A digital divide

摘要

The music industry is now in schizo push-pull mode: pushing for 'hi-res' sales at higher prices, yet pulling down quality by making low-res material ever easier to access online. At the high-end, MESA, the Media and Entertainment Services Alliance, is trying to herd cats and coordinate the launch of High Fidelity Pure Audio - audio-only 96/24 or better Blu-ray discs which (sometimes) come with the free option to download a FLAC copy of the content. Universal has led the Pure Audio push with a good selection of titles [see p109] and the 'no compression, no compromise' tag-line. Warner is onboard in France and Australia, and Sony Music announced 'a new high-resolution audio initiative' which sees 15 hi-res tracks (from Warner, Universal and Sony) pre-loaded on some Sony players. But, evoking unhappy memories of the way the music companies screwed up the launch of DVD-Audio and SACD, Sony launched its hi-res initiative with a party at an open-plan nightclub totally unsuited to hi-res demonstrations. Thanks to invites with wrong times -or no invites at all - I and others with an interest in hi-res missed a round table discussion on hi-res with the likes of David Chesky who had been flown in from the US for the event. Instead we got a rock band and DJ set.