[mcv]

I have the feeling a lot of people go visit a popular thing just because they know it's popular, and not for its actual art, meaning, experience or whatever.

I actually tend to avoid the most crowded attractions. Been to Paris several times, but never been to the Eiffel Tower or the Louvre (but the Arc de Triomphe and the Montmartre are cool places to visit).

[notJim]

FWIW, the Eiffel Tower is cool as hell up close. I find it really neat to be able to see the structure of a fairly large building up close. TBH I was more "disappointed" by the Arc de Triomphe.

[ghaff]

I've always deliberately avoided the Eiffel Tower myself. The Louvre is very much worth visiting even if it's largely frozen in time and the most exquisite works are sort of overwhelmed by the vast numbers of technically excellent but IMO often not terribly interesting paintings. (How many Renaissance Madonna and Childs can you look at in a day?) TBH, a more curated Louvre would be a more interesting museum.

That said, if I'm having to choose, I'm probably going to the Musee d'Orsay rather than the Louvre.

[fortran77]

Exactly! That's why I use Haskell instead of JavaScript, and Arch Linux instead of MacOS. Those other things are too popular and people use them without understanding the real _meaning_ of Computer Science.