Article: Guest Editorial: Why did audio stop being about audio?

[pkane2001]

1 minute ago, emcdade said:

That’s an ad hominem.  The most frustrating of the replies.

 

Are you serious? A statement about speakers measuring differently is an ad hominem? I must be in an alternate universe, there's no other explanation

 

 

[wgscott]

1 hour ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Sometimes I wish everyone would get a thicker skin and not be outraged so easily. We have a global community with countless different native languages and personal backgrounds from tons of cultures. Perhaps we should also give people a break and the benefit of the doubt. 
 

 

 

Well, at least we can console ourselves in the knowledge that much of that outrage is of the faux variety.

 

[thyname]

9 minutes ago, pkane2001 said:

 

I don't like pointing fingers, but there's this recent thread about a new ethernet switch that a gentleman involved in this very thread decided to join to try to push a subjectivist point of view ...on a decidedly objectivist-minded forum. It wasn't a good showing for him. The whole thing got very nasty.

 

 

So all objectivists are angry, bitter, evil people because one of them put something you don't like in his signature?

 

Hmmmm.... can you post screenshots of what I exactly posted there, and how? 

[kennyb123]

1 hour ago, firedog said:

And what you think is conclusive, a "massive amount of anectdotal evidence" is something they understand to not really be evidence at all. And why would they have confidence that their truth will come out? Based on what? The massive amounts of people who won't even consider the idea that their perceptions are clouded by expectation bias? The same way the climate change deniers, Kennedy assassination conspiracy buffs, Holocaust deniers, flat earthers, and anti-vaxxers have all come to their senses when confronted by facts? But according to your approach, we should all just accept all those ideas because then we will accept the  "reality" that doesn't conform to "our" truth.

All that I was saying is that people with the truth on their side behave in way that demonstrates confidence that they’re on the right side of things.  
 

Not everyone is going to come to their senses but no one put me in charge of making sure that they do.  And likewise no on on this forum was put in charge of making sure others come to their senses.

[The Computer Audiophile]

21 minutes ago, esldude said:

How many forum threads on this site (and others) devolve into heated exchanges about whether people actually hear what they say they hear? Without “proof”, listeners are often mocked, insulted and their experiences discredited.

Challenges range from assuming the listener has been influenced by expectation bias (I believe it will sound good, so it does sound good) to faulting his unwillingness to rely on measurements or blind testing.

 

I really dislike this whole start to the opinion piece. 

 

What causes the heated discussion is different people accept different kinds of proof.  I like the truth.  I bet very nearly everyone here does.  But they arrive at it differently.  Some approaches are incompatible with others.  And with many audio matters it is true someone is right and someone is wrong.  No one likes being told they are wrong.  Hard to agree to the truth if incompatible proof is accepted by various groups. 

 

So here is a good example from the same opinion:

Some will say measurements make their case open and shut. But there are too many examples of how measurements fall well short of telling the whole story. There are tube amps with 3% - 5% distortion that sound better to many than amps with far better measurements. Are those products a scam? Vinyl doesn’t measure nearly as well as digital and yet many strongly prefer its sound. Should fans of vinyl be told that turntable, tonearm and cartridge makers are scamming them as well?

 

Are there really tube amps with 3% or more distortion that sound better than great measuring amps?  Yes I would say yes.  However, there are plenty who will dig in and say if it sounds better it is better.  Which can lead to all kinds of disagreements. I'd say it sounds better because of the distortion.  A fundamental problem with being totally subjectivist is believing your preferences in sound always guide you toward fidelity.  So some will then decide distortion isn't telling us all and something else is going on.  And then you get into some who will take advantage of that with all kinds of crazy explanations via which they prey on people's imagination and hearing.  That is where the real truth can clear that up, but some don't want it cleared up as they see it as an attack on themselves.   It isn't an attack to say someone prefers distortion over clean to me.  Yet more often than not it is taken that way.  This is just a tiny single topic with dozens more that have all the same problems.  

 

Now I'll skip over a whole bunch of thinking that I believe most here can fill in on their own if they care to do so. 

 

The last part I dislike in this opinion piece:

 

 

I’m old enough to remember this hobby when people would meet at audio stores to just listen and schmooze. We’ve lost too much of that sense of camaraderie. We may differ on what we like, but we all care about how we experience music.

Whether I’m right or wrong about any of the above, would it hurt to return to the times when people’s disagreements about audio were friendly? Can we stop assailing the reputations of the people who rely on this industry to care for their families and employees? Can we respect the opinions of those who differ with us by not trying to shut them down with ridicule?

 

Though no one is imagine if someone could say, "I remember when we'd sit around the campfire in the evening after a good days hunt.  Have fine meal from the women's gathered food.  We've lost that sense of camaraderie.  I miss those days.   Couldn't we return to those days?  Why do we have to have cars, and houses and grocery stores?  Why can't those city dwellers leave us fine folk alone to live as we please? If our medicine man is okay by us, why do those people have to insist a doctor is better and a medicine man is mostly telling us a story.  We've all experienced what the medicine man does for us. Just respect our opinions. 

 

 

I like your reasoning but think it’s misguided. There is nothing to clear up. If people want the distorted amp they can reason around it any way they want and demand more. If people believe this is fidelity, I don’t think you or anyone should care. You are taking the perspective that good measuring amps will disappear If a tiny niche thinks distorted amps equal fidelity thus we must clear up something and get to a truth or else.
 

I dislike MQA because I see forced harm on everyone as a possibility. I see no harm or foul in someone thinking Santa Clause dropped off a 10% distortion amp touted as the highest fidelity in the world. 

 

 

Please read that in a good light because I respect you greatly. I can see how it may be taken the wrong way. 

[emcdade]

13 minutes ago, pkane2001 said:

 

Are you serious? A statement about speakers measuring differently is an ad hominem? I must be in an alternate universe, there's no other explanation

 

 

Yes, I never argued that ESL and dynamic driver speakers measure the same.  That is the literal definition of an ad hominem.

[plissken]

9 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

If people believe this is fidelity, I don’t think you or anyone should care

 

I don't personally care what type kool aid people drink. I'll tend to push back when I know when other people are pushing one type when it's certainly anotherkool aid in certain aspects of this hobby. 

 

Fidelity has a dictionary definition. It means something very specific and narrowly defined. 

 

 

 

[pkane2001]

6 minutes ago, emcdade said:

Yes, I never argued that ESL and dynamic driver speakers measure the same.  That is the literal definition of an ad hominem.

 

No. A literal definition of ad hominem is a personal attack in place of an argument about the subject. You were not attacked in any way that I can see by Dennis' statement.

 

[kennyb123]

20 minutes ago, pkane2001 said:

 

So all objectivists are angry, bitter, evil people because one of them put something you don't like in his signature?

 

Thanks for providing evidence that supports my civility gap assertion.  Putting words in someone else’s mouth is usually done in an attempt to turn things in an uncivil direction - particularly when someone can’t come up with a civil and substantive response.  I won’t take the bait.  But thanks for helping to prove my point.

[Daccord]

3 minutes ago, pkane2001 said:

 

No. A literal definition of ad hominem is a personal attack in place of an argument about the subject.

 

Objectively, yes. But have you tried letting a personal attack burn in for a few days?

[emcdade]

8 minutes ago, pkane2001 said:

 

No. A literal definition of ad hominem is a personal attack in place of an argument about the subject. You were not attacked in any way that I can see by Dennis' statement.

 

You are absolutely right, lol.  What in the hell was I trying to come up with, straw manning perhaps?  I don’t even know anymore!  Who gives a shit.

[pkane2001]

3 minutes ago, kennyb123 said:

Thanks for providing evidence that supports my civility gap assertion.  Putting words in someone else’s mouth is usually done in an attempt to turn things in an uncivil direction - particularly when someone can’t come up with a civil and substantive response.  I won’t take the bait.  But thanks for helping to prove my point.

 

Ah, right. It wasn't you who said this just a few hours ago. I imagined the whole thing, and the civility gap that this represents:

 

Quote

Those on the objectivist side behave as people who don't appear to behave as though they have confidence that their truth will ultimately prevail. They are angry and bitter and take every opportunity to demean the other side. They have a diminished awareness of the dissonance between their expectations and reality as they completely discount the massive amount anecdotal evidence that challenges their truth. 

 

[The Computer Audiophile]

22 minutes ago, plissken said:

 

I don't personally care what type kool aid people drink. I'll tend to push back when I know when other people are pushing one type when it's certainly anotherkool aid in certain aspects of this hobby. 

 

Fidelity has a dictionary definition. It means something very specific and narrowly defined. 

 

 

 

Why do you push back? Seriously. 

[fas42]

30 minutes ago, emcdade said:

That’s an ad hominem.  The most frustrating of the replies.

 

There isn’t a measurement I know of that gets to the mechanics of speaker design and whether you prefer the box less (and balls-less imo) sound of an ESL vs. a sometimes boxy but more dynamic sound of drivers moving air.  I’m not talking spinorama stuff or the poor off axis response ESL’s are known for.

 

The mechanics of a speaker dictate the weaknesses - the suspension system of dynamic drivers is an extremely crude arrangement, irrespective of the cost of the unit - and stiction kills the quality of the sound when cold. ESLs don't have this, and can fly from turn-on ...QED

 

ESLs have that huge blast of treble in the centre, which disappears when you move sideways - a peculiar characteristic which has had various arrangements to compensate to some degree - but I have never been convinced of their virtues.

 

The boxiness of dynamic drivers can be eliminated by driving them hard, from cold - a workaround that I have used for decades, this conditions the suspensions, a necessary 'evil' each time - you know when you have done enough, because a satisfying 'bloom' emerges in the SQ.

 

But who measures this? The process of extracting best sound is complex, so many variables in play - fighting about what matters is downright silliness ... will "audio rage" be the next biggy, after, "road rage" ... 😲

 

 

[kennyb123]

18 minutes ago, pkane2001 said:

 

Ah, right. It wasn't you who said this just a few hours ago. I imagined the whole thing, and the civility gap that this represents:

 

 

You are arguing in bad faith and the only reason I’m playing along is because of how closely your behavior aligns to a link I posted last night.  Wild.

[plissken]

Just now, The Computer Audiophile said:

Why do you push back? Seriously. 

 

Because the class of product I push back on can't provide more 'slam', 'wider sound stage', 'airier highs'. 

 

I even shot a video and posted it at AS where I start playback of a 24/192 and you can see the network connection literally go to 0Kbps but the music is still playing. 

 

You are being LIED to by manufacturers. 

[pkane2001]

Just now, kennyb123 said:

You are arguing in bad faith and the only reason I’m playing along is because of how closely your behavior aligns a link I posted last night.  Wild.

 

Whatever you say, buddy. Have a good day, I'm out.

[The Computer Audiophile]

5 minutes ago, plissken said:

You are being LIED to by manufacturers. 

Let’s continue on this line. Honest questions. I’m really trying to understand why you care. Honestly. 

 

Do you have a fear if you don’t take action against these manufacturers that something will happen?

 

Do you sense unjust enrichment?

 

Are you trying to help people who may not understand how a specific technology works, to make purchasing decisions?

 

Some other reason for caring that a tiny company is lying?

 

Have you thought about working big to small and going after the larger companies that are lying, hence more consumer bang for the buck?

[plissken]

17 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Let’s continue on this line. Honest questions. I’m really trying to understand why you care. Honestly. 

Do you have a fear if you don’t take action against these manufacturers that something will happen?

 

Something is already happening. I'm simply supplying counterpoint. 

Quote

Do you sense unjust enrichment?

 

I don't sense it. Taking money for a product that is a data product and not an audio product is happening. 

Quote

Are you trying to help people who may not understand how a specific technology works, to make purchasing decisions?

 

Same reason I took time to shoot a 3 part video series and posted it at AS on some networking fundamentals and router and switch configurations. 

Quote

Some other reason for caring that a tiny company is lying?

 

Does the size of the company have to do anything with the lie being sold? If it's a smaller company is the lie somehow smaller?

Quote

Have you thought about working big to small and going after the larger companies that are lying, hence more consumer bang for the buck?

 

I dunno... Is AQ, WireWorld, Nordost, bigger? I've started threads on them way before some other tiny companies. 

 

Why do I keep seeing MD's push back against anti-vaxxers?

[The Computer Audiophile]

21 minutes ago, plissken said:

Why do I keep seeing MD's push back against anti-vaxxers?

Because people are literally dying. 

[STC]

1 minute ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Because people are literally dying. 

Taking into consideration of the age of most audiophiles, that is not entirely wrong.  

[plissken]

2 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Because people are literally dying. 

 

Yes they are. And audio isn't as serious as that. But just because it isn't doesn't mean that it shouldn't be pushed back against.

 

Let me know if you are ok with lying as long as it's not lethal.

[tmtomh]

@joelha, I appreciate your article - thanks for contributing it!

 

I agree with you on one major point you make; I partially agree and partially disagree on another point; and I respectfully but strongly disagree on two other points.

 

Agree:

• Discussion and debate do often become uncivil, descending into ad hominem attacks and flat-out nastiness. It's disheartening, and unnecessary.

Partially Agree:

• The level of vitriol is no doubt connected to larger trends in our contemporary culture, which are apparent to us all - and so in that sense I agree that the nastiness in audiophile argument can to a degree be linked to other realms of disagreement. But I don't think there's anything unsusual or distinctive about audiophile argument - people get overheated about kinds of things that are just as minor or unimportant in the larger scheme of things as audio.

 

Disagree:

First, I feel your argument contains a very common logical omission: You do not clearly differentiate between fidelity and pleasing sound. You do mention this indirectly in one or two places but your argument does not take the implications of it into account. For example, you mention high-distortion tube amps that sound good, and then ask rhetorically why your "delusion" should be a problem for anyone else. But that's the point: if a tube amp has high distortion, then by definition its fidelity is reduced. I (and I suspect many others who put a lot of stock in measurements) am fine with you preferring the sound of tube amps - if you are fine with not trying to claim that a tube amp actually has higher fidelity by virtue of its euphonic distortion. In other words, I don't think many so-called "objectivists" would claim that you don't really hear a difference with tubes - they would only object to the claim or implication that tube sound is more faithful to the original source. When someone like Herb Reichert waxes poetic over and over (and over) again about such things, it might induce some eye-rolling, but to the extent that people get upset about subjective audiophile-press reviews, it's because that kind of rhapsodic language and hyper-detailed experiential narrative carries with it a strong implication that equipment is reaching new vistas of fidelity when the best evidence we have instead points to varying forms of coloration or "voicing" rather than enhanced fidelity. When reviewers summarize or even quote manufacturers' untested - and sometimes nonsensical - claims about technical innovations literally in the paragraph before they then report listening impressions that appear to bear out those claims, I think that is cause for suspicion and concern.

 

Second, I realize you are using religion more as an analogy than as a literal connection, but I must take issue with how you manage to depict so-called objectivists as both religious in a rigid, intolerant way and also anti-religion/anti-God in a narrow-minded/intolerant way. Subjectivists, by contrast, are depicted as religious in a joyful, open-hearted, testifying-to-the-good-news way. And objectivists, in your narrative, react against this spreading of the Good Word either with religious-style Inquisition, or with Soviet-style anti-religious condemnation. It's a highly self-serving and highly biased narrative. I don't think for a minute that you have written it this way in bad faith - but I do think it reflects a seriously blinkered and partial perspective of this issue on your part.

 

To stick with your religious analogy for a moment, I have no problem with people believing whatever they believe. If your faith gives you joy and fulfillment, that's great. And if you want to speak your truth in that regard, go for it. But if your zeal for that truth leads you to public forums where you feel the need to Spread the Good Word, then you shouldn't be surprised when you run into people with contrary beliefs, and you shouldn't be surprised when you run into some people who very much have a problem with you presenting your personal revelation (explicitly or implicitly) as The Truth. 

 

To be clear, that doesn't mean you shouldn't try to spread The Word if you feel so moved - but it does mean that if you want anyone to take your point of view seriously, you need to be very careful about the knee-jerk labeling of disagreement with your perspective as nasty, intolerant, close-minded, or a symptom of the disagreeing parties' emotional problems or insecurities. 

 

And that is indeed a common link between some audio discussion and some religious discussion: Creationism and all manner of religious objections to established scientific theories are pursued through a willful refusal of the difference between faith and science, and through a confusion of the possible with the plausible. The same is true for claims about things like high-end digital interconnects that don't measure any differently or produce measurably different results than lower-cost ones.

 

Finally, while I do lean strongly objectivist, I do agree that measurements tend to be less reliable indicators of sound for types of equipment that, as a class, are capable of less fidelity than other types of equipment. In other words, transducers - speakers and microphones - are the least accurate links in most equipment chains, and I agree that speaker and microphone measurements, while useful, are less useful in gauging sound and helping with final purchasing decisions than measurements can be for, say, DACs, which when properly designed are capable of far higher fidelity at far lower cost.

 

Oh, and a P.S. to @The Computer Audiophile and others: As you know, I have repeatedly condemned some members' tendency to play the "you're a shill" card for people they disagree with. However, I do feel strongly that it makes a difference if someone is promoting a product they are making/selling versus just enthusing about a product they have heard or purchased. An individual audiophile is expressing a point of view. An equipment vendor is pursuing a vested interest. They're still owed civility, but IMHO they are not necessarily owed the level of interpersonal deference that an individual is.

[tmtomh]

6 hours ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

I believe it was used for illustrative purposes of the absurd levels some people go to. 

 

Yes, but when such satire ignores important facts, it ceases to illustrate absurdity and instead becomes a Straw Man argument.

Over at the AudioScienceReview site - which is the reference/target of this joke about an the Apple Dongle being claimed as the equal of a $100k DCS stack - Amir has actually tested multiple brands' Lightning/USB-C dongles with built-in DACs. And he's found clear and significant differences in the fidelity they are capable of. Apple's dongle simply happens to be the best of the bunch, by a good margin if memory serves.

 

Now of course it would be silly to claim it the sonic equal of a DCS stack - Amir and the vast majority of knowledgeable members there will be the first to note that tiny portable devices like this are almost never able to match the low noise floors, ultra-low distortion levels, and low-level linearity of a well-designed component-style or desktop form-factor DAC.

 

But the fact is that the Apple dongle, at $9, does happen to be the equal of portable DACs and apparently some desktop DACs that sell for $30, $40, even $100 or more. The same cannot be said, based on his measurements, of other similar dongles he's measured.

 

I'm not trying to be an Apple fanboy, and I get the humor you are referring to. But if no one actually goes to the absurd levels implied by the humor, I would suggest it's more misleading than it is funny.

[The Computer Audiophile]

13 minutes ago, tmtomh said:

@joelha, I appreciate your article - thanks for contributing it!

 

I agree with you on one major point you make; I partially agree and partially disagree on another point; and I respectfully but strongly disagree on two other points.

 

Agree:

• Discussion and debate do often become uncivil, descending into ad hominem attacks and flat-out nastiness. It's disheartening, and unnecessary.

Partially Agree:

• The level of vitriol is no doubt connected to larger trends in our contemporary culture, which are apparent to us all - and so in that sense I agree that the nastiness in audiophile argument can to a degree be linked to other realms of disagreement. But I don't think there's anything unsusual or distinctive about audiophile argument - people get overheated about kinds of things that are just as minor or unimportant in the larger scheme of things as audio.

 

Disagree:

First, I feel your argument contains a very common logical omission: You do not clearly differentiate between fidelity and pleasing sound. You do mention this indirectly in one or two places but your argument does not take the implications of it into account. For example, you mention high-distortion tube amps that sound good, and then ask rhetorically why your "delusion" should be a problem for anyone else. But that's the point: if a tube amp has high distortion, then by definition its fidelity is reduced. I (and I suspect many others who put a lot of stock in measurements) am fine with you preferring the sound of tube amps - if you are fine with not trying to claim that a tube amp actually has higher fidelity by virtue of its euphonic distortion. In other words, I don't think many so-called "objectivists" would claim that you don't really hear a difference with tubes - they would only object to the claim or implication that tube sound is more faithful to the original source. When someone like Herb Reichert waxes poetic over and over (and over) again about such things, it might induce some eye-rolling, but to the extent that people get upset about subjective audiophile-press reviews, it's because that kind of rhapsodic language and hyper-detailed experiential narrative carries with it a strong implication that equipment is reaching new vistas of fidelity when the best evidence we have instead points to varying forms of coloration or "voicing" rather than enhanced fidelity. When reviewers summarize or even quote manufacturers' untested - and sometimes nonsensical - claims about technical innovations literally in the paragraph before they then report listening impressions that appear to bear out those claims, I think that is cause for suspicion and concern.

 

Second, I realize you are using religion more as an analogy than as a literal connection, but I must take issue with how you manage to depict so-called objectivists as both religious in a rigid, intolerant way and also anti-religion/anti-God in a narrow-minded/intolerant way. Subjectivists, by contrast, are depicted as religious in a joyful, open-hearted, testifying-to-the-good-news way. And objectivists, in your narrative, react against this spreading of the Good Word either with religious-style Inquisition, or with Soviet-style anti-religious condemnation. It's a highly self-serving and highly biased narrative. I don't think for a minute that you have written it this way in bad faith - but I do think it reflects a seriously blinkered and partial perspective of this issue on your part.

 

To stick with your religious analogy for a moment, I have no problem with people believing whatever they believe. If your faith gives you joy and fulfillment, that's great. And if you want to speak your truth in that regard, go for it. But if your zeal for that truth leads you to public forums where you feel the need to Spread the Good Word, then you shouldn't be surprised when you run into people with contrary beliefs, and you shouldn't be surprised when you run into some people who very much have a problem with you presenting your personal revelation (explicitly or implicitly) as The Truth. 

 

To be clear, that doesn't mean you shouldn't try to spread The Word if you feel so moved - but it does mean that if you want anyone to take your point of view seriously, you need to be very careful about the knee-jerk labeling of disagreement with your perspective as nasty, intolerant, close-minded, or a symptom of the disagreeing parties' emotional problems or insecurities. 

 

And that is indeed a common link between some audio discussion and some religious discussion: Creationism and all manner of religious objections to established scientific theories are pursued through a willful refusal of the difference between faith and science, and through a confusion of the possible with the plausible. The same is true for claims about things like high-end digital interconnects that don't measure any differently or produce measurably different results than lower-cost ones.

 

Finally, while I do lean strongly objectivist, I do agree that measurements tend to be less reliable indicators of sound for types of equipment that, as a class, are capable of less fidelity than other types of equipment. In other words, transducers - speakers and microphones - are the least accurate links in most equipment chains, and I agree that speaker and microphone measurements, while useful, are less useful in gauging sound and helping with final purchasing decisions than measurements can be for, say, DACs, which when properly designed are capable of far higher fidelity at far lower cost.

 

Oh, and a P.S. to @The Computer Audiophile and others: As you know, I have repeatedly condemned some members' tendency to play the "you're a shill" card for people they disagree with. However, I do feel strongly that it makes a difference if someone is promoting a product they are making/selling versus just enthusing about a product they have heard or purchased. An individual audiophile is expressing a point of view. An equipment vendor is pursuing a vested interest. They're still owed civility, but IMHO they are not necessarily owed the level of interpersonal deference that an individual is.

If all disagreements were this well written, I’d sleep very well at night and not dread looking at my inbox in the morning. 
 

Thanks @tmtomh