i trust soulseek

you're looking at about 10mb per minute of CD-quality wav file. ie. 45 minute album is going to be about 450mb, or a shade under half-a-gb in size.

there may be demand from a few people for that sort of file, but not enough yet for anyone to have set up a dedicated distribution or p2p network for it (unless it's just passed me by).

as it is, there's nothing stopping you from starting the trend. soulseek (and probably all the other p2p networks) don't necessarily restrict the file formats that get shared. go online, share a few full-length hi-quality wav files, hit the chat-rooms and let people know you're after the good shit, and get the ball rolling.

// so it's too long you're saying, to do a decent download?
// even with a good connection?

well, on a decent hi-speed connection at home, if I set up a 750mb bittorrent download to run overnight, I'd be feeling pretty lucky if it'd had actually arrived by the next morning.

I must admit, I wouldn't even try something like that on a direct p2p like soulseek, 'cos you've got to remember that you're also impacting on someone else's connection while you do the download (and upload speeds tend to be slower than download ones, so while you may have blazing connection at your end, you're totally at the mercy of how fast the person you're connected to can actually pipe the stuff out). So, again, yes, until a far greater proportion of people have truly hi-speed broadband connections, the sort of file-sharing you're proposing isn't going to gain traction in a hurry. But, again, back in the early days of napster, the situation was exactly the same - it'd take an hour or two to get a single mp3 file downloaded on your dial-up, perhaps a day or two to source an entire album. but people perservered, and that helped push along the whole p2p movement, where it's now commonplace for people to download (albeit compressed) albums, tv shows and movies.

like I said, if you want to kick-start a hi-quality wav sharing community, just do it. the tools are there, you'll probably find like-minded individuals if you spread the word.

// am just puzzled why everybody else who is downloading
// can stand to hear crappy music files.

you must have excellent ears. I cannot for the life of me pick the difference between a 192kbps mp3 and the same track off CD. So I guess most people are at my end of the listening spectrum, and hence 'don't care'.

What is your stereo like? How much did you spend on it? That's a whole other issue that needs to be addressed!
All that wiring, terrible low quality wire, low quality solder. oh but look they stuck a set of "gold" RCA's on it.
Then there's your speakers and how the signal travels to the speaker, long lengths of low grade thin wire, speakers out of phase, dust on your speakers... but i have a 5.1 system, big woop, even more room for error, including set stationary roll off frequencies for subs (which the roll off frequency is probably set wrong anyway) Sub's up too loud, (ya gotta feel the bass man.... well yes but not next door).
Bad speaker positioning, too many soft surfaces, too many hard surfaces, the list of inconsistancies is huge...
You are not going to enjoy the full quality of CD anyway.
So What bit rate have you heard mp3's at RichDubya.
Because unless it is a really low quality mp3 ie below 192.

comparable, but...
i think rw's got a point...
it's hard to overlook you're paying $30 for every cd.
that's more than alot of people in poorer parts of the get paid for a days work.
and i bullshit you not, people aren't forking that out for the jewel case and booklet
they want that superior cd sound quality,
it's not that weird.
granted weird isn't that abnormal anymore
but i think what Richard W is saying,
about buying the thing via the mp3s
for $.99 a track which roughly boils down to the price of a cd, (i really have no idea of the prices)
is that
you're not getting the [b/]standard[a] version.
and re: the standard version,
while not something you can download in a flash,
there's nothing to stop the companies, gving you the mp3 immediately
and setting aside the fullversion somewhere else for you to download at your leisure via the password or whatever.
cos ultimately with mp3 players and shit you'll most likely end up listening to audio on a number of machines in a number of formats. and certain formates suit certain musics differently, different codecs suit different styles. some styles lose nothing with alot of compression
and it's cooler if you can do it yourself, according to specs like your player capacities, speakers etc
and do it off what could technically be deemed a master (despite the arbitrariness of the format)

// beats waiting 3 weeks for the album to be imported

very good point.

Also, I'm on a 50mbps connection here in Japan and it seems to be the standard in this country. I've seen download speeds of 900kbps on Soulseek. In this kind of environment sharing uncompressed audio really could flourish. Actually 24 bit FLAC would be better sound quality and smaller file size than 16 bit WAV... imagining a time when we get beyond the CD format, so we're not ripping from a 16 bit source.

//I did say "CD or greater level"

You also seemed anti-compression, even if it were lossless. I'd prefer greater than CD quality, but with compression. Personally, an mp3 with a high sampling rate doesn't seem different to CD quality to me. And, ah, with dialup, I certainly wouldn't want much bigger file sizes...

And what about bad sound on good gear? I used to know someone with a penchant for listening to bootlegs on arcam...

// you're removing frequencies from music! why would you want to do that?

does it really matter if you're removing frequencies that even the most sensitive ears will never hear?

//does it really matter if you're removing frequencies that even the most sensitive ears will never hear?

Depends on how much you hate the neighbours' dog.

god damn those beatles used so much compression,

limegreen, i think it's worth considering that although our ears may not all be sensitive to pick up those frequencies at this juncture, given the pace of human evolution the companies should be delivering a product that our enhanced 2125 hearing will be able to decode. (um)

but more palpably, i don't think our enjoyment of music is limited to what we can consciously hear,
if you examine the paintings of Monet closely, you will find traces of sand, etc which stuck to the paintings as he painted (prior to then, most painters worked almost exclusively in the studio) .

most photos of these paintings will not have high enough definition to pick this up, and speaking generally these environmental effects have no major influence on the images themselves (from a layman's perspective), but if one wants to examine the work in any detail , they are an integral feature especially if an indepth understanding of the process and innovation of the process.

in relation to music, (especially older stuff that was recorded directly to record). i think there's alot of things a listener can feel regarding the 'vibe' of the performers which is not consciously heard. and as i said i think providing the standard version as part of an online purchase, is the responsibility of the companies who are claiming to sell the recording. and i do agree that 44.1 16 bit is nothing to write home about, but these companies should be made accountable to the point that they'll provide as good as you can buy in a shop (if not better- 96khz/24bit). in my opionion they should offer the full range of formats, (because choice is never a bad thing) with a tiered pricing system, because i think right now paying about as much for the downloaded compressed version, as the hard copy is a rip off.

ultimately, i don't understand why anyone would argue against someone proposing we should be given better quality for our dollar. the technology is an inevitability. and if the sites could offer (as i mentioned above) both a compressed immediately download and the standard version for you to get at your own leisure, who's to lose>

//i don't think our enjoyment of music is limited to what we can consciously hear

If you read further up the page, you'll see I agree. That's why I think holding CD up as "good" is silly. As I've argued in the past, sub-audible frequencies that exist on vinyl do seem to change the "feel" of music relative to CD.

//i don't understand why anyone would argue against someone proposing we should be given better quality for our dollar

I don't disagree at all. However, I think lossless compression but higher quality audio IS better value for our dollar

sorry, i'm still kind of going on when you said

"26 year old audio format as something approximating the ideal"

i hear ya

i don't think he is against lossless compression per se reading through his posts (he hasn't really addressed it), i think he's focussed on what he calls:

//crappy music files

just the audio compression, whether or not he's aware of lossless compression, (which hasn't be addressed) is beside the point (but it would be good to have that clarified) in that his posts seem to be audio focussed rather than showing concern for the file sizes. that's some thing for the web geeks. i think to asume he wants his files double the size because he wants 'greater audio quality' is much of a muchness because ultimately that kind of thing is all in the hands of programmers anyway.

yeah sounds good, keep the bass and enough of the song so you can suss out the chords. anything more fucusses too much on production and not enough on the song

//but yes, removing any frequencies from music CHANGES it.

so you don't want people to master songs anymore either? the whole point of mastering is to remove frequencies...and then it often comes down to one persons taste how the final product will sound.

haha, shy don't you skip everything and just hang out in studios for the rest of your life listening to bands lay down tracks, cause as soon as that shit hits the tape/hard drive its changed bro.

//I guess comparing the same tune, one compressed AIFF style, the other not, is the only way to be sure of that one.

Do you mean Apple Lossless or .aac
Because .aiff is uncompressed.
It is virtually identical to .wav. The only difference is one isn't easily read by Windows

but you're losing frequenies which are date?
you're saying that losing sonic data (which houses) the images will not lose visual data on the images
can you explain how that works?

and you're saying you prefer that to also having the option to purchace the work as the artist intended online?

just cos you see a disposable culture whose specifics are no big thing, i am inclined to disagree.
being dumbed down as a consumer and acepting that and then arguing egainst being smarted up is just wrong.

i'm basically in the same boat-

long live the sm58..