A fine crowd

I did not see the same kind of impressive attendance I've become used to seeing on RMAF's opening day—lines stretching through the lobby, out the doors, and around the parking lot—but, at just past 12pm this afternoon, there was nevertheless a fine crowd of anxious hi-fi enthusiasts gathered round the registration tables.

COMMENTS
TriodeDave's picture

My sense of the crowd, as an exhibitor in his ninth year here, is that attendance was down significantly. Chats with other exhibitors Sunday evening uniformly confirm this, at least anecdotally.

 

Sorry not to have seen you,, or anyone else from Stereophile, in the room this year, Stephen.

John Atkinson's picture

Quote:
 Sorry not to have seen you,, or anyone else from Stereophile, in the room this year, Stephen

My apologies, Dave. There were so many exhibit rooms this year that it broke our system for show coverage, which is to split the site geographically between 3 writers. We have to come up with a different strategy next year. But there is also the fact that many exhibitors were showing systems that in some cases were not significantly different from what we had reported on at this year's earlier shows.

John Atkinson

Editor, Stereophile

TriodeDave's picture

Too bad. We showed a speaker I had only shown twice in the last 11 years, and for the first time at RMAF.

Audio Legend's picture

Why do you censor?

John Atkinson's picture

Audio Legend wrote:
Why do you censor?

We apply a light hand to moderation on this site. But I delete text or postings that are abusive to other posters (as I just did with one of your comments), that are nothing more than a troll or flame, or that are potentially legally actionable. If you object to this, note that we have a section on the website Forum called "The Open Bar," which is unmoderated.

John Atkinson

Editor, Stereophile

Audio Legend's picture

Thank you for being forthright. And thank you for information about hte additional forum, I was unaware of it.

zuluwarrior0760's picture

Their loss Triode Dave:

The Audio Note room sounded great.  We came back twice.
The speakers as I recall were about 3600.00 as was the integrated,
coupled with great jazz tracks coming from a 9K analog setup.

Sort of redefined my view of Audionote and I'm seriously considering
the integrated and speakers for my home's second system.....

 

TriodeDave's picture

Yes, it was a distinctly different sound which surprised quite a few folks. We'll be showcasing It at next year's shows.

Audio Legend's picture

Nice mug shot.

jmsent's picture

I was involved in the Madisound/Linkwitz Lab rooms on the 4th floor. The room exhibiting the Linkwitz LX 521 speaker was very busy, virtually from the beginning to the end of the show. So, there were sufficient attendees to keep at least some of the rooms quite busy. However, in general, my sense was that this show was lighter than last year.  The same was reported about this year's Montreal and Newport shows . My own opinion is simply that there's too many shows, which makes any single one of them seem less special, and causes a lot of repetitive reporting on products.  I love RMAF, but make no mistake. It can't survive without a sufficient number of attendees.

John Atkinson's picture

jmsent wrote:
My own opinion is simply that there's too many shows, which makes any single one of them seem less special, and causes a lot of repetitive reporting on products.

Back in the day when Stereophile ran its own show, we believed you can't keep fishing from the same pond year-in, year-out. So we moved it from coast to coast each year, with intermediate stops in Chicago and Miami.

John Atkinson

Editor, Stereophile

TriodeDave's picture

I think it's impossible to separate the effects of a crowded show schedule and a still very sluggish economy, (at least for those of us somewhere in the 99%.)

Situations with two or more variables, especially very large variables, are tough to call.

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