Hodinkee Drama Strikes Again

wouter van wijk

What I don't get is that people tend to be so fierce and tight when our hobby is approached by people who actually make a living out of it, or turned it into a business model. I experienced this also on a local watch forum. People who make a living out of their hobby get sentenced by the forum Inquisition as sinners.

Wlcutter

I'm thrilled for Mr Clymer+Co for their success. I found myself headed to Hodinkee more often when the terrain of vintage watches was less clearly known+demarcated, but there's still plenty good there. Eric Wind's early articles remain worth returning to; Jack Forster's articles almost always offer illumination, ditto those from Jason Heaton.

My reticence stems from a sense that what H is fundamentally about has shifted in ways that personally don't resonate as much. Their earliest stories seemed rooted in scholarship/discovery, reporting on auctions, and/or keeping up with modern pieces as they were released (maybe that's just the stuff I paid the most attention to). In that old universe, further coverage of small movement makers, or considerations of broader watch developments (something on the pros+cons of modular movements for instance, or the mindbogglingly internecine moves of the AWCI), would've been logical and welcome. Over time, however, their sort of bro-ey language (their overuse of insane as an adjective is embarrassing, and writing about small, precise feats of engineering using the language of fratboys will always be tired and tiring) seemingly became something of an attitude, and their coverage (I'd argue) narrowed as a result. That's crappy, and H could/should have been doing *tons* more. The folks whose interest in watches BC+co have kickstarted could be having interesting conversations about actual matters of horology; instead, it's largely fashion and surface-level stuff, distinctions of fonts and dots and serial numbers.

And what that's ended up doing, I'd argue, is that they've seemingly helped or encouraged the commodification not just of watches as assets, but a sort of style/pattern of watch, too. They've (I'd argue) made a sort of Path To Get Into Watches, a blueprint (we could all name what we believe H would recommend to folks with means buying their first watches: everyone needs a Rolex 5512/5513/1680/6263, a cal 321 Speedy, a PP 3700, at least one old Heuer, etc). Which is fine! Everyone does this, all fields do this to some extent (if you're into, I don't know, stereo stuff, there's a sort of thru-line there, too, with markers for JBL and Marantz or whatever). And maybe this is what they wanted to do+become from the start: essentially another GQ. No shade/shame on them for it, I'd just thought (foolishly, perhaps) that they had a broader agenda earlier.

janice&fred

Does this mean I can't get a deal on an official John Mayer G-Shock? 😁

Iceter

Why all the animosity?

M'Bob

Personally, I don’t care what they do one way or another, but if they play even a small role in bringing watch appreciation to a larger audience, then I’m okay with them.