Well I wanted to wait a week to post a response to the Flac vs. MP3 post. I did this for a couple of reasons, 1. to see the poll results and 2. to take in all the comments. Thanks all for commenting BTW.
Now I thought about responding with snarky name calling and insults, for instance I was called a cheat and a traitor for converting to lossy MP3s, and I could retort with calling you a cheat and traitor to the artist for not wanting their music proliferated. I could point out that the artists themselves who allow taping do not stipulate a format, and I could also point out that if mp3's are so inferior soundwise to FLAC files there should be no worries of spotting them with your superior hearing ears when they have been converted back to FLAC. But I won't do that ;-), because nothing will be gained from it except another argument on the internet.
I would like to say that I now understand the FLAC purists stance a little better. They are concerned that their pure files are not preserved for future generations. Again, a valid source of concern. I would like to point out though....to use corporate speak....that their business model is fucked. You are passing on something you care about (preservation of pure music files) onto your customer base (that would be those of us who just want to hear the music). There is bound to be a better way to go about this than posting your files on the internet, then hoping everyone follows your unwritten rules of how they should listen to those files. Seems to me, the archiving of the pure files should be a seperate act from the distribution of the music. Are you tapers not backing up your own files? Are you depending on the internet to do your job for you? I will reiterate, that's a fucked business model, and if your main concern is keeping a pure lineage of a taped show, you should not be posting it to the internet in the first place. I'm not telling you folks what to do, but I would propose 2 areas, an archival area for the purest of pure files that only the elite can access (that's you guys), and a distribution area where the files can be downloaded by those who are more interested in the music than the lineage (that's us).
One of the commentors compared preserving these live shows to preserving Kafka transcipts, but I prefer a different comparison. In the middle ages, pre-printing press the bible was only read by the elite monks, and it was only read in latin. After the invention of the printing press, the bible was translated to many languages and it was suddenly available to anyone who wished to read it. The elite monks were not happy about this, and thought that the bible should only be read in latin. However because of the translations more people than ever were reading the bible and they were reading it in the most prevelant language of their area....their preferred language if you will. I guess my point here is that elitism has it's place, we would not want the translated mass produced bibles to replace the original handwritten latin ones, but was it not also beneficial to the non-elites to have a readable translation so they didn't need to learn latin and ride their mule up to the top of Mt. Cristo just to read the bible?
Music in a similar way, should be enjoyed by any who wishes to enjoy it, not just the elites up on Mt. FLAC.
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