Jacob Kramer wrote:


Yes RAO has been more diffuse than usual lately, but that's because
politics has become so divisive and crisis-ridden. Usenet has always
been a source of political news, and not just in political newsgroups.

Nahh, the underlying cause of the sea change in RAO is the fact that home
audio as RAO knew it is dying as a hobby. It's dying at least as fast as the
baby-boomers who made it what it was. The death of Zip was a benchmark.
Home audio as it was in the bye-and-bye was based on a fundamental
activity - time dedicated to listening to recordings of music in a place
that was essentially dedicated to, or at least optimized for the purpose.
Those days are passing very quickly.

Since RAO long appealed to some of the more superficial minds in audio, it
is simply among the first to disintegrate as an audio forum. It still has
verbiage, but ever since the ascendance of Singh and Middius, the actual
audio content has been falling precipitously.