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And yet UMG is one of the few companies that forces lossless downloads. Are they crazy?
I assume this is also on the HD downloads of the 007 soundtracks which I paid three times of the retail CD price for. I just hope it isn't on their CDs as well. I've spent big bucks on classical box sets the last two years...
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I always thought that the artifacts I was hearing were due to compression, but it seems not:
http://www.mattmontag.com/music/universals-audible-watermark
I was just listening to the opening track of Snow White and the Huntsman on Spotify. The artifacting is very obvious during the exposed horn and oboe solos when listening on good headphones. Earlier I was wondering why "Ray and Rachel" from War of the Worlds sounded like the strings were being doubled by a jittery synth. I pulled out my actual CD and the noise was absent. It turns out that it was indeed the watermarking that was causing the 'zippering' sound.
I'll be buying CDs as long as they're around.
OK, how can you be sure about this?
It could just be a bad transfer, bad connection,etc
What PROOF do you have?
How do you know that this bozo whose site you linked isn't just pulling it from his ass?
Do you have a second CREDIBLE SOURCE that confirms this?
How you compared it to say a download from ITUNES or Amazon?
Because one bozo saying it is what is happening on his website just doesn't cut it.
Ford A. Thaxton
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Horner's The New World from iTunes has it-- I even re-downloaded it multiple times and it was still there. I bought the Snow White and the Huntsman mp3 album from Amazon last summer and promptly complained after what I initially thought was just a bad encoding job. I listened to my friend's CD and it was crystal clear. To Amazon's credit, they gave me a full refund. With The New World iTunes said their team determined it wasn't detrimental enough to the listening experience to give a refund.
I've heard it all over orchestral recordings on iTunes, Amazon, and Spotify for several years now. The artifacts that I heard on the Amazon mp3 of Snow White are the exact same that I heard tonight on the Spotify album. I'm sure I'm not the only one who experiences this. When there are long sustained tones it sounds like there's a digital ripping underneath it all...any mp3 album I'ver ever purchased has had it to some degree. Elfman's Iris was another Amazon mp3 album where I noticed it clearly.
Any credible on the record source that will confirm this?
Ford A. Thaxton
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If the purpose of 'spoiling' the sound is to stop people copying it then it fails at the outset.
Because once the original is spoiled, then all spoiled pirate copies are just as good as it, but free.
This is why it is a dumb piracy prevention strategy if true.
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Yes:
http://www.mattmontag.com/music/universals-audible-watermark
You might not have noticed you are citing the same source as the original poster did, not a second on the record CREDIBLE SOURCE.
Because folks, it looks like everyone seems to be citing the same person saying this.
Has anyone found a ON THE RECORD source who asked UMG about this?
Everyone seems to be taking this one source as the word of god on this topic.
I'm not as accepting.
Ford A. Thaxton
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If the purpose of 'spoiling' the sound is to stop people copying it then it fails at the outset.
Because once the original is spoiled, then all spoiled pirate copies are just as good as it, but free.
This is why it is a dumb piracy prevention strategy if true.
The important term you use is 'If True"...
So far we have one blog post that is unconfirmed by any second credible source.
Can anyone found a UMG spokesperson making any sort of comment on this issue?
Ford A. Thaxton
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If the purpose of 'spoiling' the sound is to stop people copying it then it fails at the outset.
Because once the original is spoiled, then all spoiled pirate copies are just as good as it, but free.
This is why it is a dumb piracy prevention strategy if true.
The important term you use is 'If True"...
So far we have one blog post that is unconfirmed by any second credible source.
Can anyone found a UMG spokesperson making any sort of comment on this issue?
Ford A. Thaxton
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The watermark may contain individualised information about the original (legal) downloader so they can trace where the copies originated.
Well, so far it doesn't. Though probably only because at the moment, it's too much trouble technically. The contained information is still anonymous:
https://www.eff.org/press/mentions/2008/1/11-0
But of course this may be the future. If they do this, I'll sure refrain from buying files as I did before they quit their DRM crap.
You did notice that this article you link to is from Feb 11,2008?
That's over 5 years ago?
Ford A. Thaxton
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So far we have one blog post that is unconfirmed by any second credible source.
Can anyone found a UMG spokesperson making any sort of comment on this issue?
Ford A. Thaxton
Trying to resist making a comment about executives not on this board and posting contact information.
If this is such a serious issue, you'd think you'd be able to find that someone has asked UMG about this directly, so far I don't that anyone has done that.
If you can one and point me in the general direction to it, that would be welcome.
Ford A. Thaxton
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Ford, while foaming at the mouth, does make a point. Some of us can tell, particularly in orchestral recordings, the audio degradation inherent with MP3 encoding, but sometimes I feel like it can be....suggested, in a psychosomatic way, by articles like that one from 2008.
But there's the other part of me that knows that if we'd just ask someone with Universal, we'd get a canned response and it would just deepen the conspiracy theories.
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