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50% of U.S. vinyl buyers don't own a record player

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Re: 50% of U.S. vinyl buyers don't own a record player

#211

Post by bartread »

superultra wrote: post #129

I oversee pressing for over 150k+ records a year. We eliminated download cards a while ago because the redemption rate was so low. I wouldn’t doubt if the number of buyers who don’t own a record player is even higher tha 50%, and that the percentage of people who actually play the records is actually 10-20%. I don’t have data on that, it’s just a hunch. Many of us in the indie music industry (hip hop sustained record…

I’m increasingly conscious of being an outlier here. I prefer physical, for a variety of reasons (ownership being one of them), but also prefer CD to vinyl. Nobody loves CDs any more and I don’t get it. I own vinyl, I like vinyl, but CDs are objectively better and somewhat easier to store.

Re: 50% of U.S. vinyl buyers don't own a record player

#212

Post by ta988 »

superultra wrote: post #129

I oversee pressing for over 150k+ records a year. We eliminated download cards a while ago because the redemption rate was so low. I wouldn’t doubt if the number of buyers who don’t own a record player is even higher tha 50%, and that the percentage of people who actually play the records is actually 10-20%. I don’t have data on that, it’s just a hunch. Many of us in the indie music industry (hip hop sustained record…

A lot of plastic? less than a couple takeout orders no?(sure that's less of a toxic plastic in food containers but still)

Re: 50% of U.S. vinyl buyers don't own a record player

#213

Post by bayindirh »

bartread wrote: post #211
superultra wrote: post #129

I oversee pressing for over 150k+ records a year. We eliminated download cards a while ago because the redemption rate was so low. I wouldn’t doubt if the number of buyers who don’t own a record player is even higher tha 50%, and that the percentage of people who actually play the records is actually 10-20%. I don’t have data on that, it’s just a hunch. Many of us in the indie music industry (hip hop sustained record…

I’m increasingly conscious of being an outlier here. I prefer physical, for a variety of reasons (ownership being one of them), but also prefer CD to vinyl. Nobody loves CDs any more and I don’t get it. I own vinyl, I like vinyl, but CDs are objectively better and somewhat easier to store.

I love both for different reasons. CDs sound better, they can be ripped and archived and can be carried around without any loss in their digital form.

On the other hand, vinyl is great for intentional listening. Putting that hour aside to brew a nice cup of coffee and listen to something while exploring the feelings the album evoke, then get a break to flip/change the record and continue.

It's a kind of personal care for me. I even recently showed a little love to my old record player (an Akai AP-D210) so it can regulate its RPM better and play smoothly as it can.

I can argue that CDs are for listening to the music, and vinyl is for listening to yourself.

Re: 50% of U.S. vinyl buyers don't own a record player

#215

Post by KaiserPro »

bob1029 wrote: post #34
thechao wrote: post #20

My dad grew up in the 50s & 60s. During COVID he purchased my daughters' the, I quote, "shittiest briefcase record players" he could find. Both girls listen to their music on their devices, but also buy vinyl. The other day, my eldest came down from her room complaining that her vinyl "sounded awful". I told her to bring it up with their Grampy. His response: "you can't appreciate good playback until you've heard awf…

480i content, CRTs, analog signal chains, non-digital transports, film grain, et. al., provide opportunity for our imagination to step in and produce a better interpolation than the ground truth might otherwise provide.

> CRTs

Its only really recently that CRTs have been surpassed by modern screens in terms of colour.

However I'm not going back to CRTs anytime soon. Just a dumb OLED public signage display, and some high bitrate codec

Re: 50% of U.S. vinyl buyers don't own a record player

#216

Post by bpev »

mrob wrote: post #104
bpev wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not really about the data on the vinyl, and not really about sounding closer to the original. The vinyl flavor comes from the equipment. It's an analog device interacting with the real world, so the process of getting the sound from the vinyl to the speakers introduces a different sound. And some music sounds more pleasing with that process. Could you achieve something similar by using the digital release and ru…

Much of the vinyl noise and distortion is pressed into the vinyl itself. Even if you play it using an optical player it will still sound worse than a good CD.

My point was more that vinyl has a distinct sound, whereas CDs are just the digital files in a physical package. So if someone decides that distortion suits a particular album better, it's not going to "sound worse" to them.

Re: 50% of U.S. vinyl buyers don't own a record player

#217

Post by compiler-devel »

onion2k wrote: post #192
superultra wrote: post #129

I oversee pressing for over 150k+ records a year. We eliminated download cards a while ago because the redemption rate was so low. I wouldn’t doubt if the number of buyers who don’t own a record player is even higher tha 50%, and that the percentage of people who actually play the records is actually 10-20%. I don’t have data on that, it’s just a hunch. Many of us in the indie music industry (hip hop sustained record…

It’s a lot of plastic. A lot of waste. It's only waste if it's being discarded. If someone wants to keep it and cherish it, even if they're not playing it, then it's not waste.

> It’s a lot of plastic. A lot of waste.

And yet again customer demand and financial gain supercede environmental concerns. There’s no hope for a better, less consumer-oriented culture if even the indie creatives among us acknowledge the problem yet succumb to it.

Re: 50% of U.S. vinyl buyers don't own a record player

#218

Post by mosselman »

KaiserPro wrote: post #214
memoriuaysj wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You mispelled cassette

> cassette cassette can get to fuck. They were and always are, a shit medium.

Hard disagree.

Sure the sound quality isn't great, but cassettes have a great user experience.

My kids listen to stories on CD and Cassette. With Cassettes you can just stop and continue later exactly where you were. On CD they have to remember the chapter and the number of minutes. Which they never do so they are less motivated to continue listening.

The same is true for VHS. One of the great benefits of Netflix is that you don't have to keep track of where you were in a series and can quickly continue. DVD or separate downloads never had this, with Netflix you can just continue. The same is true for VHS, you can just pop it back in and continue where you were.

Also, with both cassettes and VHS you could very easily record things. This was never easy with DVDs, so much so that it basically wasn't a feature. HDD recorders were also quite bad.

Quality of sound and image is just one part of the equation. I would never listen to a music album on cassette, but the medium, from a usability point of view, is great for specific use cases such as stories and creating your own mixes.

Re: 50% of U.S. vinyl buyers don't own a record player

#219

Post by reaperducer »

bartread wrote: post #211
superultra wrote: post #129

I oversee pressing for over 150k+ records a year. We eliminated download cards a while ago because the redemption rate was so low. I wouldn’t doubt if the number of buyers who don’t own a record player is even higher tha 50%, and that the percentage of people who actually play the records is actually 10-20%. I don’t have data on that, it’s just a hunch. Many of us in the indie music industry (hip hop sustained record…

I’m increasingly conscious of being an outlier here. I prefer physical, for a variety of reasons (ownership being one of them), but also prefer CD to vinyl. Nobody loves CDs any more and I don’t get it. I own vinyl, I like vinyl, but CDs are objectively better and somewhat easier to store.

Nobody loves CDs any more and I don’t get it.

Anecdotally, I see more and more stores that sell music now carry CDs.

Just yesterday I saw an entire wall of new-release CDs at a Barnes and Noble bookstore.

Re: 50% of U.S. vinyl buyers don't own a record player

#220

Post by reaperducer »

microtonal wrote: post #44
thechao wrote: post #20

My dad grew up in the 50s & 60s. During COVID he purchased my daughters' the, I quote, "shittiest briefcase record players" he could find. Both girls listen to their music on their devices, but also buy vinyl. The other day, my eldest came down from her room complaining that her vinyl "sounded awful". I told her to bring it up with their Grampy. His response: "you can't appreciate good playback until you've heard awf…

I was going to ask, when are the youngsters going to discover CDs? Much less prone to degradation to vinyl, lossless ripping, superior quality.

I was going to ask, when are the youngsters going to discover CDs? Much less prone to degradation to vinyl, lossless ripping, superior quality.

I think they are. There was an article in the newspaper in the last month or so saying that CD sales are on the rise, and mainstream pop stars are releasing their music on CDs again.

As noted in another comment, I see CDs in music (and other) stores more and more where I live.

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