Scott Bahneman, CEO of MusicGiants, called earlier this week to announce what he called big news. "Actually," Bahneman said, "we're not going to issue an official press release—yet—but MusicGiants is going to offer Windows Media Audio (WMA) lossless music downloads without DRM.

We were taking our morning constitutional around the Interwebs one day last week when we happened upon an article on <I> Timesonline</I> titled <A HREF=http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/music… Music Really Is Getting Louder"</A>. <I>Oh boy,</I> we thought, <I>a mainstream outlet is catching on to the whole issue of dynamic compression</I>&mdash;a subject we have inveighed against repeatedly over the years. (JA first preached that particular sermon back in <A HREF="http://stereophile.com/asweseeit/177/">1999</A&gt;.)

The October 1982 issue of <I>Stereo Review</I> published what must be hailed (or derided) as the first reasoned assessment of high-end audio ever presented in a mass-circulation hi-fi publication. We disagreed with a few of the author's points, but our main gripe about the piece prompted a letter to <I>Stereo Review</I>. This is what we wrote:

Stuck out here in the <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com/asweseeit/498awsi">desert depths of the Southwest</A>, we look forward to visits from out-of-towners. So when <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com/interviews/478">David Wilson</A>, one-time audio reviewer but now full-time high-end manufacturer, called to say he was going to be in Santa Fe, there was a flurry of activity. David had agreed to an <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com/interviews/690wil">interview</A&gt;, so I started going through back issues of <I>The Absolute Sound</I> and <I>Stereophile</I> for background. Vol.6 No.2 of <I>Stereophile</I> from 1983, with its front-cover photograph of David and Sheryl Lee Wilson with their WAMM speaker system, seemed a good place to start&mdash;except that nothing inside the magazine corresponded to the cover picture. It was the <I>next</I> issue that had featured Larry Archibald's write-up on the WAMM, and once I opened its pages, I got trapped into reading the entire issue.

Much of the <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com/reference/50">descriptive terminology</A> used in subjective reporting describes things we hear in live music, and expect&mdash;or, rather, hope&mdash;to hear from reproduced music, too. I'm referring to terms like <I>width</I>, <I>depth</I>, <I>perspective</I>, <I>spectral balance</I>, and <I>tonal accuracy</I>. If you read our reports, you know these terms as well as I do, and since they are (for most people) self-explanatory, I will devote no more time to them.

I hate all those automobile reviews that go on and on about a car's design aesthetics. C'mon, I can see what it looks like, even if only in the pictures. Just tell me things I can't appreciate without a run on the Autobahn.

I hate all those automobile reviews that go on and on about a car's design aesthetics. C'mon, I can see what it looks like, even if only in the pictures. Just tell me things I can't appreciate without a run on the Autobahn.

I hate all those automobile reviews that go on and on about a car's design aesthetics. C'mon, I can see what it looks like, even if only in the pictures. Just tell me things I can't appreciate without a run on the Autobahn.