Stereophile magazine is pleased to announce that senior contributing editor Jonathan Scull has joined its full-time staff as senior editor. As of April 19, 1999, he will be based at parent company Emap Petersen's office on lower Fifth Avenue in Manhattan's Flatiron district.A lifelong audiophile and music lover, Scull has been contributing equipment reviews, features, and interviews to Stereophile since December 1993. Prior to joining Stereophile he wrote reviews for The Abso!ute Sound, and has also had articles published in Gramophone and The Atlantic Monthly.
As part of his new…
Satellite startup XM Radio got a nice Christmas gift on December 24—an infusion of $450 million in new financing that should sustain it well into 2004.Company principals have worked overtime the past few months to seal a deal that would enable them to stay in business long enough to carve a viable share of the nascent satellite radio business. Once rumored as a candidate for bankruptcy, XM Satellite Radio Holdings, Inc. has secured funding in two parts: $200 million from investors and $250 million in payment deferrals and credit facilities from General Motors Corporation, a major XM…
Judging from the e-mails we get, some folks wonder why Stereophile's website continues to cover the advance of such lo-fi formats as MP3 as well as the problems encountered by companies like Napster as they tangle with the music business. But consider this: a new study reports that the market for digital music players will grow to $6.4 billion in 2005—more than 34 times 1999 shipments—which is also nearly 80% of the $8 billion reported for sales of all audio products, including portables, from last year (see previous article).At current industry growth rates, that would indicate that two…
In the classic textbook example, the Doppler effect is demonstrated by an increase in both pitch and volume (or amplitude) of a train's whistle as it approaches a station, followed by a decrease in pitch and volume as it moves away. This effect---the shift of a frequency emitted by a moving object---leads to a fundamental flaw in audio technology. A midrange driver behaves like the approaching-and-departing train when it attempts to reproduce varying frequencies. When the driver is fed simultaneous 400Hz and 2kHz tones, the forward movement of the cone at the lower rate modulates the 2kHz…
San Diego-based MP3.com, a premier website for distributing the music of unsigned bands, has announced a new program called Beam-it, via which copies of commercial CDs will be stored at the site. The copies will be instantly available to customers who have purchased the music from affiliated online retailers, company officials said. About 40,000 CDs have already been archived on the site.The purported goal is to create a central Internet content library that music lovers can tap into with any computer—in other words, making MP3.com a personal radio station or jukebox for registered users…
Citing poor sales in North and South America, EMI reported that it lost $77.6 million during the first six months of its business year, ended September 30, compared to a loss of $44.3 million for the same period last year.A substantial chunk of the loss was attributed by outside experts to EMI's $80 million contract with pop diva Mariah Carey, whose recent movie Glitter came and went in a heartbeat after it was almost universally excoriated by critics. EMI had high hopes for the soundtrack album, which hasn't performed any better than the film. The company expects new releases from Garth…
The most entertaining part of the 44th Annual Grammy Awards wasn't the "Lady Marmalade" production number that opened the show or Alicia Keys' awkward tango later. It was Recording Academy President Michael Greene's rant about the criminal enterprise of electronic music swapping, a phenomenon that, he warned, threatens the music industry's very existence.After cursory praise for that night's winners of "Lifetime Achievement Awards," Greene segued into a riff so off the wall that it provoked hoots from some in the audience. Like George Bush, Sr. demonstrating the nation's drug problem…
Last week, USA Digital Radio, a partnership formed in 1991 with CBS Corporation and Gannett Co. Inc., announced the filing of a Petition for Rulemaking with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) seeking to permit digital radio broadcasting using In-Band On-Channel (IBOC) technology. The petition begins the process of acceptance of the USA Digital Radio IBOC system as the DAB transmission standard for the United States. According to a statement from Digital Radio, "the IBOC technology being developed by USA Digital Radio offers the most comprehensive digital radio transmission…
The sales picture has improved for Tweeter Home Entertainment Group, but not the bottom line. The Canton, MA–based retailer reported a 4% increase in sales for the second quarter ended March 31, with comparable store results up 3%. The increase lifted Tweeter's total revenue to $189.3 million, but the company reported an operating loss of $4.6 million, almost twice the $2.5 million loss posted in the same period the previous year.The most recent quarterly total included $5.1 million in "non-cash compensation charges." Removing that from the calculation, Tweeter's quarterly loss would be $…
Back in the 1990s, I lusted mightily for the large ESP speakers with their tall, slim shapes and their angled driver panels. A large-room demo of the Concert Grands with Sonic Frontiers electronics still reverberates in my memory. Unfortunately, just as I evolved to the point where I could consider buying a pair of Concert Grands, the company folded its tents. Recently, I heard a rumor that ESP might be returning, and an email exchange with founder and designer Sean McCaughan has confirmed the good news.The vehicle of ESP's return will be a redesign of the Concert Grand and of the company'…
