[deleted]
You get to be part of a community, and people like to feel as though they belong.
The Man Who Broke the Music Business
51–60 of 76 posts
Re: The Man Who Broke the Music Business
#52I remember seeing people at flea markets selling bootleg compact discs. They'd rent a booth and have boxes and boxes of them in those fluorescent colored plastic holders, the ones you could buy in 500 packs at Sam's Club or Egghead. Some of them even printed out fake covers and labels on inkjet printers, heck they would be doing it in between customers. I couldn't figure out why the cops never came and shut them down…
In some parts of the world (Singapore, Malaysia are places I have seen) there are shops in malls that openly sell copies of stuff. In fact when I first bought a PS3 and went looking for games for it in Singapore I was frequently turned away with "Oh, you want originals? We don't do that here".
Practically speaking, no one is going to buy something for $10 when they can get it for $1, especially if they have to work several hours to make $10.
Re: The Man Who Broke the Music Business
#53I remember seeing people at flea markets selling bootleg compact discs. They'd rent a booth and have boxes and boxes of them in those fluorescent colored plastic holders, the ones you could buy in 500 packs at Sam's Club or Egghead. Some of them even printed out fake covers and labels on inkjet printers, heck they would be doing it in between customers. I couldn't figure out why the cops never came and shut them down…
I couldn't figure out why the cops never came and shut them down. At one Dutch internet marketplace, you still see people selling Garmin maps (topos) which are clearly copies. They even have the gut to say 'one topo for 25 Euro, two topos for 40 Euro'. Nobody seems to care. As someone who buys them legally, I am quite appalled these businesses (since the people who purchase them legally are paying higher prices to co…
I'm not convinced that is always the case... there will always be downward pressure to compete, as long as there is competition. Copyright/Patent laws have been extended so far that it's become difficult or impossible to compete fairly, so black and grey markets become more viable as competition.
Re: The Man Who Broke the Music Business
#54This was a pretty good article, I'd love to read one (as similar as it might be) about warez crews.
If you liked this I'd check out http://www.welcometothescene.com/ The first season is great, I never got into the second season. It's an interesting format for a show, most all text with just some music in the background but I quite enjoyed it.
Re: The Man Who Broke the Music Business
#55[deleted]
Keep in mind that the majority of the torrents are actually scene leaks (never intended for public distribution). The scene is now a well known thing, but years ago it was a very exclusive club.
Re: The Man Who Broke the Music Business
#56[deleted]
Believe it or not, it's a kind of altruism. You've benefitted for years from these networks. You get to know the people involved. And now you have the skills to contribute something back to the community.
(That and, as a sibling said, being taken seriously despite your age)
Re: The Man Who Broke the Music Business
#57Earlier quoted context omitted.
I could tell the difference. I produce music, and I can usually tell the difference between low and high bit-rate MP3s. Certain sounds are handled poorly at lower bit-rates: especially high-frequency sounds - you tend to hear obvious artifacting which comes across as 'mushy'. The link above is clearly a biased example where there are barely any real high-end sounds, and therefore it would easily fool an untrained ear…
Being totally sincere and serious here; but could you create such a test?
Back in the old days, a traditional test of a music setup was to jangle your keys in front of the mic. MP3 is optimized (understandably) for pure tones and melodic instruments; it's the percussive sounds where it can't quite keep up.
If you want something that's more likely to be on an actual track, try cymbals, and listen especially for the moment just before the "actual" sound.
Re: The Man Who Broke the Music Business
#58[deleted]
Keep in mind that the majority of the torrents are actually scene leaks (never intended for public distribution). The scene is now a well known thing, but years ago it was a very exclusive club.
Certainly not the majority. Scene releases still feature, but they are no longer consistently the first to market, and they are almost universally derided for prioritising speed over quality.
Scene rules are anachronistic and slow to change. The MP3 scene stuck to -V2 VBR for far too long, for example; the change to -V0 VBR in 2011 came as the sharing of FLACs was already ubiquitous outside the scene, and it wasn't until 2012 that the FLAC scene was established. Even now CUE and LOG files are not required from a CD source, which is insane.
Re: The Man Who Broke the Music Business
#59Earlier quoted context omitted.
In some parts of the world (Singapore, Malaysia are places I have seen) there are shops in malls that openly sell copies of stuff. In fact when I first bought a PS3 and went looking for games for it in Singapore I was frequently turned away with "Oh, you want originals? We don't do that here".
Practically speaking, no one is going to buy something for $10 when they can get it for $1, especially if they have to work several hours to make $10.
...coupled with the "legitimizing" effect of paying some amount of money for something. aka "You wouldn't steal a car would you?" "No, but I might pay a dollar for it".
Re: The Man Who Broke the Music Business
#60...if the MP3 was just as good, why bother with the CD... The thing is, MP3 _isn't_ “just as good”. A rendering in lossless compression from a CD still sounds different than a 320 kBPS MP3. Which is why I just can't get over the iTunesStore selling sound in 256 kBPS. Much too bad. Amazon does 320 kBPS, but it's still not good enough.
I wish this website had a downvote button of sorts as this is a ridiculous notion. You have VBR MP3s that rival vinyl. You have FLAC, you have Ogg. People say "lossless" is such a big deal with MP3s but your ear can't really discern anything (unless you're still a teenager) above 256kbps anyways. It largely depends on the speakers, monitors & how they are made that you're listening through. Do your research.
You seem to be confusing compression bit rate with audio frequency. Even if my ears can't hear frequencies above, say 15 kHz, that doesn't mean I can't hear compression artifacts in music compressed at any particular bit rate.