Originally Posted by jyossarian
I don't know what the fascination is with 27 gear choices on a bike is when 10-12 carefully chosen gear combos would do, but I don't fault a person's choice to have all those gears.
I agree, and this is why I love riding my 3 speed. I just built a new bike that has a SRAM 5 speed in it, which seems almost extravagant to me now. I saw a bike with a 9 speed cassette a bit ago. There was so much dish it looked like the spokes on the right were straight up and down! I honestly don't understand what the point is.
I'm not so into fixed gears though. I love planetary gears primarily because I think they're beautiful peices of machinery. And it does seem that 99% of fixed gear riders around here are scenesters.