When Was The Audio Golden Age?

+1 @mahler123 I have gotten into arguments with friends who defend crap/cheap sound. It’s almost as if they are rebelling against good sound because it costs more than $150. But it’s worse than that; they do not understand that they can have good sound, or what that even means, and they do not care.

They both emphasize the paradox that while the the access to music, and the sheer skill in playing it back, has never been higher; yet the general interest in sound quality amongst the general public has never been lower.

70's and 80's at least for me.

@tylermunns 

"When a depressingly high number of people think they’re “listening to music” on a f**king cell phone speaker the size of an M&M, or think, “ok, now I’m really listening to music when I stream data over the internet through a Bluetooth speaker the size of a golf ball,” 

Your statement is correct, but your premiss is wrong.

I don't think today is any different from any other era. There has always been a very small percentage of the population that value sound quality at a ridiculous level, while the masses are more than satisfied with a transistor radio, an 8 track tape or a bluetooth speaker.

In fact, I would argue that more people listen to higher quality sound reproduction today, than any point in history.

There might be more total listeners for the higher quality sq than in previous years, but in the past it seemed like more people prioritized having a mid Fi system or better.  While there are exceptions, the younger generations simply don’t prioritize it, and most of the people previously mentioned that cared in the past no longer care

@mahler123 Exactly.  
We went into a house and saw proper sound systems. That’s just what people did.  
Not common anymore. Some cute little toy perched next to bric-a-brac on a shelf. That’s the “system.”