March 13, 2003
Will Improved Music Formats Make A Difference?
Furdlog points me to this Times report on the music industry’s using SACD and DVD-Audio to entice people away from P2P services. I know the Blue Man Group DVD-audio I bought my mom was well worth it – really, really amazing quality.
As you may have noticed, this week I’m more full of questions rather than answers – so I’ll keep asking:
1. At what point do consumers not care any more about marginal changes in sound/video quality? Will there ever be a point where better standards cannot supplant older standards simply because the better standards are only marginally better?
2. How would compression work for a DVD-audio? I mean, I know that any mp3 degrades quality, so obviously the people who download mp3s aren’t inordinately concerned about quality. But, could you retain the multichannel/surround sound mixing? Is that capability currently part of mp3s?
Along similar lines: I’ve been thinking a lot about how good compression needs to get for video quality. Divx;-) is pretty incredible. But, for movies with lots of special effects or really complex action sequences, I wonder if it’s good enough for most poeple. I’m wondering: is the reason why movie piracy online is less than music piracy simply related to the fact that most people don’t have high speed connections? Or, is it related more to the quality of Divx;-)? Or, perhaps it’s the inconsistency in quality – with an mp3, you pretty much know what you’re getting, but there’s a lot of variation with compressed movies.
In general, I’m thinking I have to study compression more at some point…. Probably won’t have any answers on these questions soon, but I’d love to hear yours. (Also, regarding prior questions: you might be interested in Mr. Dave Haxton’s response regarding the analog hole and audio recompression.)
Filed by Derek Slater at 2:33 pm under General news
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