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[quote]QUOTE: Originally posted by whitman500 I've been back in the hobby now for about 6 months and am a fairly regular reader of these forums. One topic that keeps popping up is whether the hobby has gotten more expensive and, if so, whether this is driving people away. One thought I have had is that many people are turned off from the hobby because of what they view as the impossible standards that the community seems to have set. I've detected in many places an attitude that says "a layout must have DCC, sound, be prototypically accurate with all the right equipment, buildings, etc." A question I would pose to those who have been involved in the hobby longer than I have is whether this attitude has gotten worse over time. For example, I recently bought two books on realistic model railroad design: one by John Armstrong (originally published in ~1960) and one by Tony Koester (published recently). I was struck by how different their attitudes were. Armstrong had a very relaxed view of how realistic your layout had to be while Koester repeatedly disparaged layouts that didn't live up to a certain high standard of quality/accuracy. Anyway, my point is that there has been a lot of handwringing in this forum about the hobby becoming too expensive. However, I think that argument only covers part of the problem. If the standards are too high for the average hobbyist to meet in terms of their resources of time, talent and money, then the hobby won't attract and keep new people. Thoughts? [/quote] I've found there are "snobs" with higher standards in almost everything there is anymore... Some of them are that way on purpose while some are that way by nature. Aside of model railroading, I belong to a cowboy action shooting club, and we have more snobs out there than anywhere I've ever seen. They actually stand around with their noses up in the air waiting for someone to attempt to be friendly with them so they can be rude to that person. They don't like me because I'm a nobody that out shoots the crap out of them-and because my cowboy outfits look good and fit me better than theirs do. I listen in on their conversations and 99.% of the time it's about "what they've got"... They make me sick. They're the same kind of people that have to drive expensive status symbol vehicles and be out in front on the road, live in expensive houses in subdivisions built especially for their kind by their kind. I was told one time that when you have a college degree and make the kind of money that the upper class do, then you have the right to be a snob. I wish I could have slapped the person that told me that... I say to hell with them. Enjoy your hobbies your way. If DCC isn't your thing, never mind it. If layout scenery isn't your thing, don't worry about it. Just do the best you can and have fun. That applies to model railroading and life in general... trainluver1
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