by Michael

Radio still kicking, CD sales *ouch*, Target equipment stands – Audiohpiledom March 10, 2015

Radio still kicking, CD sales *ouch*, Target equipment stands

 

Radio Still Kicking(!)

[Maybe not King, but what a shocker – we thought radio was dead]

Via Nielson

“The power of radio extends across all major demographics and ethnicities: 91% of Millennials are reached by radio each week, and penetration among both African Americans and Hispanics also exceeds 90%.”

and more…

“Of the 243 million Americans (aged 12 or older) using radio each week, 66.6 million of them are Millennials. This far outpaces the size of the weekly Generation X and Boomer radio audiences, with 57.9 million weekly listeners each. The younger generation also listens to a lot! Millennials spend more than 11 hours a week with radio, and nearly three quarters (73%) of their listening occurs while outside the home and close to making purchasing decisions.”

[Note the different (Non-overlapping!) times per day each age group listens to the radio.]

 

The marginalization of the CD and resulting shrinkage of the recorded music industry. 

 Via The Current.

There are still 140 million CDs sold in the US. Almost a billion worldwide. CDs are not going away for us audiophiles for many decades, and will always dwarf LP sales [IMO]

units-vs-dollars-riaa

Adjusted for inflation…

 

OK. Let’s cry these jerks [the RIAA] a river.

They are selling CDs that cost 20 cents to make [or less, for the entire package] for $20 or so. Made some money with this scam. Created a bubble in their earnings.

Now people are fed up and do not want to pay anything at all. Surprised?

DVDs are the same scam. Even at Costco DVDs cost $18 or so. Expect more shouting when that bubble collapses as movies also migrate from product to service.

Anyway, like all bubbles, the post bubble era will be characterized by a depressed value for music, but it will recover eventually. Think one billion+ people subscribing to music services at $30/month. 

 

Bryston becomes international distributor for Target equipment stands.

via Canada Hifi

 

Glad to see this. I have a couple of Target stands here in my office holding up my monitor speakers – but I had a hard time finding where they are still being sold on the internet for our Hi-Fi Equipment Racks page. Hopefully Bryston will fix that problem.

 

That’s hi-fi for now folks. Good night and have a pleasant tomorrow.

 

in High-end Audio HiFi and Stereo / News 0 comments
 by Michael

The evolution of musical enjoyment plus How loudspeakers work – Audiophiledom March 7, 2015

The evolution of musical enjoyment plus How loudspeakers work

The Science, History and Dissappearance of Real Music ENJOYMENT Today by the Masses

This article at Mic covers several topics, all to support the thesis that the Internet / MP3 / Spotify is killing the actual enjoyment of music for most people.

This might be positive for the industry if we can get people to walk into a decent high-end audio dealership –  and if at the same time if there should appear more decent high-end audio dealerships.  Or  maybe they should just go to high-end audio shows –  much better sound there for the most part…. Hmmmmmm…..

The  contrast between high-end audio and what  most people are used to hearing is growing and growing…

“A recent study performed by audio researchers at DTS divided a group of listeners into two groups — one that watched a video accompanied by standard stereo 96-kbps sound (Spotify’s default audio setting) and the other group listened in 256-kbps audio format. The responses in the brains of the group listening with the 256-kbps audio were 14% more powerful on metrics measuring memory creation and 66% higher on pleasure responses. And this was just 96 to 256 kbps. “

 

Lots of links  to articles and graphs in that Mic article…

From Spotify’s voluminous data analyzed by Music Machinery :

song-skipping-by-age

Just what is with you late 40 somethings and late 60 somethings?  🙂

 

Some nice animations about how loudspeakers work. Talk about your audio porn…


 

 

That’s hi-fi for now folks. Good night and have a pleasant tomorrow.

 

 

 

 

 

in News 0 comments
 by Michael

Hot Stampers, Music Lovers again, Krell Factory Tour – Audiophiledom March, 5, 2015

Hot Stampers,  Music Lovers again, Krell Factory Tour –  Audiophiledom March, 5, 2015

There is a recent article on Wired  about why audiophiles pay up to $1000  for ‘hot stampers’ vinyl.

Decent article. Essentially, the value proposition is that they weed through a  ton of used vinyl to find those  special pressing in special condition for you.  So  you are really paying to save time and effort and frustration  [if it takes you 100 purchases of $10  LPs to get one really awesome LP, well that is 1000 dollars and a ton of time]. Of course, if you have some time and enjoy flipping through LPs and the thrill of the hunt, well then, this may not be for you.

These guys could really use a much better system to evaluate LPs with… though that is  a really revealing tweeter.

BetterRecords-0254-1024x682

The comments reveal the usual Belief-based versus Fact-based world views, rife on the internet and in the media these days

Besides the value proposition explained above, besides the ‘market’ saying that  hot stampers and audiophile gear in general is worth  a great deal to a great number of people,  these people BELIEVE that CDs must sound better than LPs, the audiophile’s do not understand a lot more of what they are hearing than they do, that cables make  no difference, etc. The thing  about  BELIEVERS is there is no supporting factual base for their positions, and that it makes them feel very uncomfortable to hear factual data in opposition to their beliefs.  Their real thrill comes from vitriolic willfully ignorant compatriots who support their beliefs.

So, Mr. Fremer, I think your efforts are wasted on the people commenting on that article.

If I was to comment, I might go for the sarcastic mocking approach,  like  “Yeah, audiophiles will  spend megabucks  on just about anything!!! It  is  so EZ to sell these guys stuff that we are starting a business to do just that. You guys are just the ones who should invest – you are the ones who have figured all this out and know how big this will be, this is like shooting ducks on a pond, right? $1000 dollar CDs!!! We’ll make billions. We’re starting a Kickstarter campaign tomorrow…”

Yep. Something nice for the Believers –  just winging it here…

 

 

Music Lovers (SF) gets ripped off again, twice in the last 30 days, along with several other high-end audio establishments in the area.

If you think our marketplaces are keeping an eye out for this stuff, you would be wrong:

“We have the serial numbers. If Audiogon ever advertises our stolen goods again, as they did with a Nagra preamp, and then fails to cooperate with us so we can tell the Police Department, I’m going to sue them.”

So it is up to us to keep alert. I haven’t seen a list  of stolen gear which would be helpful…

The Poor Audiophile has a nice article on touring the Krell Factory

Haven’t read it  all –  mostly looked at the pictures 🙂

 

That’s hi-fi for now folks. Good night and have a pleasant tomorrow.

in News 0 comments