loudness war and mp3's how they are ruining our music.

[QQQ]

MP3's and other lossy formats DO NOT ruining our music. It's up to user what format to choose.
Loudness war DO ruining our music, because it's corrupting the music at the beginning, so WE HAVE NO CHOICE.

[jilgiljongiljing]

MP3's and other lossy formats DO NOT ruining our music. It's up to user what format to choose.

That is true to a certain extent but for most people the choice is more between buying a cd and the convenience of simply buying the mp3 and directly transferring it to their DAP.

Given a choice, convenience takes priority for most people, only a select bunch of ppl like the ones on this site will go the extra mile.

The day when all music download stores start selling lossless music as an option and all mp3 players start supporting lossless formats is when you can say the user truly has a choice, as of now, in most cases, most users dont have much of a choice since the industry is just pushing mp3s at them and they are misinformed.

[listenCarefully]

Originally Posted by jilgiljongiljing

That is true to a certain extent but for most people the choice is more between buying a cd and the convenience of simply buying the mp3 and directly transferring it to their DAP.

Given a choice, convenience takes priority for most people, only a select bunch of ppl like the ones on this site will go the extra mile.

The day when all music download stores start selling lossless music as an option and all mp3 players start supporting lossless formats is when you can say the user truly has a choice, as of now, in most cases, most users dont have much of a choice since the industry is just pushing mp3s at them and they are misinformed.

I agree that the average person will always opt for convenience but that's still a choice. When I want a recording I refuse to settle for anything less than the best quality available and I have NEVER bought, downloaded or even listened to an MP3. Furthermore I have always had access to, and been able to purchase, the CD (which I rip to my computer using a lossless compression format to save space). Uncompressed WAV or lossless formats can be implemented on any and all of my playback devices.

[jilgiljongiljing]

Knowing that the average person prefers convenience, if all music stores and most legally downloadable content is offered in lossy mp3, and when most mp3 players dont seem to support popular lossless formats, my point is its no longer a clear choice because they are literally shoving it down your throat. When the playing field is leveled and all players support popular lossless formats and all downloadable content is available in both mp3 and lossless, then there is a clear choice. If after that the user chooses to pick mp3, then its a choice he/she made and its their fault.

I agree people do have a choice right now and I am not saying you are wrong, people can buy the cd and take the effort to rip it, but my point is, mp3's are ruining music because the industry is pushing that at the average consumer knowing that they will buy it and knowing that it is lossy and not honest to the original content.

[listenCarefully]

This thread has reenforced the realization that the music industry has become completely and utterly commercially corrupt. I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for this industry to act with anything that even remotely resembles integrity.

[majid]

The solution is very simple. Switch to classical music. Not only has it stood the test of time, unlike adulterated pap like Britney Spears, but it is also not tampered with because of a more discerning audience.

Labels would not engage in DR compression if the so-called "artists" it is applied to were not complicit.

[listenCarefully]

I believe I already pointed out that Jazz and Classical tend to be recorded with integrity. They are not aimed at the mass market so naturally they don't attract the scum of the earth opportunists who's only interest in music is how it can be exploited for profit.

[variable114]

Originally Posted by majid

The solution is very simple. Switch to classical music. Not only has it stood the test of time, unlike adulterated pap like Britney Spears, but it is also not tampered with because of a more discerning audience.

Labels would not engage in DR compression if the so-called "artists" it is applied to were not complicit.

why would you assume that?

[majkel]

There is one simple truth: well mastered album converted to mp3 320kb/s sounds much better than a "loudness war" polluted album directly from a CD player. Rip Miles Davies' "Kind of Blue" to mp3 320kb/s using WMP11 (FhG codec) and compare the quality to the "Californication" or other audio CD's with cranked up RMS.

[Fallen]

When I was a fresh graduate, I trained for a few weeks in the biggest sound post-production house in my country, focusing mainly on sound editing and mixing for radio and television commercials.

It was a weird, schizo experience.

FIRST- They teach you how to mix well, or at least they teach you as much about mixing as they can in two weeks.

AND THEN they teach you to mix badly, compressing ALMOST to the point of clipping, mainly so that your ad will be heard clearly on the worst television sets and radio boxes.

They knew that they were teaching us how to make our work sound worse, losing all details and subtlety, but our ad agencies and clients would complain if their ad came out much softer compared to the rest of the competition.

I was young, and I thought it would be a simple thing just to get all the sound production houses together and agree to keep sound at a decent level of compression. My trainers were amused, and said this had been suggested several times before, but the levels never went down, everyone waiting for the other person to move first.

I was immediately struck by this never ending cycle.

There seems to be no solution. It's a "game theory" situation, where you can't trust your competition to keep everything at decent levels. And the sound production houses have to get the networks to agree as well, and you can never get two television networks to agree whether it's raining or not.

Maybe a major equipment change can solve this problem, with auto-adjust on televisions and radios for different levels of compression. But a gentleman's agreement seems out of the question at this point.