Yes they are Eichmanns.

Where I decided it was snake oil was when the same people who claimed they could hear cable sound started to claim the same for digital signal interconnects used for things like DD.

I'll sell you some Ethernet cable that will make the web browsing experience more vibrant and life like. Might as well.

I agree. Unfortunately, after someone has dropped hundreds or thousands of dollars on exotic cabling it becomes more of a bragging rights and face saving issue. So you'll be hard pressed to get any of those folks to say "er...it didn't really make any difference."

I remember reading a few reports of some of those MIT network boxes having either nothing inside or having a simple Zobel network to make flaky amps more tolerant of potentially bizarre impedance mismatches. However, try convincing someone who dropped a few grand on a set of speaker cables that it would be fun to open the little box at the end, possibly damaging the "bling" effect. Google is your friend.

Best,