Righto - this is silly, but it's something that a member of the public one outreach night pointed out as a concern, and as a "barrier" to her entering amateur astronomy. She stood there on the field, pointing to and counting the number of knobs my rig had on it and then, bemused and confused, asked me what they all did.
That was half an hour-worth of yakkin'. LOL! "If it needs that much adjustment, it can't be easy to learn" was her main comment.
I thought it amusing, so I played along. We counted
49 knobs (def: adjustment devices that could be turned by hand without a tool) on the scopes and mount, and 12 buttons (excluding the laptop keyboard). No wonder people look at these things and think "too complex". I don't think so, but then again... it's my hobby.
Admittedly I wouldn't have this particular setup running on a non-public night (all for show really), but it illustrates the point.
No wonder people wrongly think that you need a degree to run one.