MQA is Vaporware

[StephenJK]

5 hours ago, Dr Tone said:

Interesting content from Danny @ Roon, it turns out that MQA gets payed per track played using software decoding.

 

 Those still using Tidal and software decoding are continually feeding MQA money.

 

 

We don't all have options available to us.  In Canada, and using Roon, the only streaming platforms configured are Tidal, Qobuz and DropBox.  

 

Unfortunately, Qobuz won't allow accounts from Canada, at least not yet.  I did send them an email, and received a very polite reply that said "not available."  I would prefer Qobuz, not only for highres files but also to be able to buy music I would like to add permanently to my library.

 

In the meantime, my only option is Tidal.  

[Dr Tone]

6 minutes ago, StephenJK said:

We don't all have options available to us.  In Canada, and using Roon, the only streaming platforms configured are Tidal, Qobuz and DropBox.  

 

Unfortunately, Qobuz won't allow accounts from Canada, at least not yet.  I did send them an email, and received a very polite reply that said "not available."  I would prefer Qobuz, not only for highres files but also to be able to buy music I would like to add permanently to my library.

 

In the meantime, my only option is Tidal.  

I’m Canadian.  I choose not to stream via Roon.

 

You can use Roon/Tidal with the MQA core decoder turned off as Danny suggests.

[StephenJK]

25 minutes ago, firedog said:

Roon also pays for the users' accessing metadata. From what was said on the Roon site, it's Roon collecting the data for decoder royalty payments, not MQA. But Tidal of course, does know what you play from there, MQA or not.

There's nothing sinister about that.  Netflix and Disney+ etc. all know what you're up to, you and your family.  Oh, and your phone provider knows who you're calling, and who called you.  :)

[StephenJK]

1 minute ago, Dr Tone said:

I’m Canadian.  I choose not to stream via Roon.

All good.  Following recommendations here I turned off the Roon part of MQA decoding. 

 

Streaming with Tidal through Roon gives me the opportunity to sample music that I normally could only do by purchasing a CD or LP, or watching some lousy YouTube video.  Where I used to buy a few CDs or more a month and the occasional LP now it's only $20 a month for Tidal.  I think it's a great value for essentially Redbook sound quality.  

 

 

[firedog]

1 hour ago, StephenJK said:

There's nothing sinister about that.  Netflix and Disney+ etc. all know what you're up to, you and your family.  Oh, and your phone provider knows who you're calling, and who called you.  :)

 

1 hour ago, StephenJK said:

There's nothing sinister about that.  Netflix and Disney+ etc. all know what you're up to, you and your family.  Oh, and your phone provider knows who you're calling, and who called you.  :)

Didn't say it was sinister. 

[lucretius]

11 hours ago, firedog said:

Wow, Roon pays per play decode. That's way worse than I would ever have imagined. Of course, the MQA fanboys over at Roon said, (prarphrase) "then just buy a full MQA DAC, and don't ask Roon to decode".....

No wonder Roon costs so much...

 

So, by swapping out Redbook files for MQA files, Tidal has increased revenues to MQA Ltd. by increasing the cost of third party software (e.g. Roon, Audirvana, USB Audio Player Pro, etc.) to users.  Genius -- Tidal must have got their cut.

[SoundAndMotion]

On 4/21/2021 at 12:25 AM, UkPhil said:

Anyone cozying up for Bob’s fireside chat on Saturday with What Hifi,  not me I’ll be too busy watching paint dry unfortunately.

Have there been any reports on this? I’m particularly interested in whether the video from @GoldenOnewas mentioned at all.

[Confused]

1 hour ago, SoundAndMotion said:

Have there been any reports on this? I’m particularly interested in whether the video from @GoldenOnewas mentioned at all.

No, it was just a nice little chat with BS.

There was a good bit about digital files having impurities, and how high resolution files are larger and so dilute the impurities, which is good, whereas MQA is even better because it actually takes the impurities away.  (During a segment in which BS kept on apologising for being too technical).  Then another bit about the high carbon footprint of digital streaming, so you need MQA which just streams the data with music, not all the planet killing extra stuff that high resolution files contain.

 

I had eaten some cheese before watching it, and was very tired.  I fell asleep before the end and had a funny dream about a white haired super hero saving  the world and then taking over the universe.  

[GregWormald]

16 hours ago, Confused said:

I fell asleep before the end and had a funny dream about a white haired super hero saving  the world and then taking over the universe.  

That's all true! Santa will actually do it!

[Samuel T Cogley]

Since we're talking about Roon, I just wanted to pass along something that I discovered in the IT security realm.  Roon uploads a file to the Roon mothership called "kartpostable.tgz", which Danny at Roon describes as:

 

Quote

The most important thing is that it contains the publisher IDs for the lyrics you download and information about how often you view those lyrics. We pay licensing costs based on that information. It contains some other information as well, like the capabilities of your OpenGL driver and library statistics.

 

It's important to note that I'm not suggesting anything is untoward in Roon uploading this file behind the scenes.  But I am suggesting that preventing this file from being uploaded could allow you to decode MQA without Roon knowing about it, therefore not generating additional revenue for MQA.

 

 

[KeenObserver]

Is the opposition to MQA reaching critical mass?

 

Are people finally realizing the truth about MQA?

[DuckToller]

I was wondering a bit after our last exchange @KeenObserver

Are the owner of MQA this type of Koch or Mercer billionaires , just coming form South Africa and investing in Europe (Swiss, Luxembourg and the UK), actually into everything that generates money?
The brilliant 2005 comedy "Thank you for smoking" with Aaron Eckhart came to mind.
To rephrase my bizzare thoughts: If that film would have made 500 millions worldwide we would have had a chance that people might have been interested in the scrupelous ownership of MQA ...

[KeenObserver]

44 minutes ago, DuckToller said:

I was wondering a bit after our last exchange @KeenObserver

Are the owner of MQA this type of Koch or Mercer billionaires , just coming form South Africa and investing in Europe (Swiss, Luxembourg and the UK), actually into everything that generates money?
The brilliant 2005 comedy "Thank you for smoking" with Aaron Eckhart came to mind.
To rephrase my bizzare thoughts: If that film would have made 500 millions worldwide we would have had a chance that people might have been interested in the scrupelous ownership of MQA ...

 

The original family member that grew the fortune passed away. His grandson, of the same name, is on the board of MQA.

The family paid to publish a history, and many blurbs have been written, that seem to be from a PR firm.

But if you dig down and find the real history, it is not so pretty.

I do not think that they would have accumulated the vast wealth that they did if Apartheid was not in effect.

The way that MQA is trying to take over the music business smells of past history.

[DuckToller]

Perhaps Extinction Rebellion would be interested if they would knew that the shareholders of MQA own as well large investments in fossil fuel companies? Just a thought ...

 

Afterthought: that type of irresponsible investors just don't care about anything else than profits, not about Human Rights, not about Climate Crisis, not about Sound Quality ... What a shame!

[robi20064]

Seems Tidal is separating things even better now with a new HiFi Plus subscription. Wondering where MQA will land and whether normal CD quality FLAC is going to be an option for all labels.

 

 

[Confused]

16 hours ago, KeenObserver said:

Is the opposition to MQA reaching critical mass?

 

Are people finally realizing the truth about MQA?

Impossible to say for sure at the moment I think, but here is a little piece of information:

 

I notice that the GoldenSound video on YouTube is currently showing 130,696 views with 8,900 likes and 99 dislikes.  Based on this, the dislikes are currently running at about 1% of those that viewed and bothered to rate.

 

Purely anecdotal, but the GoldenSound video was posted on another forum, one or two subsequent posters noted that they had switched from Tidal to Qobuz for reasons of sound quality.  One poster mentioned he had previously avoided Qobuz as it did not have the content he required, but this was no longer an issue for him as the Qobuz music selection had now improved.

 

It would be nice if there were some accurate and up to date numbers for Tidal versus Qobuz subscribers, but I do not think any exist?

[The Computer Audiophile]

57 minutes ago, robi20064 said:

Seems Tidal is separating things even better now with a new HiFi Plus subscription. Wondering where MQA will land and whether normal CD quality FLAC is going to be an option for all labels.

 

 

This would be big news. Separating MQA from lossless by price tiers would be great and show people the cost of MQA again. 

[UkPhil]

I have been following a few Roon community threads in the last few days, jeez I’m seeing some serious censoring going on with deleted posts that attempts to argue against MQA, could desperation be setting in only this morning one thread went from 139 to 105 posts in a matter of hours 

[KeenObserver]

2 hours ago, Confused said:

Impossible to say for sure at the moment I think, but here is a little piece of information:

 

I notice that the GoldenSound video on YouTube is currently showing 130,696 views with 8,900 likes and 99 dislikes.  Based on this, the dislikes are currently running at about 1% of those that viewed and bothered to rate.

 

Purely anecdotal, but the GoldenSound video was posted on another forum, one or two subsequent posters noted that they had switched from Tidal to Qobuz for reasons of sound quality.  One poster mentioned he had previously avoided Qobuz as it did not have the content he required, but this was no longer an issue for him as the Qobuz music selection had now improved.

 

It would be nice if there were some accurate and up to date numbers for Tidal versus Qobuz subscribers, but I do not think any exist?

 

I noticed that the number of views on this thread went from 1.3M to 1.4M. That means that another hundred thousand have seen an alternate view of MQA other than the BS put out by BS.

[KeenObserver]

Perhaps in the future, in a more genteel age, when someone says that someone else is full of BS, it will mean that someone is full of Bob Stuart.

[JoeWhip]

 

25 minutes ago, UkPhil said:

I have been following a few Roon community threads in the last few days, jeez I’m seeing some serious censoring going on with deleted posts that attempts to argue against MQA, could desperation be setting in only this morning one thread went from 139 to 105 posts in a matter of hours 

Considering that the guys who started Roon were from Meridian, I am not surprised if this were the case.

[Dr Tone]

28 minutes ago, UkPhil said:

I have been following a few Roon community threads in the last few days, jeez I’m seeing some serious censoring going on with deleted posts that attempts to argue against MQA, could desperation be setting in only this morning one thread went from 139 to 105 posts in a matter of hours 

To be fair to the Roon forum mods that thread has rules in the first post to limit the discussion to why hardware manufacturers implement MQA and was full of the usual personal bickering and sound quality observations.

[jtwrace]

I'm so tired of MQA being able to have the power to play and not be able to force Roon to not play any MQA tracks.  I'd have no issue with Qobuz but I do find that Tidal has a better selection for some of the obscure things I tend to like.  

[The Computer Audiophile]

Does anyone know the relation of Roon's Sarah Stuart to MQA's Bob Stuart?

 

"Sarah works on music editorial and research as part of Roon’s Music Team." https://blog.roonlabs.com/author/sarah/

 

https://uk.linkedin.com/in/sarah-stuart-7889b1150

 

[vmartell22]

7 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Does anyone know the relation of Roon's Sarah Stuart to MQA's Bob Stuart?

 

"Sarah works on music editorial and research as part of Roon’s Music Team." https://blog.roonlabs.com/author/sarah/

 

https://uk.linkedin.com/in/sarah-stuart-7889b1150

 

 

This is more a comment than an answer. I have a vague recollection that Roon was spun off from Meridian or something like that (and ashamed that is vague, because I think it was last week that I read something like that, but well, memory...), so it makes sense that it might be a relationship, even if Stuart is a fairly common name... It would be interesting to confirm... or if not interesting, at least it would explain things over at the Roon forum.

 

v