The Sweetest Song

[Mattie]

Unless you can do that on proper albums, of course!?

[geordierussell]

I agree with you there Mattie.

I would prefer to choose the quality of downloads, rather than be given what "they" think is the best.

[seventieslord]

There will be no DRM in the new mp3s and the loss of quality will be negligible since you're converting from an average quality to a wav, and back to average quality.

On the point of quality.

The emusic version, which I have, is V2 VBR, which is a good standard that you can play on good speakers and put on CD without it being too obvious it isn't the CD itself.

If I downloaded from itunes, I'd not only have DRM, but a file fucked around with, transcoded and compressed to some shit format so the sound quality is terrible anyway

Maybe I care too much about bitrate, for the one song it's no major disaster as I'll be buying the CD, but if I was to ever pay to download a whole album I'd feel fucking ripped off

If iiTunes gave you the option of downloading a good quality mp3, or had different prices say to download their standard one, an mp3, or a CD quality FLAC file I'd maybe use it

Very good points.

I just don't see how paying to download fits in:

Get the files online from P2P = $0

Get the CD brand new with artwork, ability to rip, and possible bonus content = $12

Get the album as DRM-protected files in a format that you may or may not want in a quality that may or may not be sufficieint for you - $10???

If option #3 was $3 then maybe I'd see its merits.

But hey, it's popular, it must be working. Buncha suckers

[seventieslord]

...I'm referring to itunes, by the way. emusic is great and can be a far better value.

[whatevermort]

Just as a point of reference, the only music DRM that has, thus far, featured any kind of spyware was the Sony CD installer one from a year or so ago, and the fuss that it caused means that nobody will ever try it again. It contravenes all sorts of rights and regs. iTunes uses its own proprietary music format, yes, but I think that's why choice is good. If you only listen to stuff on an iPod nano, and want a smaller size format - because, God knows, you don't want to transcode anything, it sounds like watery ass - then iTunes can be a godsend. If you subscribe to emusic, or use another service, then brilliant, that's awesome as well - though, I can't stress enough, burning a song and then re-ripping it results in serious quality loss.

As far as I know, the only one of these services that hurts the artist is allofmp3, simply because Russian royalties aren't that great, and the only one that hurts the purchaser is Napster, as you have to maintain your payments or lose your tracks (they are like some odd internet-Mafioso-money shark).

I think this is a taste thing - much like the censorship beeps. If you are cool with it, awesome. Otherwise, there's people getting on their high horses and blah blah blah. Personally, I got the track from emusic, as I've already paid for it (thanks to their subscription model), and will, when the cd arrives, rip it myself for my iPod. I have downloaded albums from the iTunes store - only iTunes exclusive ones, mind you - but I kind of accept that if that's the model that the band want to follow (and I'm pretty sure it's a slightly more lucrative model than an in-store release) then who am I to argue?

Oh, and don't forget: pretty soon, iTunes will be offering a choice - the 128 or a V0 Mp3, DRM free, so all will be well in the world again.

[michelle]

Here you go Michelle...

http://web.mac.com/cellings/iWeb/Webste ... ingle.html

And where in the US are you? I'm in Texas.

I think I just wet myself.

And I'm from nebraska

[seventieslord]

burning a song and then re-ripping it results in serious quality loss.

Oh, and don't forget: pretty soon, iTunes will be offering a choice - the 128 or a V0 Mp3, DRM free, so all will be well in the world again.

1. Don't be so sure. The file you're burning to the CD is only about 128 kb/s. all those super high and low frequencies have already been removed. You put that on a CD, your computer is making a wav in the background by filling in those empty spots with the unheard frequencies - you rip to mp3, it will just take the same out and you're back where you started.

If you really want to test such a theory out, all you'd have to do is take an mp3 of any bitrate, burn it to a CD, rip that track out at the same bitrate, burn that track to a CD, rip that track, and repeat the cycle maybe 10 times. If there's a loss of quality every time you do this, if it's only audible to a trained ear after one time, then after 10 times it should be obvious to all that the 10th track is not the same quality as the first. I haven't tried this, but have always wanted to. My extensive experience in the mp3 world tells me that there will be no change in quality.

2. Why is itunes doing this? Aren't they getting along just fine fucking the music buying public over? Why give them any sort of a choice?

(I buy itunes songs too, just the exclusive ones from the bands I follow - to date, I think I have bought 50 songs from them.)

[Ean]

burning a song and then re-ripping it results in serious quality loss.

Oh, and don't forget: pretty soon, iTunes will be offering a choice - the 128 or a V0 Mp3, DRM free, so all will be well in the world again.

1. Don't be so sure. The file you're burning to the CD is only about 128 kb/s. all those super high and low frequencies have already been removed. You put that on a CD, your computer is making a wav in the background by filling in those empty spots with the unheard frequencies - you rip to mp3, it will just take the same out and you're back where you started.

If you really want to test such a theory out, all you'd have to do is take an mp3 of any bitrate, burn it to a CD, rip that track out at the same bitrate, burn that track to a CD, rip that track, and repeat the cycle maybe 10 times. If there's a loss of quality every time you do this, if it's only audible to a trained ear after one time, then after 10 times it should be obvious to all that the 10th track is not the same quality as the first. I haven't tried this, but have always wanted to. My extensive experience in the mp3 world tells me that there will be no change in quality.

2. Why is itunes doing this? Aren't they getting along just fine fucking the music buying public over? Why give them any sort of a choice?

(I buy itunes songs too, just the exclusive ones from the bands I follow - to date, I think I have bought 50 songs from them.)

1. It is true, and easily testable using the method you suggested. A magazine or website I read did it to test the difference between different methods of encoding. ...And if I can remember for the life of me where I read it, I'll scan it/post a link.

2. Apple/itunes never wanted DRM, people don't buy products they are against and that cuts into their profits and damages their brand image. DRM is the record companies saying "Ok Apple, we get that this electronic music thing is taking off, we're grudgingly going to be a part of it and make money. But if you want to do this, here's how we're going to fuck you over and make people hate you." The recent Apple/Emi descision is helping to change this, but it'll cost you a quid a track instead of 79p. And at a higher bitrate too (double the normal, in fact), oddly, albums will be sold at the higher bitrate, and free of DRM, but at the same price as normal.

[seventieslord]

1. It is true, and easily testable using the method you suggested. A magazine or website I read did it to test the difference between different methods of encoding. ...And if I can remember for the life of me where I read it, I'll scan it/post a link.

You're saying there will, or won't be a loss in quality? If there is, then the algorithms they use for encoding are fucked up, because what I learned about them in 2000 tells me that as long as we are dealing with the same quality and encoder there should not be a loss. If you do find out where you read it, please post it.

[kriscoverdale]

1. It is true, and easily testable using the method you suggested. A magazine or website I read did it to test the difference between different methods of encoding. ...And if I can remember for the life of me where I read it, I'll scan it/post a link.

You're saying there will, or won't be a loss in quality? If there is, then the algorithms they use for encoding are fucked up, because what I learned about them in 2000 tells me that as long as we are dealing with the same quality and encoder there should not be a loss. If you do find out where you read it, please post it.

MP3 is a lossy compression format - and as such will lose quality on repeated passes. See this wikipedia article for details.

Most other formats that produce relatively small files are also lossy e.g. ogg vorbis, aac, wma.

wav is lossless, but has far bigger files as a result of storing all of the samples.

Cheers
Kris

[seventieslord]

1. It is true, and easily testable using the method you suggested. A magazine or website I read did it to test the difference between different methods of encoding. ...And if I can remember for the life of me where I read it, I'll scan it/post a link.

You're saying there will, or won't be a loss in quality? If there is, then the algorithms they use for encoding are fucked up, because what I learned about them in 2000 tells me that as long as we are dealing with the same quality and encoder there should not be a loss. If you do find out where you read it, please post it.

MP3 is a lossy compression format - and as such will lose quality on repeated passes. See this wikipedia article for details.

Most other formats that produce relatively small files are also lossy e.g. ogg vorbis, aac, wma.

wav is lossless, but has far bigger files as a result of storing all of the samples.

Cheers
Kris

Yeah, I understand it's lossy, but it stands to reason that everything that it loses, it loses the first time. What's left, it will "expand" to wav format and remove the fluff when you recompress.

[kriscoverdale]

Yeah, I understand it's lossy, but it stands to reason that everything that it loses, it loses the first time. What's left, it will "expand" to wav format and remove the fluff when you recompress.

I'm not sure I fully follow what you're referring to here now - my assumption is that you are referring to repeatedly re-encoding a song in mp3. If so, I think it isn't simply a case that you get rid of the stuff you don't need the first time and then do nothing on repeated passes. Instead errors introduced on the first pass are then part of the input the 2nd time, which leads to bigger errors being fed into the 3rd pass etc. This is similar to what you can do with a photocopy - if you keep re-photocopying the copies that come out, the quality very quickly degrades. I've found an interesting discussion about exactly this topic here

If you're referring to reencoding an MP3 to a WAV, and then repeatedly using that, then yes you'd only lose the quality once in the encoding pass.

Cheers Kris

[Bang!]

God good this thread got amazingly serious and bizarrely detailed about track qulaity all of a sudden

[seventieslord]

I'm not sure I fully follow what you're referring to here now - my assumption is that you are referring to repeatedly re-encoding a song in mp3. If so, I think it isn't simply a case that you get rid of the stuff you don't need the first time and then do nothing on repeated passes. Instead errors introduced on the first pass are then part of the input the 2nd time, which leads to bigger errors being fed into the 3rd pass etc. This is similar to what you can do with a photocopy - if you keep re-photocopying the copies that come out, the quality very quickly degrades. I've found an interesting discussion about exactly this topic here

If you're referring to reencoding an MP3 to a WAV, and then repeatedly using that, then yes you'd only lose the quality once in the encoding pass.

Cheers Kris

What do you mean, repeatedly encoding a song in mp3? The second description you gave sounds a lot like the first - it has to go back to a wav to be re-encoded. Sorry to hammer this topic to death, but I want to make sure we're on the same page. take the CD out of the equation - once you have a .wav you're finished with the CD.
suppose you have file1.wav and you encode it into file1.mp3. you then decode it and it becomes file2.wav. Then you encode that and call it file2.mp3. Then decode that file to a wav and call it file3.wav, and so on. My contention is that file10.mp3 will sound exactly like file1.mp3.

Anyway, I'm going to go read that discussion now.

[Ginger_Is_God]

2. Why is itunes doing this? Aren't they getting along just fine fucking the music buying public over? Why give them any sort of a choice?

They are doing this because they are going to charge extra for the DRM free music !
WTF, they are going back in time and no doubt saving money, but because we want it that way we have to pay for it.

regs. iTunes uses its own proprietary music format, yes, but I think that's why choice is good. If you only listen to stuff on an iPod nano, and want a smaller size format - because, God knows, you don't want to transcode anything, it sounds like watery ass - then iTunes can be a godsend. If you subscribe to emusic, or use another service, then brilliant, that's awesome as well - though, I can't stress enough, burning a song and then re-ripping it results in serious quality loss.

, whatevermort why would you want to pay for your music twice?

The music industry is on to a bloody good thing here, they only have to pay for bandwith and a few pence to the artist instead of burning CD's and printing sleeves, but no they want to phuq us over all ends

I have an idea, why don't they charge us around a fiver for DRM free music with downloads for covers, inlay cards etc.

Not too much to ask, not too expensive for them, they'll still make millions and we'll get the choice of what to do with our purchase.

Till then its physical discs for me..

PS How long will it be before CD's are extinct coz they have been out for a long time now! ha ha

cheers AJ