MQA is Vaporware

[Stereo]

17 minutes ago, Rt66indierock said:

Why? Neil Young pulled his music from Tidal last year because of MQA. The post is still on his website. And after Tidal's false information about subscriber and streaming numbers. I'm not believing a press release from them.

Some of Neil’s music has since been put back up on Tidal. At least it’s now not available in MQA format so that’s good. But people listen to other music than Neil Young and unfortunately quite a lot of that is in MQA at Tidal which isn’t good. As for Tidal’s numbers they are low compared to some of the other services but people are becoming more aware that Tidal exists and I’m sure a fair amount of people are thinking of switching to it soon or already have. Apple Music is probably the other big contender with any fallout. Yes the rest of the services will get some crumbs but overall it’s bad as long as MQA is still in existence.

[Rt66indierock]

16 minutes ago, Stereo said:

Some of Neil’s music has since been put back up on Tidal. At least it’s now not available in MQA format so that’s good. But people listen to other music than Neil Young and unfortunately quite a lot of that is in MQA at Tidal which isn’t good. As for Tidal’s numbers they are low compared to some of the other services but people are becoming more aware that Tidal exists and I’m sure a fair amount of people are thinking of switching to it soon or already have. Apple Music is probably the other big contender with any fallout. Yes the rest of the services will get some crumbs but overall it’s bad as long as MQA is still in existence.

Tidal Music market share is so low that I don't see a path for them to get 1% of the market. The overall streaming market is growing too fast for Tidal to be relevant. 

[Rt66indierock]

12 hours ago, Archimago said:

 

Hmmm... This could be interesting. Wonder how much money they (likely) lost and how much the directors withdrew ;-).

 

Do you know if the reports typically itemize income sources like for example TIDAL streaming side, or hardware licensing for the ESS chips that incorporate mQa filtering?

 

Too bad only to Dec 2020. I suspect late 2021 would be even more interesting and into 2022 after TIDAL splits into HiFi and HiFi+ tiers.

 

UK rules seem to want turnover (revenue) geographically for companies the size of audio companies. MQA LTs has stated all their income is earned in the UK

 

The key for me is the discussion of going concern. This discussion includes events up to the date of the report, In this case it will include financing up to December 2021. 

 

As best I can tell MQA's market share of the streaming market is under 0.01%. My definition of vaporware is 0.25% from the beginning of this thread.

[KeenObserver]

It appears that MQA lost another Four Million Plus Pounds in 2020.

If Jabara can keep them dumping money into MQA until his retirement is fully funded, he'll be golden.

[KeenObserver]

MQA still describes itself as a going concern.

It's lost money its entire existence.

How much longer are they going to continue pushing this farce?

[KeenObserver]

Looks like Dorsey and Rihanna are donating to defund the Police.

https://thepostmillennial.com/rihanna-teams-with-jack-dorsey-to-give-climate-justice-grants-to-defund-the-police-groups

[Archimago]

14 hours ago, Stereo said:

What is worrying is how many people that may be leaving Spotify for Tidal due to Neil Young and now Joni Mitchell as well as the attention Tidal is getting which is potential for MQA to gain money. Maybe not enough to be viable but it’s heading in the wrong direction.

 

I like Young and Mitchell's music to a certain extent but the idea of many people (especially young folks) actually caring about their views to dump a music service they may have been using for years with playlists and such is highly unlikely. As far as I'm concerned, these folks are entertainers with little insight into real life or medical knowledge anyways (just like Rogan!). At most, folks might nod in agreement or send a note to Spotify, and it blows over in a week I think... Heck, I suspect the news cycle on this one is almost over.

 

Besides, even if subscribers join Tidal, they're going with the HiFi tier, not the mQa HiFi+ at twice the price I think!

 

@Rt66indierock Interesting, will see about their "going concerns". At this point, I think any investor putting more dollars into this scheme is literally piling cash into an incinerator. (Or perhaps more accurately, handing over $$$ for the "Directors" to take from an ATM.)

[Archimago]

13 hours ago, RichardSF said:

There is little detail. After all, these are financial statements for the government, not like an annual report of a publicly traded company for shareholders and investors.

You can find filings for MQA Ltd. here: https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/09123512/filing-history

Here is their filing for the year ending 2019: https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/09123512/filing-history/MzI4NzY4NTAzMmFkaXF6a2N4/document?format=pdf&download=0

 

You can look up various well known UK audio companies (Naim Audio, Linn Products, Harbeth Audio, etc). For someone like me in the tech industry, their financials are shockingly tiny.

 

 

Thanks. I guess the gross numbers and descriptions will have to do... ;-)

[Stereo]

3 hours ago, Archimago said:

 

I like Young and Mitchell's music to a certain extent but the idea of many people (especially young folks) actually caring about their views to dump a music service they may have been using for years with playlists and such is highly unlikely. As far as I'm concerned, these folks are entertainers with little insight into real life or medical knowledge anyways (just like Rogan!). At most, folks might nod in agreement or send a note to Spotify, and it blows over in a week I think... Heck, I suspect the news cycle on this one is almost over.

 

Besides, even if subscribers join Tidal, they're going with the HiFi tier, not the mQa HiFi+ at twice the price I think!

MQA is available in all of Tidal’s price tiers even the free one. If they stream the “masters” version it is mqa whether it is deciphered during playback or not. MQA would still get a cut of that stream I would think.

[Rt66indierock]

4 hours ago, KeenObserver said:

MQA still describes itself as a going concern.

It's lost money its entire existence.

How much longer are they going to continue pushing this farce?

 

Until the latest small amount small amount runs out probably. 

[Rt66indierock]

43 minutes ago, Stereo said:

MQA is available in all of Tidal’s price tiers even the free one. If they stream the “masters” version it is mqa whether it is deciphered during playback or not. MQA would still get a cut of that stream I would think.

 

MQA Ltd only gets revenue when a file is decoded. Part of their problem is there aren't enough subscribers to decode MQA files. Only the Premium tier in Tidal and anybody who streams MQA concert files on nugs.net. A few hundred thousand in a market of almost 600 million subscribers to music streaming. 

[Archimago]

3 hours ago, Rt66indierock said:

 

MQA Ltd only gets revenue when a file is decoded. Part of their problem is there aren't enough subscribers to decode MQA files. Only the Premium tier in Tidal and anybody who streams MQA concert files on nugs.net. A few hundred thousand in a market of almost 600 million subscribers to music streaming. 

 

Yeah, that's what I thought as well. Based on decoding which is why I make sure to always turn off the mQa decode in Roon as I believe they collect data on this. Not that I have TIDAL or any mQa in my library.

[Archimago]

mQa report up to 31 Dec 2020 out:

https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/09123512/filing-history
 

What do the accountants think? Are the investors gonna be happy? 😐

[UkPhil]

54 minutes ago, Archimago said:

mQa report up to 31 Dec 2020 out:

https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/09123512/filing-history
 

What do the accountants think? Are the investors gonna be happy? 😐

Not sure how long they can sustain losses another 4.3 million on this filing but have secured nearly 2 million to take them to 2023 

[Archimago]

1 hour ago, UkPhil said:

Not sure how long they can sustain losses another 4.3 million on this filing but have secured nearly 2 million to take them to 2023 

 

Technical arguments aside, indeed that doesn't seem like a sustainable business with $4M losses/year for a codec announced in 2014. Good luck to 'em with $2M secured.

 

Might be old news and I missed before:
https://www.mqa.co.uk/sustainable-tech

 

Sounds a little desperate to be pulling out the carbon "sustainability" card! Silly of course for many reasons... They might want to focus on their own financial sustainability/viability instead; pull the plug before more $$$ go down the drain.

[KeenObserver]

This whole MQA thing has reached the point of absurdity.

It has been exposed for what it is, a scheme to add another layer of "tax" on the music consumer.

Compression is a non starter today. If compression is necessary there are non proprietary compression that are better.

One does not need MQA's proprietary algorithm. One has a choice of many non proprietary to suit ones taste.

It is questionable whether MQA offers any improvement whatsoever. In fact MQA alters the original master.

 

Why would anyone pay extra for damaged music?

[The Computer Audiophile]

Has anyone seen the amount of money mQa has received year over year, charted out in a linear way? Just wondering if investors are providing more, the same, or less. 

[lamode]

I only subscribe to this thread in anticipation of the happy day when MQA's bankruptcy is announced. Wouldn't want to miss that 😛

[KeenObserver]

I don't believe that MQA was EVER about the quality of the music.

It was a DRM scheme and a scheme to derive revenue on the backs of the music consumer.

The claims of being lossless were quickly discounted. Then it was "perceptually lossless".

Then "deblurring".

Then you had the figurehead of Bob Stuart offering double speak.

And of course "Master Quality Authenticated"

I'm sure some of the early demos were given the white glove treatment.

Everything else appears to be what was sent and dumped into the MQA hopper.

 

Is anyone still impressed with the blue light?

[The Computer Audiophile]

15 minutes ago, KeenObserver said:

I don't believe that MQA was EVER about the quality of the music.

It was a DRM scheme and a scheme to derive revenue on the backs of the music consumer.

The claims of being lossless were quickly discounted. Then it was "perceptually lossless".

Then "deblurring".

Then you had the figurehead of Bob Stuart offering double speak.

And of course "Master Quality Authenticated"

I'm sure some of the early demos were given the white glove treatment.

Everything else appears to be what was sent and dumped into the MQA hopper.

 

Is anyone still impressed with the blue light?

mQa states clearly in the latest document that the company was created to exploit intellectual property developed by Bob and Peter. 

[Rt66indierock]

Chis, here you are.

[Pierre LeMonf]

2L MQA-CD | The Vinyl Anachronist-

 

https://parttimeaudiophile.com/2022/02/01/2l-mqa-cd-the-vinyl-anachronist/

 

[feelingears]

2 hours ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

mQa states clearly in the latest document that the company was created to exploit intellectual property developed by Bob and Peter. 

 

Not that it's important or anywhere near urgent, but it would be fun to see a screen grab of that section of the document, if it's easy enough to dig up.

 

In the meantime, just for fun, can we change the name of this thread to "Spotify HiFi is Vaporware" or "Sigh, Spotify HiFi, We Hardly Knew Ye"?

[The Computer Audiophile]

10 minutes ago, feelingears said:

 

Not that it's important or anywhere near urgent, but it would be fun to see a screen grab of that section of the document, if it's easy enough to dig up.

 

In the meantime, just for fun, can we change the name of this thread to "Spotify HiFi is Vaporware" or "Sigh, Spotify HiFi, We Hardly Knew Ye"?

[Rt66indierock]

29 minutes ago, feelingears said:

In the meantime, just for fun, can we change the name of this thread to "Spotify HiFi is Vaporware" or "Sigh, Spotify HiFi, We Hardly Knew Ye"?

 

We can not change the name of this thread. Spotify has been looking for a market for lossles music for a long time and can't find it. Time for Spotify to admit the market has too many players already and say we pass.