MQA The Truth lies Somewhere in the Middle

[Lee Scoggins]

30 minutes ago, Rt66indierock said:

 

One of the things I got confirmed to my satisfaction at RMAF 18 was more than a few people are asking to have MQA firmware removed from their DACs. 

 

As for Tidal the guy banging the table in Chris' seminar is upset at me for telling him Tidal is or was behind on taxes like payroll taxes to Norway, not paying royalties and not paying other bills. So I believe you about people asking for MQA on their hardware.

 

By all indications, Jay-Z is not doing a great job managing Tidal.  It would be hard to separate out management doing a poor job and gauging the impact of demand (or lack thereof) for Tidal Masters.  I don't believe they separate out the # of premium tier buyers do they?

[Rt66indierock]

1 minute ago, Lee Scoggins said:

 

By all indications, Jay-Z is not doing a great job managing Tidal.  It would be hard to separate out management doing a poor job and gauging the impact of demand (or lack thereof) for Tidal Masters.  I don't believe they separate out the # of premium tier buyers do they?

 

They do separate out the hi-fi tier when they report royalties. The numbers are very unimpressive less than 200,000 subscribers.

[Lee Scoggins]

1 minute ago, Rt66indierock said:

 

Charley was a friend and one argument we had was he wanted to hit MQA Ltd with everything we had. And I told him if you do that what happens if they get up off the mat? Answer you have nothing. The better way is keep a steady stream of negative information flowing. Then you get what happened at Chris' MQA seminar which was priceless. 

 

And personally I've been working toward your opinion hearing music in purist most natural form but I'm glad you said it first here.  Because while MQA Ltd. is questioning whether Archimago was a competitor they weren't doing their homework to sniff out actual competitors in high end audio space. PS there is one coming. They have asked me about MQA Ltd.'s financial reports.

 

 

I have reviewed the Zapruder version.  It was a reasonable discussion outside of Derek banging on the table.  The MQA guys were fine.

 

As for Charley, his comments were over the top and deeply personal at times.  A lot of people told me that they lost a lot of respect for him.  The idea that he desired the forum to "hit MQA with everything we had" seems over the top as well.

 

As for music in its purist form, Stuart and team are trying to correct for timing issues in ADCs post-mixing board.  Isn't that an approach for getting closer to what happened in the studio?

 

One reason that Peter McGrath is so enamored of his MQA-encoded recordings is that it gets him closer to the live event.  He hears more of the room, he feels the instruments sound more like what he heard.

 

There is more than one approach to get closer to the music Stephen.

[Lee Scoggins]

1 minute ago, Rt66indierock said:

 

They do separate out the hi-fi tier when they report royalties. The numbers are very unimpressive less than 200,000 subscribers.

 

That's still good revenue: 200,000 x $20 per month x 12 months = $48mm in revenue per year.  And that's one streaming service.

 

What happens if Apple gets in and sells a million people on $15 a month for 12 months?  Maybe for a few dollars more, some will want better quality 16/44?

[mansr]

8 minutes ago, Rt66indierock said:

Then you get what happened at Chris' MQA seminar which was priceless.

I've seen a number of people commenting that before watching that video, they didn't really care one way or another. Afterwards, they want nothing to do with it.

[Rt66indierock]

3 minutes ago, mansr said:

I've seen a number of people commenting that before watching that video, they didn't really care one way or another. Afterwards, they want nothing to do with it.

 

I loved the part about Archimago being a competitor. 

[mansr]

3 minutes ago, Rt66indierock said:

I loved the part about Archimago being a competitor. 

Even if he were, what would it matter?

[Rt66indierock]

Just now, mansr said:

Even if he were, what would it matter?

 

Not to me. And probably not to anyone else either except those on my pro MQA journalist list.

[Jud]

25 minutes ago, Rt66indierock said:

They have asked me about MQA Ltd.'s financial reports.

 

If they had to ask you about MQA’s financials, that doesn’t say much for their resources.  Perhaps they were just making conversation.

 

I’m personally very pleased with what I’ve experienced of Qobuz.

[mansr]

17 minutes ago, Lee Scoggins said:

for a few dollars more

Oh, this is all a spaghetti western. Why didn't you just say so? Who is Clint Eastwood playing?

[Jud]

23 minutes ago, Lee Scoggins said:

As for Charley, his comments were over the top and deeply personal at times.  A lot of people told me that they lost a lot of respect for him. 

 

Oh please.  Charles Hansen wrote like that about any number of subjects as long as I’d been reading him, probably 20 years.  Anyone who says they lost respect over his impassioned writing didn’t know him at all.

[MikeyFresh]

22 minutes ago, Lee Scoggins said:

That's still good revenue: 200,000 x $20 per month x 12 months = $48mm in revenue per year.

 

Thats gross revenue Lee, you know, before anyone or anything known as a cost (content) is paid for?

[mansr]

3 minutes ago, MikeyFresh said:

Thats gross revenue Lee, you know, before anyone or anything known as a cost (content) is paid for?

Sure, but as @Rt66indierock said, they're not paying taxes or royalties.

[The Computer Audiophile]

1 hour ago, Lee Scoggins said:

 

I think those paying for hirez are likely to be a small percentage of the music buying public.  However, I think that if an Apple or Amazon signed on, that could create momentum among some for better quality 16/44 files that people would pay extra for...although it remains to be seen how much.

 

The business value of MQA is that you can contain different resolutions in one file.  That has advantages of single inventory and less bandwidth/storage required.  The biggest advantage may be the establishment of a higher pricing tier.  That creates more money for the labels and services and also a path to solve the serious problem of needing to provide more $ to the artists.

Too much double talk for me lee. 

 

Single inventory? Sounds like you’re selling MQA to the providers rather talking to the same people you told there’s no need to worry about losing access to standard PCM. 

 

Less storage? You’re talking to people who understand that isn’t true. 

 

Higher pricing / more money? Where’s the consumer benefit? Nowhere. 

 

My life isn’t a nonprofit where I seek stupid ways to help people who’ve made stupid business decisions. If artists need more money and the labels want us to pay for what they swindled away from the artists, that isn’t going to happen. 

 

I’d like more money too. Care to buy a new computer just to read CA, so i can get compensated on the hardware purchase as well? 

[mansr]

9 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Too much double talk for me lee.

You just slip out the back, Jack
Make a new plan, Stan
You don't need to be coy, Roy
Just get yourself free
Hop on the bus, Gus
You don't need to discuss much
Just drop off the key, Lee
And get yourself free

[Miska]

1 hour ago, Lee Scoggins said:

The business value of MQA is that you can contain different resolutions in one file.  That has advantages of single inventory and less bandwidth/storage required.  The biggest advantage may be the establishment of a higher pricing tier.  That creates more money for the labels and services and also a path to solve the serious problem of needing to provide more $ to the artists.

 

Except that there are other standardized solutions that do the same:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MPEG-4_SLS

 

You don't need a non-standard (MQA) solution for that. I would see it much more likely for Apple for example to build on top of that standard solution instead of non-standard MQA, since they already use AAC, which  is the core part of MPEG-4 SLS... So essentially they'd only need to wrap the extra layer around what they already have.

 

If you look at the licensing part in above lnk, I'd be fine to pay that $0.098 per copy of HQPlayer, and I wouldn't need to sign NDA's, send my thing for approval by someone, etc. It's all open and clear, no BS.

 

[rickca]

2 hours ago, Lee Scoggins said:

By all indications, Jay-Z is not doing a great job managing Tidal.

Oh, so Jay-Z is the problem.  Nothing to do with MQA.  If TIDAL were well managed, MQA would have really juiced the number HiFi subscriptions.  I'll let him know. 

 

If you're basing this assessment on financial performance, maybe MQA isn't so well managed either.

 

We're going to end up with a whole bunch of DAC manufacturers who feel stupid about their decision to implement MQA along with a bunch of audio journalists who have lost their credibility.

 

Keep telling everybody that New Coke tastes even better than the original.

[The Computer Audiophile]

34 minutes ago, rickca said:

Keep telling everybody that New Coke tastes even better than the original.

I almost spit out my Coke Classic reading this ?

[Don Hills]

2 hours ago, Lee Scoggins said:

... Stuart and team are trying to correct for timing issues in ADCs post-mixing board.  Isn't that an approach for getting closer to what happened in the studio? ...

 

That's a very clever piece of misdirection by "Stuart and team."

For the vast majority of the MQA content available, the sound heard in the studio was recorded through non-MQA ADCs, The sound that was approved for release by the artists, producers and label reps was auditioned through non-MQA DACs. Changing that sound post-approval moves it further away from the sound approved for release.

As has been pointed out many times previously, making a music recording is a little like making sausages. You may like the result but you wouldn't like seeing them made so much. The raw sound as recorded is rarely as good as the processed sound that is released.

[Ryan Berry]

2 hours ago, Lee Scoggins said:

As for music in its purist form, Stuart and team are trying to correct for timing issues in ADCs post-mixing board.  Isn't that an approach for getting closer to what happened in the studio?

 

A fair point if I believed that is all the technology was aiming to do. From MQA's marketing, most believe that it's not, and the way it sounds demonstrated that to us.

 

You're right, Charley was brash, and at times very personal. If he were in any other industry, he probably wouldn't have fit in very well.

[rickca]

20 minutes ago, Don Hills said:

That's a very clever piece of misdirection by "Stuart and team."

Maybe MQA should hire the Russian Internet Research Agency.  I hear they are great at this kind of stuff.

[Lee Scoggins]

47 minutes ago, Don Hills said:

 

That's a very clever piece of misdirection by "Stuart and team."

For the vast majority of the MQA content available, the sound heard in the studio was recorded through non-MQA ADCs, The sound that was approved for release by the artists, producers and label reps was auditioned through non-MQA DACs. Changing that sound post-approval moves it further away from the sound approved for release.

As has been pointed out many times previously, making a music recording is a little like making sausages. You may like the result but you wouldn't like seeing them made so much. The raw sound as recorded is rarely as good as the processed sound that is released.

 

A few thoughts...

1.  The idea is to correct for any ADC based on MQA's analysis of the timing issues inherent in the ADC.  So the hardware is not required to be MQA.

2.  There is generally only one ADC needed post-mixing board so you correct that ADC and you are at the point the artist/producer wanted.

3.  Sometimes the album as originally recorded is quite good.  Examples include audiophile recordings, live to two track classical recordings, etc.  

[The Computer Audiophile]

10 minutes ago, Lee Scoggins said:

 

A few thoughts...

1.  The idea is to correct for any ADC based on MQA's analysis of the timing issues inherent in the ADC.  So the hardware is not required to be MQA.

2.  There is generally only one ADC needed post-mixing board so you correct that ADC and you are at the point the artist/producer wanted.

3.  Sometimes the album as originally recorded is quite good.  Examples include audiophile recordings, live to two track classical recordings, etc.  

 

The album as originally recorded doesn’t have to be good or bad. It’s a piece of art work that shouldn’t be changed. Especially not in the name of making it better. Making it different is cool with me but don’t claim better because that’s a pure lie unless everyone involved in the original signs off on the new one. 

 

I don’t think we should be going through the Van Gogh museum in Amsterdam saturating the colors a bit more than was possible at the time Vincent was alive.

 

A change is a change is a change. 

[Jud]

10 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

 

The album as originally recorded doesn’t have to be good or bad. It’s a piece of art work that shouldn’t be changed. Especially not in the name of making it better. Making it different is cool with me but don’t claim better because that’s a pure lie unless everyone involved in the original signs off on the new one. 

 

I don’t think we should be going through the Van Gogh museum in Amsterdam saturating the colors a bit more than was possible at the time Vincent was alive.

 

A change is a change is a change. 

 

Well look, I’m up for the Lennon and Beatles remasters. And I’d be up for MQA if it gave a clearer window into the original. But I’ve never heard an MQA track sound clearer than the hi res or RedBook version.

[MikeyFresh]

11 hours ago, Lee Scoggins said:

 In business strategy there is a concept of a "virtuous cycle".

 

In the case of Master Quality Adulterated/DRM Ltd. the double talk laced "ecosystem" you describe can only represent a vicious cycle.

 

11 hours ago, Lee Scoggins said:

building the ecosystem is the top priority for the MQA team

 

With detrimental results for all but MQA themselves and the greedy ethics challenged record labels.