BachelorBoy

How many? Hundreds? Thousands? Tens of thousands?

Some analogue or mechanical technologies don't die out completely when they are superseded. They survive by going upmarket and/or being picked up by people who want to express that they are outside the mainstream. Eg, mechanical watches, fountain pens, horses, vinyl records.

The Law of Unintended Consequences Well-meaning interventions in markets result in unexpected effects that go against the spirit of the intervention.

What are the best sources of information on the Gronk-like shunters that English Electric exported to places like the Netherlands, Australia, and South East Asia, please? *Apologies for the title of the thread. I just couldn't resist a pun on the so-bad-it's-good film from the 1960s, Gonks Go Beat!

But it's worth remembering that life expectancy in the UK has risen in that time, and the number of years in good health has also increased. And so perhaps doom and gloom has been avoided not because there are more 20/30/40 year olds taking up the hobby, but by a larger number of retired people with generous pensions who are living for longer taking it up.

Look at it dispassionately. A hobby needs to expand its appeal in order to thrive. Some members of the public are prejudiced in thinking that the hobby is exclusively for one particular group of people. Call it market segment, A. TV programmes that show people from segments, B, C, D etc also enjoying the hobby will help to expand its appeal. Members of segment A probably enjoy TV programmes about the hobby that only show members of segment A enjoying it. That's great if you're a programme maker or TV channel targeted at segment A. But such programmes will confirm the public's prejudice, and give the impression that the hobby is not for segments B, C, D, etc. This hampers efforts to expand the hobby among people in segments B, C, D, etc.

I think compulsory apps for buying tickets (and many other things, like parking for cars) are discrimination against older people. Older people are fine with lots of newish technology. Plenty of older people are posting here, for example, and using DCC and software such as Excel for modelling purposes. Facebook and WhatsApp are great ways to stay in contact and up-to-date with relatives and friends in distant places). But smartphone apps are different. But we may not be anywhere near as comfortable with smartphones as younger generations ... after all smartphones with such functions have only been around for less than two decades.

1) Should Pacers be preserved? Of course. None of God's locos and rolling stock deserve extinction, even if they are only preserved as a terrible warning of how not to build locos and rolling stock 2) Should Pacers be used instead of steam-hauled services? No. For goodness sake don't be silly. The punters want steamers. Or HSTs.

Not always. People in power traditionally like to build empires and have as many underlings as possible. Cutting the number of workers is a relatively new way to show how powerful you are.

It might be South Ealing tube station.

Sir Rod was 26 when he had his first solo number one single, and that was half a century ago.

Don't worry, I am too.

James May is 60.

I don't think Sir Rod, Pete Waterman, and Francis Rossi are particularly big names any more. Jools Holland is a little bit big still, but is also very annoying. Eddie/Suzy Izzard is still quite big. Now if BTS, Taylor Swift, Dua Lipa, or Harry Styles were on the next series, I'd be impressed.

Sir Rod, 78 Pete Waterman, 76 Francis Rossi, 74 Jools Holland, 65 Eddie/Suzy Izzard, 61 I don't think this show does much to dispel the prejudice that model railways are only for old men. Except for Eddie/Suzy Izzard, who's not quite so old, and is genderfluid.

There's a guy called Garry Hall who models 3mm , and scratchbuilds locos that really catch the spirit of TT3. Perhaps he's a member here?

Luke Towan tells you how to dust-proof your layout ... looks like it would be pretty kid-proof too.

Is it a big roundy-round with actual-sized R10 curves?

Some companies used a marketing technique called "skim pricing" to maximise profit. The idea is that some people "just gotta have it" and aren't particularly sensitive to how much they need to pay. So the company makes a lot of profit from them. Later, once all the price-insensitive customers are sated, then the company drops the price so "normal" people with smaller budgets can afford them. Obviously the profit falls. But the company makes more profit than it would have done if it had sold the item at the "normal" price at launch

Haha! Perhaps India got there first

Not necessarily. Bachmann might have priced them lower because market research suggested that poeple wouldn't pay more for those locos.

Nice one. You make a claim, plant the seed of doubt, and then run away.

Shouldn't you provide means to verify that statement

A tour on opening day from a Youtuber. The railway bit starts at 21:08 For some reason, YouTube does not allow me to embed the link, so you'll have to search for it yourself.

Managers strive for order. Leaders are comfortable with necessary chaos.