This was how I felt about it, put bluntly and perhaps over the top. Feel free to disagree:

There's something about the culture of and authority figures behind HF that allow it to be a ripe cesspool of circle-jerking bullshit, rampant with a collective mindset that shuts out those who try to cut through the bullshit of the site, its members, and the often poor state of industry as a whole. True discourse over there is rare. Noise is common. You seem to be more welcome the less you try to understand, the more your hype and pat each other on the back, and the more you let your money flow without thought. It is both a blessing and a curse for the industry and all those that spend hard earned money in it (as a producer or consumer).

They don't like it when we point anything out, and we don't like being bent over while distracted by an illusory, shiny promise behind the curtain. Always chasing, never reaching. Some of us can get and have been pretty vocal about it (or just other stuff in general), thus why you'll see some previous, now-banned HF members as regulars here (and some that just don't fit anywhere). There's actually a lot of care towards HF that much of this stemmed from, not just blind anti-HF nonsense.

Spend a bit of time here, and it starts to make sense. Don't be too put off by those of us that are overly honest, brash, or just a bit crazy and weird. We're open and cool if you are.

I only go there to keep up pirate posts that aren't here. This community is better if you want to learn, grow over time, and, frankly, make smarter purchases that are more likely to satisfy in the long run. I think it became most obvious to me when Jude commented on some gear impression and mentioned he didn't know what "tizzy" meant, or some other commonly used, seemingly easy to understand, audio term. That and many of his other posts and responses solidified to me that the everything-is-the-best-thing-ever, circle-jerk, not-sure-what-I'm-talking-about-but-here-goes, money-based culture of HF starts from the very top. I'm too interested in little things and technicalities and am a fairly critical personal overall, so that just doesn't vibe with me.

I encourage everyone to enjoy this hobby in whatever way suits them best, but, business reasons aside, this is my (potentially wrong) understanding of where some of these tensions come from and/or why I'm not crazy about HF.

The one thing I like about this forum is we don't pat ourselves on the back.

You leave us to our undeserved circle jerk. We have nothing else. (Unless you weren't being sarcastic, Kirosia gets confused easily)

Basically Head-Fi is now a full commercial venture so its undoubtedly part of someones pension plan!

I really like this summary!

Personally I think it mostly comes down to pissing off sponsors.  Nobody here is afraid to say negative things and thus Head-Fi doesn't want to be associated with us. People here share their experiences good or bad.  There are disagreements between members, but there is also mutual respect.

Nothing wrong with having a site based on positivity like HF.  If what you want is to have people validate your purchase and share in the consumer experience then HF is the place to go.  I didn't mean for that to sound as negative as it probably comes across.  HF is far from the most egregious offender of this forum mentality that I have come across.  Understandably most people don't like to be told that what they have isn't very good.

The perfect example I have come across is the HD800 thread.  I responded to someone talking about the Anax mod with a comment about my experiences in HD800 modding and the entire place went apeshit.  I forgot that you can't really have productive discussion there.  If someone disagrees with me I take that as an opportunity to learn from their experiences and reconsider my position.  I could really care less if nobody agrees with me or likes what I like.  The problem is many people take it as a personal slight.  Different people, different mindset's, different expectations from this hobby.

While I don't agree with the HF policy of removing Changstar related content, I can understand why they do.

HF is to get your feet wet and dirtied and have your wallet beaten up and stolen from you.

The other forum is where you get beaten up for no real reason whatsoever and get to be all KKK or SS like.

CS is where you give a crap about the music and get to applause for all the crap I throw at your screen!