandies.
It immediately attracted my undivided attention, so went to try them.
 
The first pair was fairly disappointing, plasticky and full of uncontrolled resonances, but I didn't despair, surely their excellent reputation had to come from somewhere, so I kept on trying other pairs until I tried the skullcrushers* on, and it was THE revelation, bass on the level I've never heard, an explosion of untamed and wild bass, +25 dB above flat level at 60/70 Hz, holy freaking s***!!!

Truly the skullcrushers are one of the most memorable pair of headphones around.
 
*The model with an extra little amp/equalizer attached to get skullcrushing bass, still plasticky though

 i hope your joking.

 

[Frequen C]

I own the monster beats myself, and their a decent bassy novelty set of headphones for if your doing something where sound quality isn't as much of a factor. The price is absolutely ridiculous though and should be about $100-150 imo. 

 

[bcasey25raptor]

i think you should add the Wesc headphones to the list of most popular bad brands. i see way to many at my school.

 

[50an6xy06r6n]

Quote:

So, I was shopping or a pair of jeans in a Beijing mall, and just on the side of the alley, I had a beautiful, magnificent vision, a stand dedicated to the most extraordinary headphones in the world, skullcandies.
It immediately attracted my undivided attention, so went to try them.
 
The first pair was fairly disappointing, plasticky and full of uncontrolled resonances, but I didn't despair, surely their excellent reputation had to come from somewhere, so I kept on trying other pairs until I tried the skullcrushers* on, and it was THE revelation, bass on the level I've never heard, an explosion of untamed and wild bass, +25 dB above flat level at 60/70 Hz, holy freaking s***!!!

Truly the skullcrushers are one of the most memorable pair of headphones around.
 
*The model with an extra little amp/equalizer attached to get skullcrushing bass, still plasticky though

The worst part is that the bass isn't even good, it sounds almost grainy or something, like the drivers can't handle it or something... >.<

 

[khaos974]

Quote:

 i hope your joking.

Poetic license:
untamed and wild bass => boomy, loose and distorted bass
+ 25 dB peak, since when is that good.
 
Yes, I was being ironical, the fanboyish double entendre should have been a big clue.

 

[Argyris]

Quote:

 
Quote:

I've tried several skullcandy phones, from friends and a display or two.  All I have to say is they feel like something to wear, rather than to listen.  The freq. response on them feels like 100-1000.  Yet, everyone at my college wears them, or unusally shares them with one earbud per person.  How did they become popular, and why are there people hellbent on buying them and claiming they are the best.   Same goes with beats, however I will admit Beats headphones do sound good, not great, but good.  However the fact that the "good" Beats cost 400+ completely eliminates them.  And it's weird how everyone owns a Beats phone that cost a couple hundred dollars when they coulda bought headphones just as, or even better for less than $150.  The Senn HD 555s come to mind with regards to that price range.

"Best" as in what? Remember it isn't solely on sound quality to everyone. "Popular" I can understand.
 
Why do they buy them? Well it's all marketing. Once the message has been delivered, the person then makes a choice: either you research it, or you buy whatever they tell you. If it's the latter, this is usually a case of what's called the "rational ignorance effect." The benefits of not knowing or not becoming educated about it is higher than the costs (researching takes up your time). That means people choose to become uneducated about a product because it's quicker.
 
Several people believe the product is so good, they make an unedcuated review on it on (ie.) Amazon or through word-of-mouth. What happens next? Those who DO do light research will look up a lot of uneducated reviews on Amazon and justify it as proof it is a good product. You can imagine how many more uneducated people will follow suit because the # of good reviews said so. On the otherhand, we see a lesser degree of this rational ignorance effect. That is us, headfiers because we're putting so much time into researching and picking the right headphones. A person might not know anything about headphones, sees Beats on ads, but decides to do some research on headphones, discovers headfi, and becomes a better educated person. We all have a different degree of rational ignorance. Happens in politics too! but let's not go there.
 
Of course don't forget factors like style/fashion, brand preference, and bragging rights.
 
 
Believe me. If AKG, Sennheiser, Beyerdynamic, Audio Technica, etc. did a little more marketing, then they'll be "popular" as the rest. But marketing isn't free, I guess they're devoting that money to R&D? There's tradeoffs. Bose, SC, Beats focuses on marketing hype, while others focus on quality.

I think this was brilliantly stated. Interestingly, I get the impression that the SC marketing in particular is pretty well targeted. I'm in my early twenties, watch TV occasionally, read a few different magazines, and walk around a college campus for a good part of the week, and I honestly had never heard of Skullcandy until I came to Head-Fi. It's like there's a void where I live and function--to this day I haven't seen a single SC product on anybody around me (at least that I could identify, and who could miss that skull?). I imagine if I went back to high school, went to certain websites (and turned off my ad blocking tools--sorry, not gonna happen), and watched certain stations on television, I'd be about sick of Skullcandy by now. Very efficient, those guys. And, evidently, very successful.
 
Social psychology at work, ladies and gentlemen.

 

[sunwolf]

From food and housing to cars, electronics, hardware and software, music and film, etc, everywhere it's the same. On the surface there is a superficial consumer world where 99% of the population lives. This world is everything visual around us, all the advertisements, what everyone we see every day has, and everything we see in 99% of the stores. We walk around in this world thinking "I am better because I have Head-Fi headphones", and it is enough for most people to take pride in being specialized in 1 area and to be happy blind consumers in everything else. Actually most people think they are experts in things that they really just brushed the surface of, which is why there are so many people acting like their Beats are the crap.
 
On one end of the spectrum we have completely naive consumers who buy into every fad and marketing technique, and on the opposite end of the spectrum we have such specialized individuals that their ideal products do not exist and they must compromise or get something made custom. The latter generally costs a lot of money + someone with the expertise to make it, or that you have the expertise to make it yourself. In areas like music for example, it's impossible to even conceptualize your ideal album let alone transfer that knowledge to someone who could make it for you.
 
It's impossible to be an expert at everything. This raises a dilemma for some of us who, realizing how superficial the market is in one area, extrapolate that to the pretty simple realization that every market is exactly the same and then set out on a quest to be better in everything. Most people are not willing to spend months or years to learn things, and end up learning nothing at all. Pooling resources is hard since so many people at different levels all think they are experts. It takes a lot of discernment and time, energy, learning, etc to get anywhere and makes us paranoid.

 

[yomomma1]

Totally agree!
 
And to put more simple
MARKETING!!!!
 
Get some famous tool to get shot wearing them (photographically not literally) and print that in as many mags and papers as pos and hey presto the kids will want them. Simples!
I think nowadays you don't really have to have more knowledge about anything, just the knowledge to use the internet and the common sense to look for yourself rather than listen to the salesmen or follow the crowd.
Quote:

From food and housing to cars, electronics, hardware and software, music and film, etc, everywhere it's the same. On the surface there is a superficial consumer world where 99% of the population lives. This world is everything visual around us, all the advertisements, what everyone we see every day has, and everything we see in 99% of the stores. We walk around in this world thinking "I am better because I have Head-Fi headphones", and it is enough for most people to take pride in being specialized in 1 area and to be happy blind consumers in everything else. Actually most people think they are experts in things that they really just brushed the surface of, which is why there are so many people acting like their Beats are the crap.
 
On one end of the spectrum we have completely naive consumers who buy into every fad and marketing technique, and on the opposite end of the spectrum we have such specialized individuals that their ideal products do not exist and they must compromise or get something made custom. The latter generally costs a lot of money + someone with the expertise to make it, or that you have the expertise to make it yourself. In areas like music for example, it's impossible to even conceptualize your ideal album let alone transfer that knowledge to someone who could make it for you.
 
It's impossible to be an expert at everything. This raises a dilemma for some of us who, realizing how superficial the market is in one area, extrapolate that to the pretty simple realization that every market is exactly the same and then set out on a quest to be better in everything. Most people are not willing to spend months or years to learn things, and end up learning nothing at all. Pooling resources is hard since so many people at different levels all think they are experts. It takes a lot of discernment and time, energy, learning, etc to get anywhere and makes us paranoid.

 

[Guitarplayer876]

Funny you say that, because a friend I know that owns the beats was so upset my beyerdynamic DT770 Pro (80) sounded a whole lot better than his beats, he sold them and bought some beyerdynamic DT770 Premium (32). BEYERDYNAMIC : 1 BEATS : 0

 

[linuxid10t]

Epic win for actually good headphones!!!  BTW, I feel sorry for whomever bought those Beats.
 
Quote:

Funny you say that, because a friend I know that owns the beats was so upset my beyerdynamic DT770 Pro (80) sounded a whole lot better than his beats, he sold them and bought some beyerdynamic DT770 Premium (32). BEYERDYNAMIC : 1 BEATS : 0

 

[Kelvs]

Mate, you gotta be joking.