There's been a big kerfluffle in the online brewing world this year over "LoDO" brewing aka Low Dissolved Oxygen brewing. Proponents of the extremely complex methodology theorize that by reducing the amount of oxygen entrained at all times in the mash or the boil that you prevent oxidative reactions that damage the beer's flavor and reduces the overall malt character.
The reason they're obsessed is they're driven to recreate the "it" character they claim German beers have with their malts that they find lacking in many commercial and homebrews.
Most of us geeky adherents to the world of homebrewing love our numbers. What's your efficiency rating, what's your gravity, your pH, your blah, blah, blah, blah..... There's a comfort, cold as it may be, in having a number we can look at. Numbers provide a reasonably solid, nonsubjective measure of the world - a target, a pin in the map.
