Saturday, July 7, 2018

Wired headphones are becoming the mechanical watches of personal audio

<em>Beoplay H6.</em>

Film cameras. Vinyl records. Paper books. Mechanical watches. And now wired headphones.

There are some classes of personal technology that refuse to die, no matter how much more convenient, compatible, or simply cheaper their successors become. Wired headphones are under no immediate threat of extinction, but the future of personal audio will be defined and dominated by their wireless peers, that’s already clear. The question then arises, in my head at least, as to the role and prominence of wired cans in our ever more technological future, and the closest analog I can find is that of analog watches.

Back in the 1970s, the quartz revolution transformed the entire watch industry. Quartz clocks were vastly more accurate and mechanically...

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