YouTube puts the final nail in the loudness wars' coffin • Hacker News Board

Re: YouTube puts the final nail in the loudness wars' coffin

#31

Post by polshaw » Wed, Mar 18, 2015, 9:50 AM UTC

tobr wrote: post #7

I wonder if this is about ending the "loudness war", or if it's more about helping amateur content with nearly inaudible levels. All the good reasons for compressing music or audio in general certainly apply to YouTube. The average viewer will probably listen through laptop speakers in a noisy environment, and a large dynamic range is not helpful to them. Also, does this mean they actually lower the volume of high RM…

Google's intent doesn't really matter (I think you're right, I don't see it as a targeted offensive against the loudness war), it's the response from labels that does.

Compressing music (in the loudness sense) at the source is never a good thing for the consumer; if it is required for a specific end user case then it should be done at that point rather than ruin music for every use case.

I don't buy for a second that it's necessary or helpful with the music that it is done to; which rarely has quiet passages. Compare the two masterings of Pharrell's "happy" I posted, the less compressed version sounds far better even on my 11" laptop's speakers, which should be pretty much 'as bad as it gets'.

Re: YouTube puts the final nail in the loudness wars' coffin

#32

Post by polshaw » Wed, Mar 18, 2015, 9:54 AM UTC

72deluxe wrote: post #26

polshaw wrote: post #22

>[on YT] Everything plays at a similar loudness, regardless of how it was mastered. And no-one has noticed. None of us noticed; it seems like the labels and sound engineers may have; take this image comparing the dynamic range of the CD and youtube releases of Pharrell's "Happy"[1]- I thought at the time it might just have been a mishap or random occurance, but now it looks like it was a very deliberate move. So, rat…

I noticed! I am a bass player who now happens to write software in the audio industry (I work for a company that makes hardware). But I noticed before coming here. Some of the worst CDs in my record collection are: 1. Paul McCartney - Memory Almost Full (this is the worst album I own - considering Sir Paul left The Beatles over the mix of The Long and Winding Road, he should leave his own band over his master of this…

It was the fact that Youtube was normalising sound volumes that the author said nobody noticed, not that the loudness wars exists.. for which there are so many examples it might be quicker to list the counter-examples.

Re: YouTube puts the final nail in the loudness wars' coffin

#33

Post by boomskats » Wed, Mar 18, 2015, 10:00 AM UTC

StavrosK wrote: post #30

72deluxe wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I noticed! I am a bass player who now happens to write software in the audio industry (I work for a company that makes hardware). But I noticed before coming here. Some of the worst CDs in my record collection are: 1. Paul McCartney - Memory Almost Full (this is the worst album I own - considering Sir Paul left The Beatles over the mix of The Long and Winding Road, he should leave his own band over his master of this…

Try System of a Down's Holy Mountain, where the damn CD clips ! I can't imagine who would let a CD track clip.

Pretty sure that first MGMT album clips all over the place. And yeah I agree.

That first SOAD album is an impressive piece of mastering though.

Re: YouTube puts the final nail in the loudness wars' coffin

#34

Post by DocG » Wed, Mar 18, 2015, 10:03 AM UTC

If they could only do it for the ads also.

The sole reason I started using adblock, was when I lived in Istanbul for couple of months, their ads were out of hands. Imagine having to control the volume, every time ad plays, in playlists or in front of videos.

Re: YouTube puts the final nail in the loudness wars' coffin

#35

Post by cnvogel » Wed, Mar 18, 2015, 10:04 AM UTC

StavrosK wrote: post #30

72deluxe wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I noticed! I am a bass player who now happens to write software in the audio industry (I work for a company that makes hardware). But I noticed before coming here. Some of the worst CDs in my record collection are: 1. Paul McCartney - Memory Almost Full (this is the worst album I own - considering Sir Paul left The Beatles over the mix of The Long and Winding Road, he should leave his own band over his master of this…

Try System of a Down's Holy Mountain, where the damn CD clips ! I can't imagine who would let a CD track clip.

It's not clipping, it's just compressed at infinitely high compression ratio, and infinitesimally short attack and release.... ;-)

Re: YouTube puts the final nail in the loudness wars' coffin

#36

Post by McKayDavis » Wed, Mar 18, 2015, 10:09 AM UTC

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #18

vanderZwan wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that is exactly the motivation: avoiding the random shifts in volume between videos. Pushing back against the loudness war was probably just a bonus. It's like watching a series on TV and then getting blasted with EXTREMELY LOUD COMMERCIAL BREAKS (and they do that shit on purpose too).

Re the commercials, over here in NL they (finally!) introduced a law that prohibits that behaviour.

In the US, Congress passed the Commercial Advertisement Loudness Mitigation (CALM) Act in 2010 and the FCC began enforcement in 2012.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commercial_Advertisement_Loudn...

Re: YouTube puts the final nail in the loudness wars' coffin

#37

Post by guru_meditation » Wed, Mar 18, 2015, 10:10 AM UTC

tobr wrote: post #7

I wonder if this is about ending the "loudness war", or if it's more about helping amateur content with nearly inaudible levels. All the good reasons for compressing music or audio in general certainly apply to YouTube. The average viewer will probably listen through laptop speakers in a noisy environment, and a large dynamic range is not helpful to them. Also, does this mean they actually lower the volume of high RM…

I think the average viewer is a teenager with their headphones (Beats, maybe?) plugged into their cellphone.

Even the cheapest headphones make halving the dynamic range obvious on typical top of the charts pop tracks.

Re: YouTube puts the final nail in the loudness wars' coffin

#38

Post by jon-wood » Wed, Mar 18, 2015, 10:17 AM UTC

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #18

vanderZwan wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that is exactly the motivation: avoiding the random shifts in volume between videos. Pushing back against the loudness war was probably just a bonus. It's like watching a series on TV and then getting blasted with EXTREMELY LOUD COMMERCIAL BREAKS (and they do that shit on purpose too).

Re the commercials, over here in NL they (finally!) introduced a law that prohibits that behaviour.

Related to the sibling comment here on the CALM act - who thinks up these names? Is there a committee in some basement somewhere that gets told the gist of each act, and has to think up a suitable acronym for them?

Re: YouTube puts the final nail in the loudness wars' coffin

#39

Post by gadders » Wed, Mar 18, 2015, 10:23 AM UTC

Semi-related: Has anyone else noticed how HD channels have their volume levels set higher than non-HD? This is quite noticeable on the BSKYB service in the UK. I wondered if it applied for other suppliers.

Re: YouTube puts the final nail in the loudness wars' coffin

#40

Post by ilghiro » Wed, Mar 18, 2015, 10:32 AM UTC

gadders wrote: post #39

Semi-related: Has anyone else noticed how HD channels have their volume levels set higher than non-HD? This is quite noticeable on the BSKYB service in the UK. I wondered if it applied for other suppliers.

With Virgin Media I have to pretty much double the TV volume on HD channels to get the same volume level.