Research in organizational theory suggests that category-spanning organizations typically suffer penalties in evaluations, as consumers downgrade producers they see as violating authenticity norms. We challenge this view by linking two heretofore separate insights: first, that categorical boundaries erode as categories become taken-for-granted and, second, that consumers in a given category tend to become more heterogeneous as their numbers increase. We argue that newer consumers employ diverse evaluative schemata and rely less on established conceptions of authenticity than do veterans, leading to more generous evaluations as the ranks of consumers grow. Using the canonical case of craft beer, we test the effect of audience growth on consumer evaluations, particularly when producers violate categorical authenticity norms. Our analysis of an original dataset of more than 45,000 ratings of craft beers from a popular online forum finds both that overall beer ratings increase and that penalties to authenticity norm violations attenuate as the number of new reviewers participating in the evaluative process rises. These results refine our understanding of shifting demands for categorical purity, conceptions of authenticity, and consumer evaluations as functions of market growth.

组织理论方面的研究表明，跨类别的组织通常会受到评估的惩罚，因为消费者将生产者降级，他们认为生产者违反了真实性规范。我们通过链接两个迄今不同的见解来挑战这一观点：首先，随着类别的获得，类别边界逐渐消失；其次，给定类别中的消费者随着人数的增加趋于变得更加异构。我们认为，较之于退伍军人，较新的消费者采用了多样化的评估方案，并且对既定的真实性概念的依赖程度更低，从而随着消费者等级的提高而进行更为慷慨的评估。使用经典的精酿啤酒案例，我们测试了受众增长对消费者评估的影响，尤其是当生产商违反分类真实性准则时。我们对来自一个受欢迎的在线论坛的45,000多个精酿啤酒评分的原始数据集的分析发现，随着参与评估过程的新审阅者数量的增加，啤酒的总体评分会提高，而对真伪规范的惩罚也会减弱。这些结果完善了我们对分类纯度，真实性概念和消费者评估作为市场增长函数的需求变化的理解。