Only because it is lossy. Any lossless encoder would have absolutely no issue at all
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This is pure victim blaming. Well done 
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Published and peer reviewed:
There are also about 30 others from earlier years, also published, peer reviewed, and relevant.
They have never released any of this research.
Your lack of familiarity with their published work underscores a lack of familiarity with the science. You cannot comment in public and expect to be taken seriously by engineers without that understanding
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Nothing of the sort. (Also please do keep in mind not all AES papers are peer reviewed…)
In fact the first step for any scientific process is observation. And it’s important to separate evidence and theory about differing things into different groups. Both in terms of information on different areas that the same group has put out (not everything MQA has released is actually to do with MQA itself), and also separating what is effectively a good idea from something proven to work.
MQA has put out a lot of information, papers (not all of which are peer reviewed, AES has multiple types of papers, and additionally when they ARE peer reviewed it is done anonymously which for a situation where potential for industry bias is so high is a critical concern), and posts. But they are not all about the same thing.
For example their white glove service vs normal MQA.
And again still, they have NOT presented any evidence that MQA does what is claimed. They can present arguments on theory til the day the sun goes dark. But unless they’re happy to actually provide evidence, it’s all moot. So far all the evidence that I, and others have collected suggests that it is false.
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Just to be clear I didn’t link my patreon here and would never do so as it would be inappropriate.
But just to give a little context:
The discord server is of course completely free. Anyone can join and chat. But there are some private channels for supporters. (And a private telegram chat)
I use patreon because it allows me to run my channel in a way that I think is more appropriate than most.
Most review channels use affiliate links to generate most of their income. Meaning they review something, you click the link and when you buy it, the reviewer gets a kickback.
I personally feel this introduces an inherent bias. If you get more money when more people buy the product you review, you have a financial incentive to overlook faults and give positive reviews. And that is a problem.
And so when starting my channel I made the promise that I would never use affiliate links. It allows me to speak openly about something when I feel it is not good.
But also means that when I’m positive about a product, the viewer can trust that I’m saying that because I genuinely like the product. Not because I’m trying to keep a manufacturer happy or earn referral income.
It just helps to keep things honest.
Additionally, all my reviews use music, both because I feel it makes the video more entertaining and enjoyable, but also because it allows me to convey my thoughts and what I’m hearing much easier.
BUT, this gets the videos demonetised immediately.
So patreon allows people who wish to do so to support me, and allows me to put that money towards paying to get stuff in to review (shipping into/out of the UK is unfortunately not cheap now) and to put it towards stuff like an analyzer which would open the doors to plenty of interesting future content.
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I don’t want this thread to become another generalized MQA bash/debate, but from my point of view, MQA has made a target of themselves which I think to some extent justifies and validates the deliberate, non-objective, efforts to rhetorically take them down.
MQA ties two things together that don’t need to be together, which has turned it into a closed, proprietary system. If deblurring and other DSP are beneficial to the sound of the music, make that available as a processing tool. Charge for it. No problem.
But using this end-to-end closed system, requiring specialized hardware, creating the potential for centralized control, it indicates to many people that MQA has done a deal with the devil. It’s not about making a DSP available to people that they might like and may be willing to pay for.
It’s clear to many folks that MQA is attractive to record labels in order to establish DRM in music. People have a right to protect their IP. But DRM like this is still evil…does more than simply protect content. If people like MQA that is fine, but it seems pretty clear between MQA, the record labels, and the behavior of Tidal, that part of the objective here is to restrict choice TO MQA. And so we’re going to fight that.
And once you get to that logical point: that the growth of MQA is a threat to choice, then you are going to closely scrutinize the propaganda that is being used to push MQA. You’re going to look at the claims made by MQA and point out every untruth and misleading statement.
To me the claims about audio quality itself are subjective and like an argument over which dishwasher detergent is more effective. The more egregious side of their claims relate to lossiness, and about implying that EVERY album and track receive white glove treatment when that’s simply wrong. They’re just reselling batch DSP’d content for the most part, and tying it to a system that can introduce DRM.
I feel that GoldenSound’s portrayal of himself as objective and not out to get MQA is disingenuous. I clearly felt he had an axe to grind and set out with an effort to take them down. But I happen to agree with that axe and I have no problem with it. Perhaps being more open about that would help with credibility, but that’s about as far as I would comment on that aspect.
What I do have a problem with is that Tidal and MQA took down the files. It feels like a defensive cover-up. This of course is part of the closed system…the mere existence of GoldenSound’s files, that a pre-DSP’d master and post-DSP file are both available for direct comparison is a threat to the veil MQA wants to maintain, is to me a very substantial indictment.
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I think it is really important, as in academia, and areas such as medicine, that interests are declared. I created the link because I didn’t think it was inappropriate to be transparent about any form of gain, especially when coincident with your videos.
I would question though how independent anyone using ‘tipping’ or other means of monetising can be. In social media there are biases, such as influencers acting in certain ways to maintain followers and thus income streams…creators and influencers are certainly not independent. And of course, algorithms on VSPs have tended to promote hateful content, which also encourages certain content creation. I have learnt a great deal about this during COVID, and the commercial operations fuelling disinformation in the service of stimulating vaccine hesitancy.
Right from the moment Linn posted their much publicised critique of MQA, and other industry figures spoke out against it, I thought the issue of conflict of interest was key, but it is seldom acknowledged. If MQA succeeds, it has implications for many established businesses, as have many digital developments. Ironically, the endless attacks on certain magazines or other websites for having advertising does not go unnoticed when conducted on forums that also depend upon advertisers.
Some have learnt early in the journey, I presume, that stirring anti-MQA feeling is good for business, and we see repeated stunts that continue to provoke and fan the flame.
So when it emerged that you were seeking to gain from your activities, it should be acknowledged, so there is at least a level playing field?
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Whataboutism, also known as whataboutery, is a variant of the tu quoque logical fallacy that attempts to discredit an opponent’s position by charging them with hypocrisy without directly refuting or disproving their argument.
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To my knowledge, not one test by anyone other than MQA has produced ANY empirical data to support the validity of MQA. And I haven’t seen MQA release any data that supports that validity, either. And, unless you can test from “the sound the artist intended” through what is coming out of the DAC and show they are the same, any testing is invalidated.
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@Richard_Graham
I couldn’t agree more. Numerous of the most vocal anti-MQA industry designers have competing products in the market, and somehow this is never understood by audiophiles. Likewise there are websites who fan the flames in order to draw visitors, and thus ad placement, to their sites.
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Of course. But this is exactly why I operate my channel in the way I do. I explicitly avoid things such as sponsored reviews, affiliate links, product ‘gifts’ etc.
If I were to take these I could make quite a bit, but I believe that in the interest of integrity it is important not to do so.
Patreon is good because there is no bias introduced. No one is supporting because of one product or one review, and what I say about various products doesn’t directly affect patreon support. It’s the most unbiased way to cover costs. Though if someone has a suggestion they feel would work better I’d of course be keen to hear it.
I’d also like to be VERY clear that I have absolutely no links, affiliation with or agreements with any company in the audio industry whatsoever.
And more to the point, absolutely none of this has anything at all to do with the issues with MQA shown in my video…
^^
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I hadn’t thought of it in those terms, but for those arguing for greater transparency and honesty, they may want to model that themselves?
Thank you for pointing that out.
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Having spent some quality time with your videos (I don’t watch Bob Stuart’s) I must confess that the combative tone was not expected…which is puzzling for something portrayed, by you, as neutral, enquiring, independent. Your description of what MQA does to music files, for me, is littered with hyperbole (not uncommon in this space; someone elsewhere, literally compared MQA to an invading army, with absolutely no trace of irony) that may make for good drama, but not facilitate good judgement. It is unrecognisable from my repeated experiences of actually listening to, and not measuring, MQA tracks. It is puzzling to me why at this point in the MQA story you would do this.
Still, that main principal of science, replicability, is impossible now, not because of MQA, but because you have broadcast your videos across the Internet, albeit with repeated placements of your Patreon channel. If you had kept quiet, and asked others to repeat what happened with Tidal, there would be more than a sample size of one. What was the urgency? In other forums there is frequent reporting of MQA’s demise, through scrutiny of the accounts…allegedly the company is in its (now rather protracted) death throes.
And here we land upon the one piece of the MQA response that I don’t think that you commented upon:
This is not the first time that people have leveraged MQA to gain ‘clicks’, it won’t be the last.
If your Patreon channel did not loom so large in the videos, one might wonder what they were talking about.
Still, as you posted your second video in the ‘Rethink’ thread I started earlier in the year, I wonder what sense you make of that first post? I remain curious about MQA too, but I’d rather be certain of its failings, and also the limitations of PCM, before being confident it should be destroyed.
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I’m not at all intending to be combative. Just simply saying that ad hominem arguments against myself are of no help to anyone and nothing to do with MQA. And I will not respond further to them.
I have not said in the videos that I thought MQA sounds bad. I don’t.
In fact in the part 2 video I quite clearly stated that I have absolutely no issue with people subjectively preferring it.
Subjective preference is not always linked to objective performance or whether or not marketing claims are genuine.
And this is also not specific to MQA.
For example I have an upcoming video on the Denafrips Ares 2 dac.
I like this DAC. I think for the money it’s an absolutely stellar option. BUT, their description of it being “NOS” is false. And I will discuss that in the video because they are being dishonest.
Subjective preference must be kept separate from honest/dishonest business practices and lies about what a product is/does.
I’m not quite sure what this is implying. There was no rush/urgency. Was there a particular time or date that would have been better to release the video?
Others are free to repeat what I did themselves. There is no time limit
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Do all of these have the disclaimer “this might resemble MQA but is a PURELY hypothetical and technical explanation for doing something that resembles MQA”, or just the first one?
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Placing a video on youtube dealing with a currently controversial topic, copying it to numerous websites, and then promoting one’s equivalent gofundme page is a set of tactics that can be read as designed to launch an aspiring journalist career.
Good journalists however are knowledgeable and fairly open-minded. Admitting that you never read the papers and patents of the technique you’re attempting to test, and therefore don’t understand what it is about (as also said in Bob Stuart’s response), yet are trying to leverage your test video, is not a good start for any journalist. I would agree with Bob Stuart’s assessment that MQA is being used as click bait for unrelated reasons.
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Publications are like patents. They describe ideas but not the final, implemented detail. There is nothing unusual or wrong in that.
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Dude, have you even seen the video?
He states very clearly what he wants to test and how he is going about doing that. You don’t need to know the geometry of “folding” a music signal if what you’re looking for is whether the signal is the same going in and going out.
I don’t have to know the chemistry of decomposition to avoid eating a rotten apple.
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MQA not being lossless despite their claims to the contrary is hardly “unrelated”
If you’d like some other evidence then there is plenty available with a quick google.
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The point is that you can link those publications all you want, but as they’re stating in the very publications you’re linking to that this is not how MQA works we haven’t really learned anything.
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