ORIGINAL: mwd
...I actually like some of the Bose stuff.
Bose has (fairly or not) a bit of a reputation in the pro audio world for being sort of over-hyped, over-priced consumer-grade equipment marketed as high-end equipment.
Unfortunately for their victims, Monster actually *does* make high-quality cables and components, which has won them some credibility in the pro audio world. Professionals may snicker up their sleeve at the "jazz" instrument cables or whatever, but monster is still generally regarded as being on par with Mogami or whatever. They are also widely available and have their name stamped all over the place. As a result, they have a rather high-visibility presence in pro recording studios and sound reinforcement, often just because a couple of monster cables are conspicuous as such in a mass of generic-looking Ameriquad or Mogami cables. This visibility trickles down as credibility to end users who 'remember' seeing this $100 cable in use at the recording studio or whatever.
Somehow, Monster has also persuaded owners of cheap hi-fi systems to spend ridiculous sums for speaker cable and the like. Perhaps this is something like the phenomenon of people who would rather own a designer watch or a flashy car than own a home. You may not be able to afford a top-line stereo system, but for $100, you can have the same cables that rich people use, or something like that. Whatever the reason, Monster cable has somehow become a sizable company selling overpriced, high-margin cables and connectors. Ordinarily I would congratulate them on their success and leave it at that, but for whatever reason they have decided to supplement their legitimate business income with exploitative, frivilous lawsuits aimed at any company that has employed the ancient word "monster" in any capacity at all.
And that is what makes them a completely disgusting company. One that undermines the whole spirit of capitalism and free enterprise. They have made a sideline business of simply "gaming the system" for unearned profit, looking for opportunities not to create products or services better, cheaper, or faster, but simply to exploit the vagaries of trademark law to file bogus lawsuits as part of a shakedown scheme to get random companies to thow their lawyers some cash because paying the protection money is cheaper than fighting a lawsuit.
I hope the officers of monster cable all become afflicted with gruesome venereal diseases and chronic scabby mucous around all their bodily orifices. I hope that all their lawyers' spouses cheat on them and leave them and successfully sue them for 80% of their income. I hope that all the aforementioned people become afflicted with a yellowish, jaundiced complexion and a chronic bad egg smell emnating from their pores. And I hope they make all the money the money in the world and still never escape that bad egg smell.