Hi there folks,
just wanted to ask for your opinion on future music storage. With streaming services such as Tidal and Spotify (and Apple sneakily too), where one pays annual subscription fee and has access to everything, it feels like it can't get much better for the average listener.
BUT
I'm fond of this saying, what's not available offline, doesn't exist.

By default, the streaming quality is adequate, but still cannot beat lossless formats. With Tidal, you can opt in for lossless stream, for additional $10 of course. Also you can listen to the music only in places with reliable internet access (which like 70% of rural areas lack). Statistics is being pulled from you which artists/tracks you prefer. You account can be cancelled anytime for no reason. Some publicly unknown artists that can't make it to the service won't get the exposure. And of course you don't own anything and you're required to own 'smart' device capable of running proprietary software.
We're slowly moving to an era, where client and local storage no longer matters. Everything is getting backed-up to cloud storages, even your Wi-Fi and Bitlocker passwords.

I'm generally against all this, have my music collection safely backed up offline and available immediately, playable cross-platform in common formats (FLAC, AAC, MP3).
But I can see how member of average society doesn't care.

 

I always like to have my personal collection offline and in the future would like to setup a NAS box or something for streaming, but like you mentioned people on mobile connections usually have some form of data limit which restrains it, so at the minute i just download everything offline and put it on my phone's SD card. I think streaming heavily impedes on a producers potential to gain any form of revenue. Its a heavily one sided pro-consumer method of divulging into entertainment which sucks. I don't even know if there would be any benefit to storing and streaming wavs/flacs just yet, and my only reasons are network infrastructure (data limitations), business models (mobile phone companies) and the devices in which these are played on themselves. For example i could see myself streaming all of my music collection from my NAS box while im in the car to my mobile phone, but then again would i notice a difference using an AUX cable into shitty car speakers?

Also you mentioned the consistency in connectivity strength across rural areas, even in some densely populated areas, the connection can be horrible. I think there is an obvious difference in the method of consumption based on listener type. If you are a fan of music, you aren't gonna want buffering stops while you wait for your mobile connection to sort itself out, or have to use some poor bitrate to listen to music constantly. I also make mixes and stuff quite often so having 320's of a tune at a minimum is definitely a thing for me. I also like having the freedom to backup my music, or put it wherever i like.

I also like appreciate the ability to find new artists using a streaming service, but it comes at a cost of throwing away any form of attachment. I like to slow digest the music i listen to. The streaming medium can feel very disposable at times. I know friends who use streaming services, they just use other peoples playlists and listen to songs, with no care for the artists name, their ideologies, artwork etc. I agree that the average listener doesn't care, and its super frustrating to me.

 

If it ain't on my local storage, it ain't mine. Although cloud storage can be convenient, I wouldn't rely on it completely.

 

Although I think streaming services will eventually have a big market share there will always be a diversity.
I spoke to an distributer of audio equipment the other day and he said many CD players are still being sold in Belgium where audio streamers are very dominant source components in Netherlands. This has to do with the networks in both countries. In NL it is all fiber-optics and download speed of 150 mBps is pretty standard.

Also vinyl is a growing market out here. Even high quality tape has returned to the market mainly catering the growing market of Chinese billioaires. See:
http://www.yarlungrecords.com/analog.html
http://www.unitedhomeproducts.com/prices_and_features.htm

Last word about Tidal: the lossless stream option does provide good quality as well as some services available up here (Like Quobuz). Also Tidal is expected to support a new hires format MQA this fall.

http://www.trustedreviews.com/opinions/what-is-mqa-meridian-s-digital-audio-format-explained
https://www.meridian-audio.com/news-events/meridian-audio-launches-mqa-master-quality-authenticated/

 

Last edited: Apr 16, 2016

Reference library is always offline. I've started collecting YouTube videos too. Who knows when we might be living on a desert island

This is my preferred audio listening environment away from the computer ...

 

Last edited: Apr 15, 2016

One good magnetic pulse in one or many regions and everything that we archive using modern means of storage are...history. The burning of the Library of Alexandria wI'll seem like nothing compared to the incredible loss of human knowledge and intellectual treasure if and when this happens. Loosing your HDD or SSD is bad, everyone loosing theirs at the same moment...? I guess an ending is just a new beginning. We need multiple planet backup storage if we keep going down this violent, primative road we travel. Off-planet backup, yea.

 

My music is physically in my possession, digitally, yes, but no third party, no drm.
This will never change.

 

Last edited by a moderator: Apr 16, 2016

Well-played pieces are stored on my brain. For everything else, there's my HD.

I have music in all sorts of formats: WV, FLAC, DTS, AC3, AAC, MP3 (including surround) etc so any "music-optimized" service isn't likely to handle all my needs. More like generic online storage.

 

The more and more these streaming sites will grow, the earnings from digital music sale for small or mid musicians, will shrink. Fuck these streaming services, I don't give them any money and refuse to allow them to play any of my music (crap anyway but is mine)

 

i pay for spotify, i use it a lot on my mac and on my iphone. i like it because i can offline save songs for when i'm commuting.
i have used apple music. but not tidal and i don't intend to.

i still buy cd's i have a nice collection and i also like to collect vinyl.

it'd be nicer if spotify and the others could play lossless and wav etc. but the majority of people don't have good internet speeds.
i get 150mbps fibre so this doesn't affect me so i would like there to be an option for that.

hopefully in the future when more people have access to higher speeds this will become an option for streaming.

 

If that happens i think we will have more to worry about than a few missing mp3's

 

That is an understatement.

 

last month an artist who I produce pushed an rough mix in mp3 format to spootify deezer and Itunes
I should've seen the look on my face when I found out...

so what does it has to do with this topic and embarrass myself u might ask?

well I guess most material wasn't even collected in high quality because that wasn't the purpose at that time,
so it isn't that simple as pressing a button to change that.

 

1: Online streaming services do not, nor will they ever, have "everything."

2: It is stupidity to rely (solely) upon cloud storage or service.

3: Without redundant back-up, preferably on hard drives stored in separate physical locations, consider your data ephermeral.

4a If artists would stop submitting their music to Spotify, et al., then such services would have nothing to stream,
4b: BUT, since artists need the exposure, they should submit only selected tracks, not their entire discographies,
4c: and thereby deprive Spotify, et al., of the opportunity to provide all their music for (basically) free.

5: If Spotify, et al., were to stream lossless audio, that audio stream could be recorded in lossless quality.

6: The better quality in which one submits audio to Spotify, Soundloud, or any other stream-site, the better-sounding the low-bitrate streaming audio into which it will be transcoded ("Garbage in, garbage out").

7: ALL of the music files streaming on a Soundcloud playlist or page, or Bandcamp page, or most other such pages, can be individually DOWNLOADED through browser plug-ins, or en bloc by copy/pasting the URL of the page into JDownloader or some such download client. These files are commonly MP3@128. Most people will settle for that rather than to pay for lossless-quality music.

8a: Musicians have let techies usurp musicians' interests and self-presentation;
8b musicians have let techies tell them how to go about their biz and what they have to put up with;
8c: musicians should find a way to restore their comraderie, recognize the techie takeover for what it is, and come up with a way of marketing and selling their music which is aligned with their own interests and sensibilities as artists.

 

Last edited: Apr 17, 2016

While Streaming is convenient you have to just look at the titles of best sellers, its all rubbish flavour of the month. its the same with all printed media, newspapers/ magazines, books are all going digital. In a consumer nation above all the people must consume for it to thrive.. the easier it gets the more they will consume, specially when it comes to organising a music collection where a vast majority of consumers don't even know the name of the artist or the song... "oh I love that song, i don't know who sings it but i goes "la la la" but with all this technology there are still people that like to "own the book/ but the paper or mag / get it on Vinyl!!!! or cd.
Ive said this before and ill say it again new bands need to find a new way, the internet is Great cause you have a lot better chance of being heard there then 20 years ago making a demo on an 8 track in sone hobby Garage studio and then shopping it around. for that one in a million shot. and even if you got a deal it was another million to one that you'd find an audience. these days you can have a better recording setup in your bed room the most of the top smaller studios that cost 10000 a week to record in. its up to the artist to get the song out there... the problem is these day out there means FREE!!! so how do you make money???? how to do it ? write good songs and record them... Tour your ass off building a following... then they buy t-shirts/cd7what ever swag you pin to a wall after your gig, and you are there selling it to them taking pix with them... giving them what we all wanted in the 80's to hang out with the band... make them a part of the experience thats where social media comes in... we don't have Business cards anymore we have Fasebook and twitter A living breathing interactive Business Card where your followers can get what ever they want with a click of a mouse... do this and the next time you make a record you include them in the process, and they give you money... they can give you LOTS of money to buy gear to make another record to tour and go back to those cities and to do silly things like PAY YOUR RENT, buy food etc. and guess what, there no Label standing in the middle bleeding you dry.... yes its a lot of work but at least your getting paid for what you put in and not some fuck in a suit who only because of his reputation thinks he deserves 90% of what you make. technology has made things obsolete since the dawn of time what makes the Music industry & and media industry so different. I say let sportify feed the sheep. Ill still buy Vinyl & CDs Ill still every morning browse my iTunes for stuff to listen to for the day depending on my mood or the often "damn i haven't listened to this in a while spontaneity. the medium may have changed but the process is still the same.

 

I think music in only the first step, to get it a bit further, i strongly believe in near future, our whole rig will be in a cloud and we will only need an input device (say keyboard, mouse) and an output device (a screen etc.) or just a ridiculously good touchscreen.
In the name of insanely fast processing and economy of space in our place of course...

 

I keep my collections on hard disks, as I want to see it, watch the pics, read something... make compilations, move folders to sub genres and so on.
I have the same approach as for lps and cds.
I listen to modern rock and indie rock but stop collecting it last year.
Most of my collections come from the 60s and 70s, some rare stuff, maybe records that I won t easily find online so I prefer to store it the old way: in my hands.

I think I have about 4000 bands.

 

I have my digital music on a 12 TB NAS, CD's, SACD`s and DVD audio. Also I have a big (1500 albums/EP`s).

I listen mainly in my living room (audio streamer, (SA)CD-player and my 22 years old LP-12 record player. I do have TIDAL HIFI and it is surprising what they have: the last album of Scalameriya - Hubris released last month was up in a week; so was Israel Vines - Gatekeepers (EP, obsure techno).

Quality wise there are differences. I compared Portishead - Live at Roseland NYC and vinyl still sounded best. Then CD and lastly Tidal (level matched). I'm shure streaming services don`t have all music but they do have surprisingly much. They do offer a great means of discovering new artists.