Frustration with digital download age.

DrGonzo · 2013-02-18T10:42:05+00:00

Ok so with the coming of iTunes store to South Africa, there seems to be a slowly brightening future for paid for digital downloads yes? :-\ But why is it that we are so restricted to the format that we buy music in? Shoudlnt we be able to have a choice? why is it so difficult to come across lossless audio? I recently went on a genocidal rampage on my laptop to delete all mp3's that were not 320 bit rate... there was a lot, the reason being is that I also listen to music on my Focal monitors and they really highlight the shitty encoding of most mp3's, So i decided Im gonna be a good audio professional and clear out the garbage on my computer as wells commit to having a small, growing music library of LEGAL, high quality audio and high quality music rather than a mass quantity of 128kbit mp3's which was previously occupying my hdd space. I have bought a number of albums off iTunes.. and I will say, the aac encoding is not bad, if i burn the cd for my car front loader i will probably not hear the difference, and I understand the need for such encoding regarding file sizes and portable music players etc, but surely you should have the option to choose what format - FLAC? ALAC? wav? cdda? come on! same with amazon, only mp3's nothing else. Bandcamp is the greatest website around allowing unsigned artist to sell their music and the option to download it in just about every format you like! but very limited artist. where as itunes you can find so much music. Like for instance last night I wanted to download the new deftones album... The engineering, mixing and production on deftones albums are nearly always phenomenal and like to really hear all the nuances, depth and spaciality as a reference for my own work, so in that case I would prefer not to have a 256kbit aac/mp3... But I searched the internet and could not find a paid for download in flac or alac format... i did a quick torrent search and top hit was a absolutely simple free FLAC download of the album at the click of the button, which i ended up doing. - now that irritates me because as much as I am, really, quite commited to supporting musicians and the digital music industry, when i have to search for ages reaching dead ends to try and be a diligent, legal citizen then obviosuly I am gonna reacxh a point and be F$%$ that and get a super easy free download. >☹ I know the majority of the population couldn't care, nor hear the difference of a 128kbit mp3 or cd wav but I can and its a shame that the quality of audio has ever increasingly from great to worse as we go forth into the "future"

V8

DrGonzo wrote but I guess its a relatively new market and we will just have to wait until a complete infrastructure for everyone to be satisfied. I understand that for now, services like itunes and such care first and foremost for their commercial consumers i.e. ppl with portable ipods and iphones etc where the space on the device is limited and Hi-Fidelity audio is a secondary concern (music is listened to generally on $10 in ears not $600 studio reference cans.)

I reckon it's a opportunity to service a growing market. I'm no longer a fan of physical media for distributing music (Vinyl/CD).

I've a bunch of dj friends, who frequent beatport mainly because they can d/l wav's. For them it's apparently a fidelity issue, especially on bigger sound systems (20K+) at outdoor events.

When sourcing music in a loss-less format for fidelity purposes - we'd surely want to consider the source (What and how was it digitized?). E.g What = was it Vinyl, CD or did the artist supply in digital format? How = What codecs & parameters were used during the digitizing process? Just being available in FLAC doesn't guarantee fidelity (although it usually is preferable to mp3).

It might only be the last 1% in the fidelity chain, but -imho- it still would affect the product you receive.

Slightly off topic : As musicians (amateur or not), we feel strongly about the artist being recompensed fairly for their work? Even in the digital age, it seems major labels are ripping artists off for digital downloads : http://arstechnica.com/uncategorized/2008/01/radiohead-artists-often-screwed-by-digital-downloads/

But when they retain rights over their music and distribute digitally, they stand to make excellent returns. So...it's not as easy as buying from iTunes and believing the artist is still receiving reasonable compensation. Not that this excuses piracy in any form.

A more current article about Radiohead's internet distribution : http://www.nme.com/blog/index.php?blog=10&title=did_radiohead_s_in_rainbows_honesty_box_&more=1&c=1&tb=1&pb=1

DrGonzo

Yeah will iTunes is not wholly fair on the artist either, but its a hell of a step forward. at least its SOMETHING.

Put it this way, just about every single person that I know (and don't judge me on my friends) love music, but would rather not pay for it. and given the opportunity they will not. they believe such things should be free and don't even pretend to understand what the music business is like and whats its like to be an artist.

However in the last year or so, I have actually seen that attitude in a number of people I know slowly changing and quite alot of them were actually excited about iTunes SA and set up accounts and felt it was great they could search for any music and it was way cheaper than a CD store.!

and that gives me hope!

as its been said the digital download age is still in its infancy and once more and more people adopt it and the torrent system is slowly (hopefully, maybe?!?) shut down I reckon it will be much more flexible offering multiple formats of your choice. Perhaps also, some music rights organizations can step in and lobby and negotiate better deals for artists with apple and other distribution agencies.

DrGonzo

V8 read the article thanks for the share.

shit man there is always someone putting their hand in and screwing over the musicians.

I guess, at least, its not that different from the last 60 years of the music recording industry so its less of a shock. :-\

BMU

You all can hear the difference between 256 and 320 bit mp3? Really? Blind test really?

Not me. 128 bit mp3 is unlistenable, just horrible. But anything above 192 sounds just fine to me.

But then as I always say: the key to happiness are low standards.

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