You object to the stereotype that the wealthy aim for "good taste", instead the of the latest gadget. Your suggestion for the exemplar of a fabulously wealthy person aiming for understated good taste is Paris Hilton!? Perhaps you are talking about a different person.
People who are in gossip magazines are pretty much by definition in bad taste.
The celebrity heiress is precisely what a £50,000 watch that isn't made of platinum & diamonds aims away from.
all insecurity about needing to show off your wealth goes out the window.
And that is why the most expensive timepieces aren't diamond covered. It doesn't need to be sparkly, but you know the quality.
enjoy the latest gadgets just like you or I do.
Your case is that the market for expensive watches will disappear because of a new technology. Your quoted evidence for this is that wealthy people bought the latest smartphones.
This is weak for the following reason - smartphones did not replace anything that previously existed. (I suppose you might claim they replaced desk diaries, but desk diaries never had any jewellery value) They were a new category. one which is very useful indeed, so the richest among us bought the top of the range model. No surprise at all.
You still have no evidence that people who bought expensive watches for jewellery reasons will stop doing so. After all they could afford a superlative timepiece (of great value, but not diamond-encrusted) and the latest iwatch galaxy couldn't they?
Secondly, smartwatches are not looking anywhere near as popular as smartphones - they are just not as useful. There will need to be some kind of revolution in what can be done usefully with a screen of that size.
So far no-one has made a popular smartwatch, but even when your bag or pocket has lots of devices that tell the time many (most?) people still wear a watch. I do so because it's handy just to turn your arm to see the time. The thing I wear on my arm to see the time will cost one ten thousandth of the billionaire's choice but they will still choose to wear one.
That's not evidence, there is no mature smart item to replace any existing jewellery out there.
Then why do the exceptionally wealthy choose mechanical and hand made watches instead of quartz ones that are more accurate?
Aren't they gadgets?
Watches used to be sold as accurate. But the marketing changed in the 70s from accuracy to tradition. Wearing a smartwatch leaves no room on your wrist for your grandfather's Breguet. (Or the watch you will pretend was your grandfather's)
A smartwatch that costs a fortune will be pretty much by definition, nouveau.
gold plated diamond encrusted dumb phones
Yes they won't use those. And that is precisely what a jewellery-priced smartwatch would be.
The snob value issue, is not so much about having just what their friends have, as having what no-one in the lower orders could possibly have.
Mechanical watches are fundamentally different from quartz, but your imagined SmartPatek would simply be some the same electronics in a Platinum case.
You seem to be claiming that for some reason the category of thing on your wrist will change from this is where I show my good taste and breeding, to this is where I have the very latest gadget.
Why would it do that?
Old and new money will have differing opinions of what good taste is, of course. Among some types it's an insult to say that someone "bought all his own furniture"
Absolutely no-one who wants to be well thought of wears a quartz watch - "Oh my goodness me, Blancpain don't make quartz - who could be seen with one of those.. How terribly arriviste!"
So, dividing his net worth by 100 (let's say he lives for 100 years) and then relating that to a high estimate of the cost of that watch. (I bet he doesn't have one that's inlaid with diamonds so I am sure I will be overestimating.)
We get:
65 billion / 100 call it $600 x 10 ^6.
600 x 10^6 / $12,000 is.002%
I am sure he could choose a 19th century antique that was made for some historical figure, instead he spends one 50 thousandth part of what he could spend in a year.
Even if you get that casio for £10 (it seems to be listed at about £20) then to be doing a Buffet, you need to have £mid six figures per annum to be at the same proportion.
He doesn't really feel the need to have sparkly things to show that he has more money than you, does he?
My suggestion is that a mobile phone / smartphone of any variety is a particular kind of item. It is a gadget.
I think it's unlikely that 4-or-5 figure value watch buyers would choose the latest shockproof casio over something handmade and mechanical. Exclusivity is key for them. There are comments on this thread to the effect that their goal is "no hoi polloi have what I have."
My evidence that they will choose "jewellery" and "tradition" and "timeless quality" is that this is what they do already.
Given that wearing a smartwatch means you can't wear a clockwork antique what will they choose to do? Be seen with a £8,000 inaccurate-but-durable "timepiece" or be seen with a £600 superduper smartwatch - which one has more snob value?
The rest of them will ditch their Rolexs as quick as they dumped their Blackberrys when the same guy turned up with an iPhone back in 2008.
Disagree. Blackberry and iphone/smartphone clearly belong to the same category.
A Swiss-made mechanical watch is an item of jewellery that says "I have a great deal of disposable income." They are objectively worse at telling the time than quartz watches, but they prove you have made it.
50 watches ? You have money to burn. If you are a good example of a wristwatch owner, then you are cast iron evidence of what a non-digital watch is - jewellery.
Not really. It is still a thing you put on. I many of us are still used to turning your arm slightly to see the time, instead taking something out of your pocket.
It's dead right that expensive watch makers aren't in fight with smartwatches - that fight was lost to quartz watches in the 1970s
Rolex (and any mechanical watch, no matter how more-than-a-brand-new-car expensive) is measurably less accurate than your £25 Casio. That's why they stopped selling Swiss watches on accuracy when quartz arrived.
Expensive watches are jewellery - a way to show off that you are wealthy, and part of a group that has a particular kind of taste.
Claiming that a mechanical watch is better is like claiming an antique table is better at being a table. It doesn't hold things off the floor any better, it just cost a great deal more.
Maybe for penis-measuring bros. I find it difficult to imagine anyone over 18 thinking their car should project their urgent, skirt-chasing masculinity. "I can't drive no fagget car"?
Grow up.
Tesla S looks like a big Audi because it is aiming at the same customers.
Nissan Leaf looks like a small family car since that is who would buy it - people who look at a Ford Focus.
Presumably small family cars - rather than saloons - are the place to start with electric, since they weigh less.
Cricket might not even be the second most popular sport in England. (Association) Football a clear first, then either cricket or Rugby (but which kind of rugby??)
Vastly more popular in India, Pakistan, Australia and the West Indies / Carribean
Further, not knowing an idiom does not make one illiterate.
Perhaps it isn't evidence of illiteracy, it is certainly evidence of a lack of reasoning ability.
If you cannot use context to make a decent guess at what some non-obscure words mean, this is laziness. Or stupidity
The context being discussed was work-related and the phrase was "downing their tools".
If you don't recognise "tool" as the noun that describes the item one uses to perform a task, and cannot see that "downing" might mean "putting down" then you have limited ability in what you claim is your native language. (Or are very tired, or drunk, or you forgot your reading glasses)
I always find these kinds of responses to be far too close to
"It is impossible for you ever to be right. Your privilege allows me to judge you by any chracteristic I choose. Your wrongness is axiomatic"
The only acceptable response by anyone with any possible privilege, is to "check" that privilege and if unwilling to apologise for deviating - leave the space.
Someone who chooses to live in the most expensive place possible cannot complain if they don't have enough money left over. They should move to somewhere less expensive.
Welfare queens can't live in expensive places, and neither should people with million dollar houses who claim to be in the "squeezed middle"
It's a loophole to make sure a bigger share of your estate lands in the hands of your heirs, rather than in federal pockets.
NO. It's most likely a term life policy that will pay out enough (on death occurring within a certain time period) to cover inheritance tax bills, thus avoiding the need to do things like sell property.
It is a very common thing to do amongst the wealthy enough to worry about inheritance-tax. It's often done to allow beneficiaries who can't earn money (e.g. because of age or childcare responsibilities) to pay a possible inheritance tax bill.
He has $200k equity in his home, and has saved $800k towards retirement.
Your concern is that those who are literally millionaires are not getting a fair deal? There is some serious inflation going on in your notion of "middle"
government to force the sale of his home
It is very common indeed for the wealthy to take out term life policies to hedge against inheritance tax.
If you are in the inheritance tax-paying class and you didn't know this, get better financial advice.
Slashdot Mirror
Really, what proportion of people will be heartbroken at missing out on a tiny aspect of avant garde 20th century orchestral music?
People who are in gossip magazines are pretty much by definition in bad taste.
The celebrity heiress is precisely what a £50,000 watch that isn't made of platinum & diamonds aims away from.
all insecurity about needing to show off your wealth goes out the window.
And that is why the most expensive timepieces aren't diamond covered. It doesn't need to be sparkly, but you know the quality.
enjoy the latest gadgets just like you or I do.
Your case is that the market for expensive watches will disappear because of a new technology. Your quoted evidence for this is that wealthy people bought the latest smartphones. This is weak for the following reason - smartphones did not replace anything that previously existed. (I suppose you might claim they replaced desk diaries, but desk diaries never had any jewellery value) They were a new category. one which is very useful indeed, so the richest among us bought the top of the range model. No surprise at all.
You still have no evidence that people who bought expensive watches for jewellery reasons will stop doing so. After all they could afford a superlative timepiece (of great value, but not diamond-encrusted) and the latest iwatch galaxy couldn't they?
Secondly, smartwatches are not looking anywhere near as popular as smartphones - they are just not as useful. There will need to be some kind of revolution in what can be done usefully with a screen of that size. So far no-one has made a popular smartwatch, but even when your bag or pocket has lots of devices that tell the time many (most?) people still wear a watch. I do so because it's handy just to turn your arm to see the time. The thing I wear on my arm to see the time will cost one ten thousandth of the billionaire's choice but they will still choose to wear one.
That's not evidence, there is no mature smart item to replace any existing jewellery out there.
Then why do the exceptionally wealthy choose mechanical and hand made watches instead of quartz ones that are more accurate?
Aren't they gadgets?
Watches used to be sold as accurate. But the marketing changed in the 70s from accuracy to tradition. Wearing a smartwatch leaves no room on your wrist for your grandfather's Breguet. (Or the watch you will pretend was your grandfather's)
A smartwatch that costs a fortune will be pretty much by definition, nouveau.
gold plated diamond encrusted dumb phones
Yes they won't use those. And that is precisely what a jewellery-priced smartwatch would be.
The snob value issue, is not so much about having just what their friends have, as having what no-one in the lower orders could possibly have.
Mechanical watches are fundamentally different from quartz, but your imagined SmartPatek would simply be some the same electronics in a Platinum case.
You seem to be claiming that for some reason the category of thing on your wrist will change from this is where I show my good taste and breeding, to this is where I have the very latest gadget. Why would it do that?
Old and new money will have differing opinions of what good taste is, of course. Among some types it's an insult to say that someone "bought all his own furniture"
Absolutely no-one who wants to be well thought of wears a quartz watch - "Oh my goodness me, Blancpain don't make quartz - who could be seen with one of those.. How terribly arriviste!"
I am sure he could choose a 19th century antique that was made for some historical figure, instead he spends one 50 thousandth part of what he could spend in a year.
Even if you get that casio for £10 (it seems to be listed at about £20) then to be doing a Buffet, you need to have £mid six figures per annum to be at the same proportion.
He doesn't really feel the need to have sparkly things to show that he has more money than you, does he?
I think it's unlikely that 4-or-5 figure value watch buyers would choose the latest shockproof casio over something handmade and mechanical. Exclusivity is key for them. There are comments on this thread to the effect that their goal is "no hoi polloi have what I have."
My evidence that they will choose "jewellery" and "tradition" and "timeless quality" is that this is what they do already.
Given that wearing a smartwatch means you can't wear a clockwork antique what will they choose to do? Be seen with a £8,000 inaccurate-but-durable "timepiece" or be seen with a £600 superduper smartwatch - which one has more snob value?
What a piece of plastic and silicon build by the millions in a fab will say about you?
That I do not need to advertise my wealth or lack of it? I wonder what watch Warren Buffet wears, or Bill Gates?
The rest of them will ditch their Rolexs as quick as they dumped their Blackberrys when the same guy turned up with an iPhone back in 2008.
Disagree. Blackberry and iphone/smartphone clearly belong to the same category.
A Swiss-made mechanical watch is an item of jewellery that says "I have a great deal of disposable income." They are objectively worse at telling the time than quartz watches, but they prove you have made it.
anything intelligent to add, I might listen.
This from the man (I presume) who just mentioned 200m water resistance.
If you are a scuba diver
50 watches ? You have money to burn. If you are a good example of a wristwatch owner, then you are cast iron evidence of what a non-digital watch is - jewellery.
already culled by the mobile phones in general
Not really. It is still a thing you put on. I many of us are still used to turning your arm slightly to see the time, instead taking something out of your pocket.
It's dead right that expensive watch makers aren't in fight with smartwatches - that fight was lost to quartz watches in the 1970s
Rolex (and any mechanical watch, no matter how more-than-a-brand-new-car expensive) is measurably less accurate than your £25 Casio. That's why they stopped selling Swiss watches on accuracy when quartz arrived. Expensive watches are jewellery - a way to show off that you are wealthy, and part of a group that has a particular kind of taste.
Claiming that a mechanical watch is better is like claiming an antique table is better at being a table. It doesn't hold things off the floor any better, it just cost a great deal more.
Maybe for penis-measuring bros. I find it difficult to imagine anyone over 18 thinking their car should project their urgent, skirt-chasing masculinity. "I can't drive no fagget car"? Grow up.
Tesla S looks like a big Audi because it is aiming at the same customers.
Nissan Leaf looks like a small family car since that is who would buy it - people who look at a Ford Focus. Presumably small family cars - rather than saloons - are the place to start with electric, since they weigh less.
Here's a link to a story about IMEIs routinely being worked around - by the dodgy phone shop in your neighbourhood, not by SIS.
Cricket might not even be the second most popular sport in England. (Association) Football a clear first, then either cricket or Rugby (but which kind of rugby??)
Vastly more popular in India, Pakistan, Australia and the West Indies / Carribean
Perhaps it isn't evidence of illiteracy, it is certainly evidence of a lack of reasoning ability.
If you cannot use context to make a decent guess at what some non-obscure words mean, this is laziness. Or stupidity
The context being discussed was work-related and the phrase was "downing their tools".
If you don't recognise "tool" as the noun that describes the item one uses to perform a task, and cannot see that "downing" might mean "putting down" then you have limited ability in what you claim is your native language. (Or are very tired, or drunk, or you forgot your reading glasses)
A few years old, but a very very educational series of articles:
http://www.edmunds.com/car-buy...
It's justifiable if you will eat what you kill, other than that you are a sadist using survivalist fantasies to justify your cruelty.
"It is impossible for you ever to be right. Your privilege allows me to judge you by any chracteristic I choose. Your wrongness is axiomatic"
The only acceptable response by anyone with any possible privilege, is to "check" that privilege and if unwilling to apologise for deviating - leave the space.
Two wrongs do not make a right.
The failing motion picture industry is terrified of admitting the trend of ticket sales.
Completely separate from whether Frozen is any good- I haven't seen it.
Uh, median household income is $67,348
The United States 2012 census found 2012 median household income to be $51,371 . Allowing for a quick estimate of inflation, you are wrong by 20%.
So, it seems that you argue publicly by relying on false information, and starting every comment with "Uh".
Welfare queens can't live in expensive places, and neither should people with million dollar houses who claim to be in the "squeezed middle"
upon one's death and for no other criteria
Apart from the value of the estate. So you would be wrong.
Uh, a $200k home and $800k IRA is pretty much the definition of a middle class person
Not mine, it isn't. This is the wealthy claiming that only Bill Gates is a little bit wealthy.
It's a loophole to make sure a bigger share of your estate lands in the hands of your heirs, rather than in federal pockets.
NO. It's most likely a term life policy that will pay out enough (on death occurring within a certain time period) to cover inheritance tax bills, thus avoiding the need to do things like sell property.
It is a very common thing to do amongst the wealthy enough to worry about inheritance-tax. It's often done to allow beneficiaries who can't earn money (e.g. because of age or childcare responsibilities) to pay a possible inheritance tax bill.
He has $200k equity in his home, and has saved $800k towards retirement.
Your concern is that those who are literally millionaires are not getting a fair deal? There is some serious inflation going on in your notion of "middle"
government to force the sale of his home
It is very common indeed for the wealthy to take out term life policies to hedge against inheritance tax.
If you are in the inheritance tax-paying class and you didn't know this, get better financial advice.
A very peculiar definition of middle class.
So much irrelevant garbage in the android store.
I really have no idea if apple is any worse or better, but I would be more likely to spend if I could actually find useful stuff.