Pet Peeve -- why do headphone companies make the LEFT and RIGHT symbols so hard to locate

What is so hard about marking with nail polish or stickers. This is like whining about BRGHT LEDs.
Heard of stick um?

The point is I shouldn't have to mark up a product because the manufacturer didn't consider usability and affordance when designing it. Or age or bad eyesight...

Bright LEDs are not a usability issue, they are an aesthetics issue.

Audio equipment in general gets poor marks for interaction design. Tiny buttons, all the same size, no hierarchy of function, etc.

Look where the wires connect to the earpiece. Red means Right...

On Gado 10E in ear phones, the left has a very tactile bump.

Why do the manufacturers make these important labels so small and hard to find? Aesthetics? Arrogance? Lack of human factor design skills?

All consumer-facing companies have a group (two groups) devoted to this (UX and ID) to provide input on aesthetics, human factors, etc. So it's usually not a lack of thought on this. But the outcomes of these groups can be questionable at times. Many design engineers look at the ID/UX decisions that they have to incorporate into a product and shake their heads, when form is chosen over function (to the detriment of the product). I have always called this "form over function" in my line of work.

Look where the wires connect to the earpiece. Red means Right...

Not all headphones have two connections and not all are color coded.  My HD6XX are balanced, but both ends of the cable are black, they stick straight down, and the little "L" and "R" are hard to see in the dark.  It is a little annoying, but it's my only complaint about these excellent headphones.  I have more than 10 other sets of headphones and it's pretty easy to tell which side is which at a glance.

OP, I agree.

Also a capital crime: small stickers on every stupid piece of fruit.

I think we have the beginnings of a political platform.

Maybe we can use it as a casus belli and take over congress.

but really, it’s a case of most people wanting the markings to be small and nearly invisible.

It’s like writing in big letters on the front doors of a car "LEFT" and "RIGHT".

That most people don’t want it or need it and they find it to be an eyesore more than an aid of any kind. Thus the labeling is more innocuous, with many headphones these days also being a fashion statement.

Place a small length of red heat shrink tubing over the right cable where it plugs into the headphone.  If you listen in the dark, then use glow in the dark heat shrink! 

Or we combine the first response with one of the more recent responses, and place fruit labels on the headphones. Done, no need for any takeover.

What is so hard about marking with nail polish or stickers.

Also a capital crime: small stickers on every stupid piece of fruit.

I am fully behind your idea. Next time I am at the grocer, I will buy a Lemon and a Rambutan and use the stickers to identify the L and R sides of my headphone. Thanks!

Many Sennheiser headphones have 3 small bumps on the left earpiece near where it connects to the headband. That makes it easy to tell which way the headphones go without having to look at them. You can just feel for the bumps.