Fried, the legend goes, fell in love with reproduced music when he heard Stokowski leading the Philadelphia Orchestra over the big corner horn speakers in his father's movie theater in 1928 ("the year that the movies learned to speak"). The importance of music reproduction to Fried was made paramount during his service in WWII, where he encountered fellow…
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Just look at the dates and you'll see a legacy that essentially spans the entire history of electrical music reproduction. That's fitting. In his career—or more properly, many careers—Irving M. ("Bud") Fried all but embodied that era.
In the first set of prophecies, we foresaw the effects of DVD-Audio, high-end sales around the world, and tweak multidisc CD. For the second installment, we look into our crystal interconnects and foresee new audio data-distribution methods for the coming year.
4) Downloading music from the internet heats up---slowly.
There was a dumptruck-load of hype when several online music services launched, but the numbers reveal that "CD quality" audio streaming is still for web fanatics. Expect this situation to change when ADSL, cable modems, and high-bandwidth satellite links, providing…
What began as a seemingly random collection of songs became a classic animated movie. Yellow Submarine was recently remastered and reissued on DVD and CD, and has now become the latest in a string of virtual-reality theme-park rides: Beatles fans visiting Berlin's Potsdamer Platz can travel through Pepperland at The Beatles' Yellow Submarine Adventure.
The ride, which opened to the public on January 20, is a key attraction of the Music Box, a new Sony entertainment center intended to celebrate music in all its forms. Other attractions include a melodic water fountain that can be played by…
During the recent, successful Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA) predicted that manufacturer-to-dealer sales of consumer electronics products will total a record $101 billion in 2004—a 5% increase over 2003.
These numbers, revised upward from the CEA's pronouncements four months ago, were issued as part of CEA Market Research's semi-annual US Consumer Electronics Sales & Forecasts report. The forecast also reflects optimism that the industry will finally top the important $100 billion milestone that it was aiming for in 2003.
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Audiophile's Journey continues.
Our few days in Istanbul stretched into a dreamscape with its own strange normality. We ate and drank and walked and talked about anything and everything—music and audio, of course, as well as politics, art, literature. In contrast to often one-track American engineers, Leonid Korostyshevski showed an amazing depth of knowledge about painting and sculpture and non-Russian authors—and revealed a previously unexpressed interest in creating new forms of dance that would reflect the effects of technology the way other art forms have.
"Dance is a dead art…
In what is intended to have the biggest impact yet on the thriving "rip, mix, burn" lifestyle, Macrovision has revealed that several record labels have been secretly putting its copy protection system onto new CD releases since around March of this year (see previous report). The process, called SafeAudio, is a Macrovision registered trademark and is intended to prevent the copying of CDs, or tracks from CDs, onto CD-R discs and computer hard drives. The technology was developed jointly by Macrovision and TTR Technologies.
While it is not intended to completely prevent copying,…
Audiophiles constantly seek the next level in musical realism, as any reader of this website would acknowledge. The world at large, however, can't get enough of low-fidelity audio, as evidenced by the continuing popularity of the MP3 format.
Xingtone, a small company with offices in Los Angeles, Atlanta, and Amsterdam, is betting on low-fi in a big way with technology that will allow people to send and receive MP3s over cell phones. The recently launched company already has 3000 users.
Reuters reporter Sue Zeidler notes that Xingtone's software can convert compressed music files…
The merger of Sony Music and Bertelsmann Music Group (BMG) may not be a done deal after all.
On Wednesday, November 4, a trade association representing approximately 2000 small European record labels announced that it would appeal the merger approval granted in July by European Union (EU) commissioners. Impala, as the association is known, contends that the merger concentrates too much power and market control in too few hands.
Impala will make its case before the EU's high court. Should its petition succeed, EU regulators would have to reverse an unconditional approval and order the…
The Electronic Freedom Foundation (EFF) maintains a website that we have found invaluable for keeping up with news about technological restrictions to information and fair use. Last week, we were directed to the EFF's new User's Guide to DRM in Online Music, which we recommend to everyone still undecided about buying into one of the online providers.
We have our own reservations about download services—as audiophiles, we are, of course, concerned about the lossy compression schemes that dominate the mainstream providers. Yet, we reckon that most consumers know they are sacrificing bandwidth…
Slap echo got you in a flutter? Jonathan Scull writes, in "Fine Tunes" #27, that "last month I delved into avoiding reflective, parallel-wall slap echoes from ruining your audiophile day. But I've since learned of a perfectly useful workaround that's much less costly and involved than horsing around the Sheetrock." George Cardas lends a hand.
Kalman Rubinson loved the MSB Link DAC, which he reviewed back in January 1999. He now turns his ears to the Link's most recent incarnation, the MSB Link DAC III D/A converter. Kal lists the Link III's attractions: "user-installable enhancements,…