Those who simply want to use a light as a tool aren’t as noisy as those who want custom-made toys. Forget mil/popo, just think of plumbers, HVAC people, house inspectors, etc., who just want a light that they can bang around in the course of doing their jobs, which will Just Work, and they don’t give 2 shiites about SOS or strobe, let alone lightning or candle modes. They might want a status light that’s red/green as far as battery charge, but would think it’s retarded to stick RGB aux lights in it. Onboard charging might be nice, but not if it ruins the light the first time it falls into a toilet or puddle. They might be used to probably one single medium-mode level, and leave it on that 99% of the time, and that’s IF they even get a light that’s more than simple 1-mode on/off.
People don’t want ¼" drills, they want ¼" holes.
Tradesmen and the like just want a tool which puts sufficient light where you aim it, yet has enough oomf to last through a whole shift/workday.
“Enthusiasts” want a fancy toy they can show off to all their friends. The more blinky shiite, the better, whether it’s a lit switch, aux lights, or the main emitter itself.
And electrician that needs to tell wire-colors apart from each other might care about CRI to some extent, but a plumber just wants to see where that f’n drip is coming from.
While a lot of “enthusiasts” can be pretty ridiculous with their incessant conflicting if not mutually-exclusive demands, they do to some extent “drive the industry” by pushing NW and even WW over the usual CW standards, or pushing for better CRI in emitters, or pushing better and more efficient drivers for more runtime, and that leaks over to those becoming more accepted and hopefully the norm across the board.
But it’s hard for them to accept that most wanters-of-holes just want a decent simple light to do a job, vs wanters-of-drills who want fancy toys. It’s hard to accept that most normies don’t think as they do. Even if normies see how much nicer WW looks on woodgrain vs their CW-emitting Home Depot Special, they can’t get arsed to go chase after a WW light. Much less so when “I got a light that already works, so why should I buy another one?”.
And a plumber or house inspector doesn’t care about a 2500lm “turbo” that lasts all of 15sec before dropping like a rock. They’d much rather have a consistent 500lm light which can keep that level for an hour or two straight, poking around in basements or crawlspaces or attics.
So, yeah, lights like Fenix will probably be the Tool Of Choice by people who just want that, a tool, and not a toy.
Me, I just never got into Fenix because I didn’t really need a milspec light for banging around. A bog-standard Convoy tubelight was enough for me at the time.
