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Yesterday, Salon.com posted an article in its "Audiofile" section called the "Death of HiFi?". While the article is nothing special in that it tells us nothing that we haven't already heard and dismissed here at AA , what is fascinating are the fifty-some letters to the editor it generated. The letters are written mostly by musicians and engineers and music lovers, but by very few audiophiles. The letters illustrate what such music-loving, yet normal, people really care about in music quality. The letters are very, very well written and educational to the Ipod crowd in ways that I think we all could aspire to here at AA. For example, one person concisely differentiates dynamic range compression from lossy file compression when debating analog vs. digital or cd v. mp3. Also, an engineer concisely describes in plain English what MP3 distortion sounds like. Some of the writing is entertaining. For example, "djansing", a vinyl lover writes:"I suppose if you were to go out with your American Express Plutonium Card to an audio specialty store and spend more on a stereo system than one might expect to pay for a new Cadillac, you could get something that made those old vinyl records sound really, really good, to the point that someone under the age of 20, whose ears are still capable of picking up the smallest nuances of what was recorded, could point out every surface flaw in that prized copy of Led Zeppelin IV you played exactly twice since it was pressed."
If you got an hour to kill, I recommend reading the letters. Go to:
http://www.salon.com/ent/audiofile/2007/04/24/stereo/index.html
Follow Ups:
...counting the amount of feedback he has received.Not only do people perceive differences in sound (as many comment), but many people care enough about good sound to respond. I have not seen this many letters to an article in Salon in a long time :)
Die gefährlichste Weltanschauung ist die Weltanschauung derjenigen, die die Welt nicht angeschaut haben.
Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859)
I liken the inability to distinguish MP3 from CD via typical playback equipment to the inability to distinguish Minox photos from Polaroid photos via inkjet copies.....I've heard non-audiophiles notice sonic changes rather easily in the presence of decent playback. Which unfortunately is not nearly as often as it once was.
My fear is that the notion of "MP3 no worse than CD" will catch on in the music industry (it has already), and recordings will become even poorer. This whole trend has become a death spiral.
It requires registration and unfortunately bugmenot does not work with that site.
And thanks to Tom for the link. Didn't read all the posts but most of what I did were excellent.Under cloudy Seattle skies, Gill
Maybe you clicked in the wrong place and got sent to the registration page.
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