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Alternative view of MP3s
A reader sent us an alternative viewpoint of the MP3 craze.
Although the writer likes MP3s for their ability to allow small artists to get their material out,
or to catch those last few B-sides, he still wants to collect actual physical media.
Face it, Mp3's will not kill records and CD's. Nobody puts Mp3's on for critical listening or for listening to clasics (like Oldies or Classical Music).
Mp3 are great for disposal music, like the lastest 'craze' song like 'Millienuim' (robbie williams) or 'Get A Job'(offspring). Songs like those die quickly, and you never want to here them again.
But then again, you can listen to songs like 'Yesterday' (beatles) or 'I'll be Back'.
I don't plan on replacing my records or CD's with mp3's, that's silly. Mp3's don't dent my CD purchases at all. Mp3 are fun to play for non-critical listing, but just don't compare in value to Records or Mp3s.
And NO, I don't own tapes. Tapes are evil, records (Lp, Ep, 72s) and Compact Discs rule!
I understand where he's coming from, but I don't see how he can deem it to be important that music have a physical basis or be "limited edition". Part of the wonder of MP3s is that the problems that come with the need for physical storage of music are no longer issues. This may make it, in some odd way, less "special", but we shouldn't forget that this is ultimately about _music_. I don't care what I listen to my favorite songs on, so long as it comes through loud and clear. I find the liberation of music from matter to be a positive thing. Before the advent of recording media, music was about performers and an audience. Then Edison and his cylinder appeared, and music suddenly became property. Why must music have a physical basis? It's only sound, after all.
I can't say I agree with much of what he says. His point about the ease with which an MP3 collection can be destroyed assumes that you're treating MP3s as you do physical items like CDs - when in fact you could/should be paying for the *right* to listen to the music, rather than the file itself.
"With MP3s, rarity does not compute." Sure you can have limited edition MP3s - in fact, by lowering the cost of getting music out there you can have a lot more, in the form of live sessions, less "saleable" recordings etc.
As for blurring the lines between art, music, and data... is music heard on the radio intrinsically different, or lacking in "artistic" value because of the transport mechanism used to get it to you?
"People will forget how to make music the old fashioned way." Oh *please*. There's no reason why MP3 should change the way music is made - it's a distribution network.
I really enjoyed reading his article, and I agree with most of what he had to say. I do have one problem with the following paragraph:
MP3s also blur the lines between music, information and data. I don't have any problem thinking of music as data, but it takes a lot of the art out of the concept.
The fact that mp3 is a binary data does not mean that it is not an art.
When I program I don't feel that I do ordinary work like a salesman or a bank teller. I feel that I create new things, and this is some sore of art.
Moreover, there are some sorts of music that cannot live without mp3 (like Techno -- since it is computer generated music mp3 is the format most of the creators use, and then if they are successful they might distribute also on CDs) are those not considered art?
Is creating binary images with The Gimp of Photoshop not considered art?
That fact that binary data files are easily reproducible does not necessarily mean that the content is not considered art.
Liran.
Caveat: My comments only apply to those whose musical tastes are relatively MP3-encoding-friendly, and for those who don't consider themselves audiophiles; that is, those for whom 128k is adequate for their needs, and to whom 160k is indistinguisable from the original. I believe my comments would also extend to most MP3-"unfriendly" music with a sufficiently high bit rate - try VBR, 160, or higher, until your ears don't notice.
The author writes that "there's something about looking at a big mass of music". I get the same feeling when I look at a hard drive full of MP3s - it's just as big a "mass" of music, just in a different form.
Ane yes, you can have the same feeling of "hunting down" MP3s as with other media. I find it odd that the author writes that one can build up a huge library "with a T1 and a healthy dose of spare time" (emphasis added), and then goes on to say in the next paragraph says that only collection of physical media offers the feeling of reward that comes with finding a long-sought item. If the "item" is the experience of being able to listen to the song at any time you like, it's not just a matter of downloading it. Someone else has to have it, rip it, encode it, and post it to USENET or an FTP/WWW site. If an FTP/WWW site, you've gotta find it, and then you've gotta get through to it to make the download. If USENET, you've gotta be reading the appropriate group at the right time, all the pieces have to propagate from the poster's server to yours, or you've gotta hope/pray/beg for a repost. In either case, music that's "rare" on physical media can often be every bi n MP3.
The author's snort of derision ("Oh, how impressive") at the notion of an 18G hard drive of MP3s strikes me as bizarre. I think what we have here is a culture clash. I'm a geek. I think small is cool, and the thought of having 18G of MP3-based music in the palm of one's hands as immensely attractive. Does the author snort just as derisively at a CD of music when the bulkier 78RPM vinyl format could have been used? (A hint - we call them "albums" because a collection of songs from a single artist in the days of "78s" was a hefty book of discs. Each "track" was roughly the mass of a 12" vinyl recording. I snort in derision at the notion of a CD as a tangible item :-)
How many of us have looked at our hard drives and remembered when floppies were king, pondering the question "how many rooms full of floppies are on that drive?", and marvelling at the answer? I think of it the same way - how many shelves of CDs can I fit in the palm of my hand?
As for permanence, I think the /. crowd needs little reminding that backing up an 18G hard drive (or transferring it to some other storage media when "hard drive" technology is replaced by something else) is far simpler than backing up a wall full of vinyl or CD. A safety deposit box in a bank costs as little as $20/year. A spare 18G hard drive, a little over $250 and falling. If you've got 18G of data, a monthly trip to the bank for offsite backup is the least of your worries.
Lastly, getting back to the notion of collecting as a hobby that requires effort - how long does it take to download 18G of data? And given the impermanence of FTP/web sites and USENET binary postings, how long would it take one to replace every track on those 18G worth of MP3s? About as long as it took to find the MP3s in the first place, assuming a random probability of any specific MP3 showing up in any given place. I dunno about you, but at the rate I've been accumulating MP3s, our author's hypothetical 18G collection would represent several years of work.
To recap - yes, if you're interested in "original" material and the ability to say that you have one of the 500 pressings of Foo's limited edition single, maybe an MP3 collection isn't for you. But if it's the music, not the packaging, that you collect, collecting MP3s can be a hobby that's every bit as rewarding as collecting physical media.
I guess if you are more interested in looking at and thinking about your music collection rather than actually LISTENING to it CD's win out. Myself I'd rather que up a playlist and do something constructive with my time, besides splitting fingernails trying to open jewel boxes.
Frank Zappa used to say that "fondling and fetish potential" were an important part of the experience of owning an album.
---Joe Merlino gnupg public key ID: 1E91EBAF
I understand where the writer is coming from in many ways. However, there are A LOT of times that I would gladly have bought a single vs. the entire album. Most artists have one or two tracks that I am actually interested in - with some notable exceptions. Still, after you get the CD you have this large piece of plastic and aluminum media with a jewel case and a 4-6 page insert. If you are lucky to find an artist that has disdain for jewel cases thats a rarity. I like the comment about this technology being for the "bushes". I also know that markets haven't emerged just yet for when media is transferred to a new supreme format. I mean how much cool collectible visual information can you put on the cover to a MiniDisc? How about if music starts being sent out on smart media cards? Maybe that is the time when large throw away lcd panels that are the size of a poster come into vogue. You put in the media and it will tell your poster what to show off. Just a thought. I also don't think that MP3 will be the end all be all of formats *cough 8 tracks* but it will last through the time of cheap disk space and plentiful bandwidth for some. Basically, it is rare to find what you want when you want unless you have a small out of the way record store (why do they still can them this when they rarely have records i.e. wax?). Sometimes you can get lucky and they have the promo stuff with the song you actually care about. Most often though there are the music walmarts and the mega mega music wholesale places inside malls. At least with new technology you get some input into the purchasing. So, the writer has some points but those points don't apply to the way I think about music distribution. Record companies might set up those central servers but that isn't happening right now but MP3's for those of us here in the "bushes" are happening right now. When I can dial in the local college radio station and hear an entire nights show composed of mp3's of artists I would never have heard of in a mega mall record store I think this MP3 phenom is doing just fine without critical acclaim. :)
"You cannot uncook Mushoo pork once is has been cooked" -- wiseman
http://fudge.org
KILLRAVEN ROTE: > Here it seems that we disagree on the meaning of listen. NO RAVEN UBUT DAVEO THINKS WE DON"T. MAYBE YOU LIKE LIKSTENING TO SOMETHING DIFFERENT WITH DIFFERENT FORMATS BUT WE BOTH NO WHAT LISTENING MEANS. >No matter how you argue, you will never get away from the fact that MP3's are of lousy quality. They have little dynamic range and lack true stereo. Their only feature is they are convenient if you have a computer handy and sound quality is irrelevant. THAT'S A GOOD POINT, HOWEVER DAVEO USUALY DOOESN'T NOTICE THE DIFFERENCE THAT MUCH. DAVEO THINKS THAT THE TRADEOFF BETWEEN HAVING BAD QUALITY AND GETTING FREE LARGE AMOUNT OF CONVENIENT MUSIC IS WELL WORHT THE PRICE
-DAVEO
I seem to have messed up the URL in the message above. For the page on the LAME encoder, go to this page.
Before we get into legal arguments, I should mention that this encoder is distributed as a patch on the ISO encoder distribution and, as such, does not violate any patents. Compilation of this code in a country that allows software patents is at your own risk, however.
--
If I really like an artist, I'm going to buy that person's merchandise no matter whether or not I can get the same stuff for free online.
i.e. I own the 15 anniversary edition of the Star Wars Trilogy. But I still want the original release copies of the videos. And the Special Edition. And...
I still bought 'Sesame Street Fever' on 8-trck, though I don't have an 8-track player. It was for sentimental reasons *ahem*.
I never buy an album because I like one song by the artist... it's a waste. Instead, I copy it off one of my not-so-restrained friends. This is where Mp3s come in handy for me; the record companies aren't getting my money anyway. I know this is small consolation for them, but what might make them feel better is that I'll buy anything REM puts out, even if it's a c.d. entirely of highway traffic noise. Because I'm a fan, and that's what I do.
Neat! It's MikeO! I discovered DigitalDJ yesterday . Very nice stuff, especially since I don't know anything about SQL. Could use the ability to delete songs from the database, though :) Oh well, what do I expect from a 0.4 version piece of software.
Music is my hobby and I take my hobbies seriously. As such, when I heard about .mp2 I was interested and when I heard about .mp3, even more so. But so far they've all failed in some way or another, no matter what bitrate you choose.
/mp3/r/radiohead and ls reveals mp3s of the album. How will they know what the packaging looked like?
Why mp3 is good:
free stuff -- sometimes legally, mostly not
convenience -- It took me about 15 minutes to track down mp3's of the Moxy Fruvous indie tape. It took me several months to find the original tape those came off of, and when I did, it was an expensive, used tape, not an unsealed nor the super-rare cd.
space-savings -- It's true, if I put my 500 cd collection to mp3, it would fit nicely on a couple large hard drives.
why cd is better than mp3:
jewel boxes -- I like to see and feel the artwork, to read the original lyric sheets and actually hold the original case in my hands. Some CDs offer nothing in this manner, but some cd's have carefully chosen artwork, and even paper stock along with subtle things like unlisted alternate titles in the lyric sheets (check Smashing Pumpkins -- Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness for an easy-to-obtain album that has all of these things)
sound quality -- Nobody will ever convince me that mp3's are cd-quality, because if I A/B them it's not just possible to tell which is CD or DAT and which is mp3, it's downright easy, it can be done within the first 5 seconds usually, and that's using computer speakers. On a professional or high-end consumer sound system the difference is immediately apparent and to anyone who has invested serious money in their equipment, it's also immediately annoying. Who wants to playback mp3s on a system that they've dropped tens of thousands or even just thousands of dollars on?
collectibility -- the article hammered this one, but it's true. I own quite a few cd rarities, most of which I acquired before they were rare. Which is more interesting, a person's reaction when they turn to their favorite group and see all sorts of Imports, EPs, singles and concert recordings that they've never heard before, or if they do a cd
Just my thoughts.
How true - there's some artists that I really like that I want to get the whole album from, but let's face it - there's usually only a single that you want. CDNow had the right idea - let you put all your favorite singles on a single cd and ship it - but that's inconvenient. Why is it illegal to be able to get what you want right now?
Anyway, I think the music industry is changing - maybe more like "open source" - give away the music, and charge for the "support"- aka concerts and shows. I for one like the idea of direct capitalism - nobody controls what I buy, who I buy it from, and for how much. It's all open to the market now. The RIAA is dead. It's a market inevitability.
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Though he makes some good points, I can't relate. I have a ton of CD's and I'm working on converting all of them to MP3's. I enjoy organizing my music into categories and playing music based on the category I'm interested in. I enjoy not switching CD's or only listening to part of a CD or a single song. I like the background music to my daily work and listening to 120 mp3's before switching to something else.
I disagree with his philosophical views as well, feeling that the increase in competition will actually cause new forms of music to rise to the top. I especially like the idea that this is a world wide medium and that influences from different cultures than the US and Europe will play larger roles in what becomes popular.
But he does have a strong point of view when you look at your collection and start to drool... and then again -- so what.
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Resume
Football Sports Contest - Win $500 for having an e
I can't figure out how to get it working with MySQL. I downloaded the latest version of the server and client from mqsql.com, but neither has the file libmysqlclient.so.4, which DigitalDJ says it needs. Is this file on an older version of mysql, or do I have the wrong package?
Any help on this greatly appreciated.
Vidi, Vici, Veni
I used to agree with the guy who wrote the article. I didn't really see the point of MP3s. I downloaded a few songs off the net (some legit, some not) and generally ended up deleting them.
Then I realized that on a 10 gig drive (which is pretty affordable these days) I could store over *200* albums. That blew me away! Then I realized that I could burn the whole lot onto a DVD. That *really* blew me away. Imagine taking your entire music collection over to a friends house in a single jewel case.
Now I'm an MP3 convert. I've written software to allow me to convert my CD collection into MP3 format ( Grip, a ripping/encoding tool and DigitalDJ, an SQL-based playback tool). I'm in heaven! I've got 64 albums online at work so far (taking up about 3300 megs of space).
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Unlike most of the /. crowd, I guess, I for one prefer having a CD of music, or even a sheet of paper with the notes on it, than I do having an MP3. If records had better sound quality I'd be happy as a clam. What most of us forget is that all media decays, and years from now, bit rot on my harddrive will kill an MP3 collection before the plastic on the CD turns yellow and flakes off.
There is no ideal media other than making it part of a living culture, such that it is preserved by people playing the music itself. However, as the music industry is little different from that of the book publishing industry, mechandise and not the art itself, I'd rather have a hard copy than a soft any day. I'll pay for the physical object, but the bits and bytes are 'freely' reproducible as long as one has the technology.
That said, I think the same thing goes for books, as e-books also become an issue. I'd rather have archaic vellum & ink than a DVD filled with jpegs.
The tangible aspect is fundamental.
Also, as small scale reproduction of intellectual objects becomes a universal part of daily life, the sale of the physical media becomes the basis of exchange by which one supports an artist. It is not about stealing & copying, but about encouraging more art to be produced. MP3's will spread the word for lots of new bands, but unless people are willing to produce hardcopies from copying digital media, future generations will not remember the greatest works of popular culture.
MP3s are a means of distribution of information, CD's are tokens of appreciation.
I dunno, MEEPT is funny sometimes.
Your right to not believe: Americans United for Separation of Church and
From the "You're into computers, let me ask you something" file:
"If I put an MP3 on a CD, it has CD quality, right?"
1) He does not mention the importance of data formats. Think about it - every single digital media storage we know of has a far shorter life span than traditional musical storage.
Tape, 5 1/4 floppy, 3 1/2 floppy, HD, fat32, ext2, and so on. Conversion is required every 5-10 years if your data is to survive. This is something that ambushes people after a few years when they scramble to convert. mp3 is hip today, but its successor has already been named by lucent, and it will probably last another year.
2) Fear of new media - this article is full of it. Every time something new comes along in telecom/media, people fear it. I wouldn't call him a luddite - he uses CDs after all. I'm sure people who played LPs wrote articles like this when CDs came along.
I think they are missing the main point - mp3 vs. CD has nothing to do with physical media - it has to do with distribution mechanisms that are shaking the industry.
L.