January 13, 2024
"I firmly believe that by the time a person, man or woman, is 19, 20, 21, they know what they’re going to do with their life."
"And if you’re on that path and things are being done to your satisfaction, it’s easy to keep going to look for the next goal."
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I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life at 19, 20, 21. I knew what I wanted to want to do. It took another ten years before I did what I had wanted to want to do, and I’m still doing it, though rarely do I want to do what I’m doing.
Parse that.
Is he the namesake of an electrical appliance going on the "Fritz"?
I, for one, had no idea what I was going to do with my life at age 21. I had identified my future wife by that time, and proposed, and I expected to have children with her (we had four) but my career took several unanticipated turns after age 24. Lots of surprises.
The most important thing, when it comes to listening to music, is just listening to music.
A creature of habit, a progressive (i.e monotonic) lifestyle.
Can't read it but I know a bit about the subject.
One of the main things being that audio 'excellence' is often incredible subjective.
For instance, there is an entire class of audiophiles who insist that $1k/foot cables are mandatory, while another will say that whatever you find at Radio Shack will do the job.
Like the wine biz, there are a LOT of snobs...
Some people do know. Others don't. For some who do know, responsibilities and duty lead them in a different direction.
I detest people who take an anecdote of one and project a rule onto the rest of us.
"Man wasted life building the greatest stereo the world has ever seen", says man who spent life in a chair in front of a computer.
Men focus on things. Women focus on people. He was a man of his generation, hence he was a hardass. Many were. He was probably "out there somewhere" on some spectrum of something or another, like me.
If you didn't share his passion, he must have been a hard man to like or understand. My takeaway is that the most important things to keep in mind are those that should never be said out loud. Stoicism has its merits.
well, "scientists" tell us that INFANTS know what They are going to do with their life
"The real cost was unfathomable"
A WaPo stringer labels facts he hasn't bothered to obtain unfathomable.
Looks like an unemployable nephew has an influential uncle.
You remember, what I told you about the wireheads at the NYT? How they have to constantly be searching for something, anything, anything at all, to write about?
I guess actually, you probably understand this at least as well as I do.
Back in the late 80's early 90's, one of my roommates was dating a guy in Hoboken who had a gadget that could nearly completely mitigate an LP record's noise. So, when you recorded an LP to a tape it would sound like when the record was new. I started going to his apartment with my records and blank tapes to record. It was like heaven. The gadget was not available in stores.
Bullshit.
I turned 75 last month. I've had a long and eclectic professional life in 8-10 different fields, often 2-3 concurrently. I sought out none of them. I fell into by mostly. By accident.
I wouldn't change a minute of it.
I keep working half days (12 hrs) just to find out wh what is going to happen next. And for the pure fun of it.
At 19 I wanted to be a cook. Had the navy listened to me, I might be running a very successful Arby's and bored to tears.
They said I wasn't dumb enough to be a cook and sent me to be a nuclear machinist mate. One of the great inflection points of my life.
Thank you navy
John Henry
Ken Fritz:
I firmly believe that by the time a person, man or woman, is 19, 20, 21, they know what they’re going to do with their life.
Having known quite literally hundreds of 19-21 yr olds, I disagree.
I must disagree. I believe a great many people at 19, 20, or 21 (at least in America) do not have any idea what they want or are going to do with their lives.
I'm with Oligonicella, Cook, and some others: Ken Fritz's 'firm belief' is that everyone else is like him (or should be).
Some of my old friends were audiophiles, always looking for that perfectly reproduced sound. Unfortunately their musical tastes were often abysmal.
I will say there is a difference between knowing what you want to do with your life and knowing what you are going to do with your life, or likely going to do with your life. If you don't know what you are going to do with your life, life has a way of making that decision for you eventually.
That article just made me sad. His obsession strained or ruined his relationships with his family. And ultimately, you can't take it with you. After his death, his million-dollar sound system was auctioned off for $150,000. Sic transit gloria mundi.
The real cost "unfathomable." Are we talking opportunity cost here? Hypothetically, if he weren't passionate about his sound system. Reminds me of those lines from Pogues' Fairytale of New York:
"I could've been someone!
Well, so could anyone."
“I firmly believe that by the time a person, man or woman, is 19, 20, 21, they know what they’re going to do with their life.”
There is no “ one size fits all.” If you are going to be a rock star or Olympic athlete, or golfer, you need to know that by 10 years old.
If you want to be an academic, ceo, or military general you need to know that in high school so you can get into an elite school. Otherwise you just don’t have time to check all the boxes. A football player who does not get drafted out of college or an mba that does not work for McKinsey by 23 is essentially not going to make it to the top.
That is the first cruel take, obviously you can change your major once or twice in school, join the military for a few years before or after school, and reinvent yourself mid career. You can go from attorney, accountant, or engineer, to management etc. but in most things if you don’t have a target in high school you will age out of opportunity. This traps even good people. When the economy is bad new grads don’t get hired, and when times get better companies hire new grads, not the ones who did not get jobs out of school. It’s sad but true.
I don’t think too many people get accepted to med school at 30. Some, but don’t count on it.
This is 100 percent false.
Having worked for several years in a madison area funeral home, I've seem people at those ages who had no idea what their life would be, nor that the next day they would be dead.
Josephbleau writes that "If you want to be an academic . . . you need to know that in high school so you can get into an elite school."
I'm an academic (emeritus prof) and never went to an elite school; in fact none of my academic friends and colleagues did. Nor did I know in high school that I was going to be an academic, although I was aware that it was a likely option for someone with my interests and aptitudes.
FWIW I had to look up Ken Fritz to see why anyone would take his opinions on anything seriously. If he was at the top, it was a very small and, frankly, stupid heap.
One of my best history students (I was but an adjunct, my faculty position was in the library) was a guy in his mid-30s (as I was at the time) who was on his way to med school. I don't know how he fared. A colleague's wife was also an MD who didn't get into her program until her early 30s.
Some of my worst students were retired enlisted military; they thought they already knew everything about every subject. A friend and colleague of mine who has taught at West Point and Norwich reports that retired O's can be even worse.
Sorry Narr, I don’t mean to be rude, I was thinking of a Nobel prize academic, something that 99.9 pct never reach of course including myself. I was depending on the AAMC stats. “ The Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) said (in the MSQ 2023 report) that nearly six percent of people enrolling in medical school are aged 28 or older since there’s no age limit.” So I admit I don’t know if 6pct is more than “some”.
What I wanted to do with my life wasn't even available until I was in my mid-20s. Didn't know I wanted to do it until PCs became available. Talked my way into a couple of jobs in computer repair, and I retired from it 40 years later.
Son, on the other hand, got the bug to be a pharmacist - and bent all his efforts to that from the beginning of 10th grade. Got his PharmD 9 years later. No BS, no MS, straight for the PharmD. (Apparently you don't need undergrad degrees to get into a Doctorate program if you meet all the requirements. Who knew?)
Lovely bride wanted to be an engineer - which lasted through her first year at college. Then she shifted to the family profession - nursing. Went from floor nurse to director of research at a local hospital, after getting a BS and MS in nursing. (Oddly, it was the Masters that got us together. Seems her computer blew its copy of WordPerfect, and I had a bootleg installer, so... I guess it's only sensible that our son was a PharmD? Lol)
Me? No degree, but a lot of misc skills. Like I said, what I wanted to do wasn't around when I was in HS. Makes me wonder how many others just never find what they were meant to do, for whatever reason...
I think at ten, the bulk of the world is at the playground slap the other little kid on the back and run away stage.
What I wanted was to work in entomoloy. Later, when I needed a job, I found out those were not only scant but mostly already filled. So I took a couple months and hit all the news and landed on solving logic puzzles for a living - program development. It was right as the churning of businesses from fleets of clerks to computers and I turned it into a career. Not because I found it so wonderful but because it was easy for me. Not because I sought the environment (corporate) because I didn't. But that was where the money was.
So none of my career was because I always knew. I just wanted the cash and I could get it.
Watch this excellent neutral one-hour documentary on Ken Fritz and his stereo -- when he was very much alive. It's probably the root source of this article and the origin of awareness of this man outside the audio hobby:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4b2IOOhJmxw
Another update: https://aftermath.site/the-worlds-best-stereo-system-what-happened-ken-fritz
He was clearly sane, extremely smart, had exceptional drive, and astounding attention to detail. He might have been another Elon Musk if not so into his 'home' stereo system.
Regarding value...many audio products cost way more than they are 'worth.' This follows from low volume production and custom setups -- this results in high labor rates from niche suppliers and the desire to spend money by a buyer. Many $500,000 audio systems are indistinguishable from $100,000 systems and even struggle to rise above $10,000 systems if listening blindfolded. These are luxury products and as much about showing off or decorating a house for 'keeping up with the Joneses' dinner parties as they are about sound quality. Much of the "value" comes from bragging and showing off.
Between $1,000 and $10,000, audio system quality differences are obvious.
I'm 64. I'm still trying to figure out what I want to do when I grow up.
You weren't rude, Josephbleau. I just thought my own experiences might be of interest. (It goes without saying that one of the lessons of the last few years and decades is that elite universities, aren't.)
And I need to correct the statement about my history-teaching friend: many of his Norwich students are serving officers, not retirees. One of his stories was about a lady major (IIRC) who simply wouldn't do the work but expected the rewards anyway.
So what kind of music did Ken Fritz prefer anyway? Maybe he liked sound effects?
Audiophilia is a treatment-resistant form of OCD. It's sad to see people waste time and money on it. Similar in some ways to trans identity disorder.
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