Tool marks

[Tyson A Wright]

...I'm saying there used to be an accepted difference, now in the modern world, everybody wants royalty level, even when performing dirty grunt work...

Any knife over $100 should have basic finish sorted. We're not discussing a $40 beater, we're discussing a knife in the $180 or so range. So the comparison to officer's swords in the past is much more valid than comparing this to a peasant tool.

A "peasant" goes to Walmart or something, and spends $30 or so on a Bucklite Max II Small (or less than that on some more obviously junky knife). This is a knife forum, and we are knife nuts, so we just take for granted that three digits makes sense as an amount to spend on a knife, but if you just want to cut something and aren't obsessed with the details of a knife, you are never going to spend that kind of money on a knife.

At $180, it's not unreasonable (or some 'modern' affectation) to expect them to have troubled themselves to sand the spine.

 

[Londinium Armoury]

Any knife over $100 should have basic finish sorted. We're not discussing a $40 beater, we're discussing a knife in the $180 or so range. So the comparison to officer's swords in the past is much more valid than comparing this to a peasant tool.

A "peasant" goes to Walmart or something, and spends $30 or so on a Bucklite Max II Small (or less than that on some more obviously junky knife). This is a knife forum, and we are knife nuts, so we just take for granted that three digits makes sense as an amount to spend on a knife, but if you just want to cut something and aren't obsessed with the details of a knife, you are never going to spend that kind of money on a knife.

At $180, it's not unreasonable (or some 'modern' affectation) to expect them to have troubled themselves to sand the spine.

That's the exact mindset I was pointing out that exists in sporting / hobbyist knives, I wouldn't include all outdoors, because the puukko guys aren't really this way, with their hand made scandi's. That $100 cut off limit is not universal among all types of knives. That's some modern production knife standard likely influenced by folding knife market.
100 is still in rough budget realm in certain styles of knives hence Japanese example earlier. You can't expect anything like that at 100 dollars, after 300 dollars and up you can start expecting non kurouchi finish, and maybe spine ground smooth. but really that's for cheap kasumi laminated low end stuff anyway, hongasumi would be the next upgrade of a kasumi that basically is just a kasumi that has been hand finished to what you would call "acceptable standards".
Different folks different strokes in corners of the knife world. Standards are not universal or universally upheld in all corners of the knife world.