[nathanm]

She did not have music in her restaurant on the grounds that it was a distraction from the holy grail of her food.

  Awesome!  I would make a beeline to such a restaurant!

[shep]

 :oops:me and my strange questions Wonder how this will change things...it's like having a gal walk into the locker room saying, "move over and make way for a dame"! So then where are the other 55 hiding? waiting for our mystery guess to be the first? Do we call her miss, madame or ms. Don't mind me, I'm just drugged from this dreary mid-winter country living. Hey a fox and two rabbits crossed the road tonight! that was the high point of the day...when does she make her official debut???

[Russell Dawkins]

In my few years as a speaker designer/builder I came to a few conclusions re: men, women, musicians and how they listen/hear. Of course, these have to be generalizations and I am talking about my experiences of 30 years ago.

My design target was a Quad 57 with better WAF, more extended LF and better dynamics.

For perspective, my design priorities from most to least important were:
1. accurate midrange tonality
2. lack of obvious resonances ("quick" sound)
3. wide bandwidth
4. simple and elegant physical design that would fit unobtrusively into most  living rooms
5. good dynamic capabilities
6. good imaging - wide sweet spot if possible

I learned to value the opinion of women when it came to getting second opinions on tonality. Typically, they didn't have any interest in the process by which the sound was produced - only whether they liked the sound, the appearance and the price.
I found most men were distracted by the technical aspects to the extent that it colored their expectations and their assessment of the sound to the point where, as far as I could determine, they were "listening" but not "hearing". Some apparently, were not even listening!
In fact I learned not to pay much attention to the opinions of most men when it came to sound! Typical questions were "how big is the woofer?" and "how many watts is it?" I got sick of fielding a lot of irrelevant questions of this type.

Actually, I got sick of "hi-fi" altogether, sold everything and lived for two years with only a clock radio with a 2 1/2" speaker! I got to the point where even the best home hi-fi sounded like s**t and I was tired of pretending otherwise to myself.

I think the situation is better now, we have matured somewhat as consumers, but the tendency remains.

As to musicians, well many are too broke to contemplate the high end and most are acutely aware of the difference between even the high end and the real thing. All they look for is a convenient system that doesn't cost too much and sounds good enough to permit them to be able to suspend disbelief without too much effort. If any criterion is important to them it would be midrange tonal accuracy beyond everything else.

I realize I am speaking for others and generalizing a lot, but these are my considered opinions.

[WEEZ]

I think I read somewhere that women are very sensitive to high frequency sounds; and sounds that are too damn loud. 

Mrs. Weez enjoys my system, and was opinionated about some of the gear I've tried over the years. If we ever go into one of the electronic stores like Best Buy, or Electronics Express, she can't wait to leave. (me too, actually). She understands the difference between 'high end' sound and 'mid fi'. She likes music. She likes shoes better.

[jules]

Yes well, I know what you're saying nathanm.

Most restaurants have a tape loop or simply use musack [spelling?] which is incredibly annoying but with a bit of care and sensitivity it's possible to tune the music to the moment even though there might be a room full of people all with different tastes. It does need attention to changes at a track by track level rather than a CD by CD level as well. Maybe it's a bit like backing music for a film. They'd be pretty dull without it. Overall mood in a restaurant changes dramatically from the time people start to arrive in dribs and drabs, up to a peak where the food and alcohol weave their spell and through to a slightly more contemplative stage. Different nights, different moods though.

Sorry, very OT but I really like Russell's post for a bit of realism.

jules

[John Casler]

:oops:me and my strange questions Wonder how this will change things...it's like having a gal walk into the locker room saying, "move over and make way for a dame"!


 Do we call her miss, madame or ms. Don't mind me, I'm just drugged from this dreary mid-winter country living. Hey a fox and two rabbits crossed the road tonight! that was the high point of the day...when does she make her official debut???

Shouldn't change anything.  She is well regarded at the meetings, which are basically guys.

I call her Lori, but I'm sure she'll have a screen name if she signs up.

She is supposed to e-mail me for info soon.

[macrojack]

I still can't get past a ghastly vision of the lady chef with sausages made from her own blood. Was it a monthly special perchance?

[jules]

Ummm ... I think I might sort of bypass your question slightly 

The idea was more like a sort of mad excess of creative zeal. It's the sort of thing that makes you think/talk though and the opposite to a sign I saw on the local take-away the other day ...

"Buy three cold pies, get one free" ... aaagh, what a thought!!

jules

[Duke]

My wife - I guess that would be "Duchess" - accompanies me to audio shows and (when we lived in New Orleans) to audio club meetings.   She was an audiophile before we met, but she didn't know it.  She has very strong opinions on speakers, and doesn't mind if they're huge (she likes Edgarhorns, Classic Audio Reproductions Hartsfields, and SoundLabs). 

Once back when we were dating, I called her up to tell her about a pair of speakers I'd travelled to Florida to audition.  I was describing the cabinetry and finish to her.  She interrupted me with, "But how do they sound?"!

I remember overhearing a whispered conversation at a friend's house shortly after we were married:  "What the... are we letting women into the club now?"  "Shut up dude, that's Duke's wife.  She knows her s#*t!"

"Duchess" is very good at quickly homing in on the sonic differences when you make a component change.  I tried to trick her once when doing an extensive tournament-like blind comparision of six different interconnects, but the notes she was jotting down showed that she really was consistently describing each of the six cables.  And I hated to admit it, but she was right - to my dismay she consistently dogged the cable that I wanted to win (and kept re-inserting back into the "winners bracket" of the tournament), and yes it was less lively than the others. 

She reads the magazines, especially the equipment reviews, but has no interest in participating in audio discussion boards.  She has some interest in becoming a reviewer herself, especially after hearing from manufacturers about unethical behavior on the part of some reviewers.  No, she's not interested in getting in on the unethical action - she wants to be part of cleaning things up. 

Duke

[jrebman]

Some notable women from audio that seem to be missing:

Kara Chaffee -- chief engineer at De Havilland, Jennifer Crock at Jena Labs, and Irina Lam of Lam Audio.

Then there's Neli Davis of Audio Federation -- a personal friend, and well seasoned audiophile (and one who certainly does appreciate the hardware.)

But, if John The Chair Guy's stats are good, then yes, where are they all hiding?

Maybe they're just lurking and adding up what their husbands/partners are *really* spending on all this stuff .

Seriously, sure would like to see more of them here.

-- Jim

[James Romeyn]

Bring back Enid Lumley.  She made the most intense & phanatical member here look like a Piker!

In a similar but inverted track: Women are virtually the only ones targeted now for marketing of every automotive device.  Faces of humans in auto ads on TV will be either:
none (such as Escalade &/or Hummer)
OR
a woman
OR
If both genders: The woman is featured & the man is a minor role.  For instance, me & someone else are watching the tube & a car ad starts out w/o any faces.  I'm telling the other person to watch the only face will be a woman.  Guess what shows up?  A woman.  But then I'm shocked because a man shows up briefly later.  Now, the ad director tried but couldn't easily get a woman actor that was taller than the man (esp hard because only virtual midgets are used in auto ads to make the vehicle look larger). 

So what did the director do?  He oh-so-obviously ordered the smaller woman to stand about 1.5 steps IFO the man, so she was major foreground & looked bigger than the man.  This happened exactly twice in just a few seconds, both times the woman stands directly to the left of the man but looks about 25% larger.  Her face is way animated, the man stands there blank face. 

And don't you love the Volvo ad w/ the little guy about 4.5' tall wearing the pullover sweater, installing the seatbelt in the back seat for this little 5 year old girl who talks so much & fast she'd be a great substitute for waterboarding at gitmo? (she's practicing for back seat driving)

YMMV...but not much!