MQA is Vaporware

[Ralf11]

4 hours ago, mansr said:

It matters because this is, regardless of current deployment, part of the extended plan for MQA, and as such should it factor into any evaluation of the format.

 

 

Exactly.  It is just like a virus with a delayed effect.  First, it infects the entire population, and then ...

[Jud]

26 minutes ago, mansr said:

DRM is a technical mechanism for enforcement, not a legal contract. Perhaps your experience is a bit out of date.

 

It could be, but yes, I know what DRM refers to.

[mansr]

Just now, Jud said:

I know what DRM refers to.

Then start acting like it.

[Shadders]

[Jud]

1 minute ago, mansr said:

Then start acting like it.

 

Oh dear.  Because I supposed an NDA might cover the underlying content that MQA clients would surely be concerned with?  (I've done an NDA for a software company.)  When you provided additional context, I said yes, the reference to rights management was about aspects of the software.  Until I saw the additional context, I wasn't going to assume that.

[crenca]

12 minutes ago, Jud said:

 

Oh dear.  Because I supposed an NDA might cover the underlying content that MQA clients would surely be concerned with?  (I've done an NDA for a software company.)  When you provided additional context, I said yes, the reference to rights management was about aspects of the software.  Until I saw the additional context, I wasn't going to assume that.

 

It's interesting what you say about "context".  Here is the orignal statement that mansr posted:

 

"The parties to this Agreement wish to discuss and exchange information in the general area of streaming or downloading, encoding, re-coding or decoding of high-resolution music, rights management, encoding and quality authentication."

 

So you have this list  (I count 4) of technical, digital MQA capabilities as a software product, and in the middle of this list (of 4) is something called "rights management" (#3).  So in the context you assume that they are referring to another issue entirely separate from the context of the list itself?  It's not as if "rights management" is something incroguent like say "ice cream" - it fits rationally into the context of the sentence/list.

 

Not trying to put the screws to you Jud, I am just trying to understand how a lawyers mind works ?

[Jud]

1 hour ago, crenca said:

 

Your confusing the products themselves with the underlying standards they rest on.  With IE, Microsoft once tried to enforce its own standard (a hacked up, proprietary form of HTML - the standard), they failed utterly.  IE/MS Edge today rests on the current flavor HTML.  With Office, Microsoft has been more successful with implementing its own sort-of-standard (what version of hacked up xml are we on today?), but even here they have been forced by the market to stay relevant.  I don't use Office, I use Apache Open Office even though 99% of my business partners, family and friends use MS Office and our documents are intercompatible because MS Office recognizes (has to - the market so far demands it) standards.

 

Apple might be a better example for your argument/angle - it's ecosystem is quite closed which is the primary reason I don't allow it in my house (and back when I had influence in IT I worked very hard to keep it out of the whatever corp/government ecosystem I worked in). Yet, folks from other ecosystems (MS, Android, Linux, etc.) can intercommunicate with Apple just fine as they are forced to use HTML, etc. because the market demands it.

 

A DAC is a DAC (i.e. a product), and the underlying software standard (i.e. PCM/DSD) is the standard they all rest on...

 

MS very successfully screwed up web standards for many years, ensuring Netscape (and other browsers) wouldn't work with many websites that IE did.  You can still see the effects today when two browsers produce different results.  These days part of the reason MS makes a more compliant browser is because Google beat them at the market power game and sites have to work with Chrome.  (Of course computer based browsers are no longer so important since smartphones came into existence.)

 

I understand the distinction you want to make on the basis of format, but at a practical level we are really talking about accessibility and availability.  Better access to RedBook and higher resolution downloads and streams still has (and for the foreseeable future will have) far more to do with the market dominance of the non-proprietary mp3 format than MQA. 

[Jud]

14 minutes ago, crenca said:

 

It's interesting what you say about "context".  Here is the orignal statement that mansr posted:

 

"The parties to this Agreement wish to discuss and exchange information in the general area of streaming or downloading, encoding, re-coding or decoding of high-resolution music, rights management, encoding and quality authentication."

 

So you have this list  (I count 4) of technical, digital MQA capabilities as a software product, and in the middle of this list (of 4) is something called "rights management" (#3).  So in the context you assume that they are referring to another issue entirely separate from the context of the list itself?  It's not as if "rights management" is something incroguent like say "ice cream" - it fits rationally into the context of the sentence/list.

 

Not trying to put the screws to you Jud, I am just trying to understand how a lawyers mind works ?

 

Yep, seems quite obvious, but I did not want to assume that.

 

I am sure that for anyone associated with MQA who might have any access to content, their access rights and restrictions on any copying or redistribution are provided for by contract. You would then have the choice of whether to put this in a separate agreement or include it in the same contract along with the obligation not to disclose the technology.  You'd also have the choice of whether to have the individual agree directly with the various content providers or have MQA take that on as part of its contracts with the client and the individuals involved.  (I'd think the latter would be more likely.)

[mansr]

9 minutes ago, Jud said:

I am sure that for anyone associated with MQA who might have any access to content

Why would a DAC manufacturer get access to content by adding MQA?

[Jud]

17 minutes ago, Jud said:

I understand the distinction you want to make on the basis of format

 

If you ever want to see what are likely some of the first cases regarding format and attempts to use it for market dominance, there are some interesting railroad gauge (track width) cases from the 1800s.  Before gauge was standardized, railroad owners would build tracks only their cars could run on. 

[crenca]

11 minutes ago, Jud said:

 

I understand the distinction you want to make on the basis of format, but at a practical level we are really talking about accessibility and availability.  Better access to RedBook and higher resolution downloads and streams still has (and for the foreseeable future will have) far more to do with the market dominance of the non-proprietary mp3 format than MQA. 

 

Hum, not sure where you are going with this.  Yes, formats are the underlying basis of "accessibility and availability".  That is one of the primary reasons they are important.  When you see companies wrestle with formats in an effort to control (your IE vs Netscape) example, what is happening is a format war of sorts  - at least format/standards are the technical weapons in a market war.  Consumers (civilians) get caught in the crossfire true, but I suppose I go back to the original point in that consumers tend toward (very strongly in fact) their interests in open standards, and that closed standards only "win" when an outside force (in the case of DVD/Blue ray, the Congress of the USA) intervenes.  In other words, DRM was and is rejected by the market/consumers and not embraced as you allege.

 

Not sure what mp3 is or was a threat to "access" of 16/44 or higher.  mp3 is a modification in a different way to PCM than MQA, and while it is (or was - patent expired if I am not mistaken) its purpose, as a standard and a digital implementation was not to supplant PCM as an "end to end" standard.  MQA express goal is to replace PCM. 

 

You keep coming back to a "until a certain threshold no worries" and it is a truism on a certain level, but mansr's point is that MQA is a digital DRM solution/implementation in a way that these other things you are pointing are not.  Despite explicit denials of all the MQA players (Bob S, the trade publication promotion machine, etc.), this is true as it even says so right in the NDA...

[Jud]

1 minute ago, mansr said:

Why would a DAC manufacturer get access to content by adding MQA?

 

I wasn't aware this was an NDA with a DAC manufacturer.  You may have said so and I missed it.

[mansr]

2 minutes ago, Jud said:

I wasn't aware this was an NDA with a DAC manufacturer.  You may have said so and I missed it.

I didn't say it was, and maybe it isn't. Now if it's with a studio or label, there'd be no reason for MQA to provide content either since the other party would then have their own.

[Jud]

16 minutes ago, mansr said:

I didn't say it was, and maybe it isn't. Now if it's with a studio or label, there'd be no reason for MQA to provide content either since the other party would then have their own.

 

MQA would not be providing the content. Let's say MQA hires a producer to make a new master of a Sony-owned recording and run it through the MQA process.  If I were preparing a contract for the producer on behalf of MQA, I might have a section entitled Rights Management that could have one or two subsections.  It would certainly have to provide for access rights and copying and redistribution limitations of the producer with respect to the recording.  If MQA DRM was involved in the project, there would also be language providing for the producer’s non-disclosure of that technology.

 

Edit: Doesn’t have to be the producer. Could be anyone used by MQA to run the recording through the MQA process.

[mansr]

5 minutes ago, Jud said:

MQA would not be providing the content.

Then it wouldn't be covered by the NDA as it is worded. The NDA covers information exchanged between MQA and the other signatory, as is standard practice for NDAs.

[Jud]

24 minutes ago, crenca said:

 

Hum, not sure where you are going with this.  Yes, formats are the underlying basis of "accessibility and availability".  That is one of the primary reasons they are important.  When you see companies wrestle with formats in an effort to control (your IE vs Netscape) example, what is happening is a format war of sorts  - at least format/standards are the technical weapons in a market war.  Consumers (civilians) get caught in the crossfire true, but I suppose I go back to the original point in that consumers tend toward (very strongly in fact) their interests in open standards, and that closed standards only "win" when an outside force (in the case of DVD/Blue ray, the Congress of the USA) intervenes.  In other words, DRM was and is rejected by the market/consumers and not embraced as you allege.

 

Not sure what mp3 is or was a threat to "access" of 16/44 or higher.  mp3 is a modification in a different way to PCM than MQA, and while it is (or was - patent expired if I am not mistaken) its purpose, as a standard and a digital implementation was not to supplant PCM as an "end to end" standard.  MQA express goal is to replace PCM. 

 

You keep coming back to a "until a certain threshold no worries" and it is a truism on a certain level, but mansr's point is that MQA is a digital DRM solution/implementation in a way that these other things you are pointing are not.  Despite explicit denials of all the MQA players (Bob S, the trade publication promotion machine, etc.), this is true as it even says so right in the NDA...

 

I think you might find the vast majority of consumers not knowing or caring what DRM (or any other form of rights management) is unless it makes life inconvenient or expensive for them personally.  So I think the bottom line is price and convenience (and to some extent quality) rather than principles involving rights and open formats. 

 

What I mean regarding mp3 is that as long as consumers who are willing to buy it make up such a huge percentage of the market, there is no incentive for content companies to supply RedBook or hi res. Those resolutions are pushed into a tiny niche just by market forces, and their availability is thereby limited far more effectively than MQA can do until and unless it becomes far more popular.

[Brinkman Ship]

Dear Lord, Jud has all you posters in a sleeper hold. That is 3 hours you will never get back.

 

[crenca]

5 minutes ago, Jud said:

 

I think you might find the vast majority of consumers not knowing or caring what DRM (or any other form of rights management) is unless it makes life inconvenient or expensive for them personally.  So I think the bottom line is price and convenience (and to some extent quality) rather than principles involving rights and open formats. 

 

What I mean regarding mp3 is that as long as consumers who are willing to buy it make up such a huge percentage of the market, there is no incentive for content companies to supply RedBook or hi res. Those resolutions are pushed into a tiny niche just by market forces, and their availability is thereby limited far more effectively than MQA can do until and unless it becomes far more popular.

 

I think I see where you are coming from.  Where we differ is our evaluation of where consumers are vis-a-vis DRM.  While consumers can not "explain" it to you, or spell DRM, like pornagraphy they know it when the see it.  DRM is always in some form or fashion an inconvenience and expense (by design - that is what it is for) and so again, consumers can't use the right words but they know it on some level.  That is why they almost always reject it.

 

As far as mp3, I can recall only a handful of times I have went to make a purchase and could not at locate at least a 16/44.  All of them involved Electronica which I have only gotten into in the last couple of years.  I suppose I am with you on this, in that I won't worry about it until mp3 gains a certain market threshold ?

[Jud]

38 minutes ago, mansr said:

Then it wouldn't be covered by the NDA as it is worded. The NDA covers information exchanged between MQA and the other signatory, as is standard practice for NDAs.

 

I don't know whether you have been involved in contracts that concern multiple parties, but someone would be contractually obligating the person running the content through the MQA process with respect to his access rights to that content and limitations thereon. That could be the content provider, but in my experience it would more typically be the vendor (MQA in this case) so the content provider doesn't have the headache of dealing with multiple individuals.

 

If this contract is with MQA, it could be a separate agreement, or part of an overall contract that included provisions for non-disclosure of MQA (edit: digital rights management) technology.  I haven't seen the agreement and so I had no way of knowing who it was with and whether it was limited to non-disclosure of MQA technology until you made that more clear.  (You did refer to it as "an NDA," but I was not going to assume on the basis of a non-lawyer's brief description what might or might not be included in the agreement.)

[Jud]

6 minutes ago, crenca said:

As far as mp3, I can recall only a handful of times I have went to make a purchase and could not at locate at least a 16/44.  All of them involved Electronica which I have only gotten into in the last couple of years.  I suppose I am with you on this, in that I won't worry about it until mp3 gains a certain market threshold ?

 

So you're able to buy everything available on iTunes or the streaming services as soon as it comes out in at least 16/44.1 downloadable format? 

 

Edit: Oh, and for a reasonable price?

[crenca]

14 minutes ago, Jud said:

 

So you're able to buy everything available on iTunes or the streaming services as soon as it comes out in at least 16/44.1 downloadable format? 

 

Edit: Oh, and for a reasonable price?

 

I don't do Apple so I don't know about iTunes.  With my usual genres of Jazz and Classical I can find a download usually, occasionally resorting to having to order a CD online.  With Electronica I have to resort to ordering a CD more often (which is counter intuitive to me at least), often from more obscure places as well.  Usually for a reasonable price yes, but I might be less price sensitive than some.  Like I said I have only been blocked a handful of times because I could not find the CD or 16/44 or higher download as I won't buy mp3.  My collection is surely smaller than many (most?) of the folks around here, but I am still actively buying at I don't know, couple of hundred dollars a month...

[Dr Tone]

58 minutes ago, Jud said:

 

So you're able to buy everything available on iTunes or the streaming services as soon as it comes out in at least 16/44.1 downloadable format? 

 

Edit: Oh, and for a reasonable price?

 

7digital has most everything available on Apple Music and reasonably priced.

 

Or at least everything I look for...

[Jud]

1 minute ago, Dr Tone said:

 

7digital has most everything available to Apple Music and reasonably priced.

 

I've found some things they didn't have that I had to purchase as CDs on Amazon.  They are sometimes more expensive than other sources, sometimes cheaper, depending on the recording.  Overall I like them.  I once bought a recording from them that had a corrupted track.  They couldn't get hold of the correct version, so they refunded my purchase, though I don't know if they ever got around to correcting the situation or pulling the recording.    (I assume they eventually did one or the other.)

[Jud]

52 minutes ago, crenca said:

 

I don't do Apple so I don't know about iTunes.  With my usual genres of Jazz and Classical I can find a download usually, occasionally resorting to having to order a CD online.  With Electronica I have to resort to ordering a CD more often (which is counter intuitive to me at least), often from more obscure places as well.  Usually for a reasonable price yes, but I might be less price sensitive than some.  Like I said I have only been blocked a handful of times because I could not find the CD or 16/44 or higher download as I won't buy mp3.  My collection is surely smaller than many (most?) of the folks around here, but I am still actively buying at I don't know, couple of hundred dollars a month...

 

Yes, I agree you can nearly always get the CD if you can't get the download.  But that's part of what I'm saying, is that sometimes a download is unavailable so you have to order a disc. (I personally worry more about long term availability of discs in such situations than I do about MQA.)

 

I also wonder if hi res downloads in particular might be a little cheaper if they were more widely available.

 

First World problems, I grant you.

[Siltech817]

Speaking of music, saxophonist Jerome Sabbagh has an upcoming release I sampled on Soundcloud.

In a recent interview I noted the following quote from the artist:

 

Q: MQA has been a controversial topic among audiophiles recently. It has been criticized for being lossy, a closed proprietary system, and a fee generating scheme. However, some have subjectively claimed it “improves” the sound of digital masters. What is your take?

 

A: I honestly don’t know what MQA sounds like, as I’ve never even heard an MQA file. I have a problem with the fact that proponents of it seem to want to apply it retroactively to recordings. I don’t think that’s wise, given that approval for the master was given years before. Whatever MQA does, good or bad, it does something and thus I think it runs the risk of changing the sound of a recording in a way that the artist and/or producer didn’t sign off on. I also don’t like the fact that, according to what I’ve read, MQA encoded files are supposed to gradually take the place of high resolution recordings. I am happy to pay for high resolution recordings, I want to keep the option of buying them as a consumer.

 

An Interview With Jazz Musician Jerome Sabbagh

 

Quite interesting, I for one am in full agreement with this artist, and I will buy his forthcoming album on hi-rez download when released.