This was more what came to mind when I saw the original post. Had I not stumbled onto Pinball Arcade (nostalgia/being reminded of how much I liked pinball), I wouldn't have ended up at TPF '15 (or the several shows after) and have 6 mechanical machines in my house right now (heck, the pieces weren't even in my face to figure out that owning a pinball machine was an option [more or less a forgotten game in general]).

You may very well be right, but the 2010s are a bit different than even the "2000s" to an extent. The amount of DIY help content on the internet has expanded greatly since the 2000s, partially due to the average person now having a capable camera that hooks up easily to a computer to load up to Youtube, etc. Thus, we now expect to find information on fixing just about anything. Owning a machine in the 90s seems as if it would have been quite daunting for the average joe, to the point of no chance of consideration. Now we have a greater sense of comfort with active forums and accessible videos to protect our investment (often times cheap/DIY).

Hence my use of the word "sense" It can most definitely be a trap, but that sense can be enough for someone to dive in (presumably with some similar repair experience if they plan to go the DIY route).

My point was that many people that (re)discover pinball (as it continues to pop up in bars and video games) will have likely already experienced the help they can get from car forums or perhaps some other hobby forum, etc. It's more widely known that help can just be a click away. That "sense" alone may motivate someone to research the possibility and risks of owning a pinball machine in the first place (and the information...is just a click away these days).