So the average keyboard joe will walk into an electronics store and buy the cheapest keyboard because he doesn't care and thinks it's all the same OR he'll see something nice on display, buy it and then tweet/facebook all about it thinking he just came home with a mercedes or something.
Then there's the indoctrinated joe, who's bought into the marketing and will buy a new razer keyboard and tweet about it because in Joe's mind razer is the best. If you show him a nice Filco, he'll say god why is this keyboard so plain?
You've all been there, you've all seen this and felt it before.
Bias is everywhere.
It's human nature to errrr and contradict themselves.
Some other things, age and demographics obviously play into this. It's no secret younger folks tend to nut necessarily undergo more dramatic paradigm shifts. It's no secret that buyer's always have a need to rationalize their purchases. It's no secret that not everybody is actually good at perceiving quality differences and that's a huge issue when reading reviews and that sort of thing.
Just 3 more things I wanted to point out and bear with me if you don't agree.
We tend to disagree about switch types quite a bit and especially Topre. There's always 2 active threads *****ing about Topre and 200 bucks down the drain.
We're not very consistent about minimalism sometimes. We tend to disparage mainstream boards that have a lot of bling and we espouse boards that are very minimalistic, simple and clean - like filco or kul (plain is what what average joes might say). However, the very same people also like to garnish their boards with colorful key caps and Lego like color schemes to varying degrees but again it's diminishes the effect of what would otherwise be a nice, uniform professional (workplace) keyboard. Again, some not everybody.
If you've ever actually caught up on a thread, you'll notice that the majority of users don't read and follow the entire thing. There's alot of odd gaps and misinterpretations abound.
The other one is backlights. I feel like the community more or less discourages backlights ... unless it's on sweet custom keyboard in which case all the disco globes and acrylic sheets come flying out.
Do you think as enthusiasts (and of course there are varying levels of enthusiasm) we're above this sort of average joe behavior or would you say we're just in another cycle of it. Do you think we're actually more rational, fair minded when it comes to judging keyboards due to our experience and the community here than the average keyboard joe?
The community as a whole is not anymore rational or fair minded about keyboards than anyone else. And the "average joe" when it comes to keyboards is an enthusiast (maybe) in something else..with the same good or bad rational just applying it to something else. Just as the keyboard community is equally ignorant about other things and has the same good/bad rational when it comes to that. Also, in general, because of the demographic, the keyboard community i
Do keyboard enthusiasts know more about keyboards than the average joe? Sure..but their judgement isn't any better. They might make informed decisions about certain things but most of the decisions made are purely just opinion. We might be happier with our purchase but are we any better off?
But to some of your comments...I don't think the community as a whole discounts quality..in fact, the community probably values it too highly but that is how most enthusiasts communities are. You spend 100% more for 5% better quality...Or they chase stuff in an effort to look "cool" to their community...Or they make an effort to be different to show how they're not one of the sheep (even though they are, they just don't know it).
As to your other comments.
We disagree on things like Topre because everyone has a different opinion about what they like and everyone thinks they're right. If they didn't, they'd change their opinion. You have some people that are more accepting that others will have a different opinion and some do not.
Backlighting - I think you're mixing up the opinions of those that like it and those that don't..and some people (like myself) think backlighting looks nice but wouldn't buy it because I'd never use it. There are plenty of people on here that like backlighting but I also think there is recognition of the fact that there are very few high quality keycaps that support backlighting properly...so you have to make a choice between the two. This is one of those things I don't think the community is hypocritical about...I think some people enjoy backlighting and some do not and I think they stay pretty consistent with that...
Minimalist keyboards - I don't know what others think but most of the time when I see a lot of the gaming keyboard designs, I think they all look nice but I also know they've done so at the expense of quality. I do think people that dislike bling when it comes to larger companies but bling out their own boards (sometimes with technicolor yawn) they're being a bit hypocritical..but some are doing it because they enjoy X and not Y...some do it because they think X is cool but Y is...not because that is their opinion but the opinion of others.
I'm not really sure why you're asking...Did you think the keyboard community was somehow smarter or had better judgement than any other enthusiasts community?
