Buying vs. Streaming

[ando]

For me the chief boon of subscribing to Apple Music is having my iTunes catalog at my fingertips wherever I might be. It remains my main method of ripping and organizing CDs. (It's also one of the reasons why I never switched to a complete IOS set up - no MAC support.) The only other viable alternative that I've seriously considered over the years has been PLEX, which with a lifetime membership allows you to upload an unlimited amount of data with unlimited access and reasonable sharing features. Trouble is, your home server needs to be on at all times because, unlike their early days, they don't store your data but merely serve as a third party to organize and transmit it. (Further, I hear that with recent managements changes the lifetime membership may be going.)

Not good enough. So it's Apple Music with the ever-klunky iTunes (and their everlasting updates). 

[Papy Oli]

Alas, in the US it is available to stream from Qobuz, but not to download. Solves my quandary, whether to get it.

Damn, sorry for the false hopes

[Spotted Horses]

Damn, sorry for the false hopes

No worries, I'm delighted to stream it.

[AnotherSpin]

In reality, it's quite simple. Collecting CDs (whether you rip them to your HD or not - which is perfectly legal) ensures that your available collection is composed entirely in the way you want. With streaming, you are completely and utterly dependent on which music and which recordings the streaming service wants to promote, and here several other considerations than the purely musical can come into play. And CD has a fairly standardized sound quality, while the quality of streaming may vary. I have only used streaming by youtube and mostly as preliminary orientation about CDs I considered acquiring.

Sounds really weird to me. From streaming we get what the streaming service wants to promote, but by buying CDs we don't get what the record companies want to promote? Don't streaming and CDs contain the same material, duplicating one over the other? The only difference is that there is immeasurably more of everything in streaming?

[DavidW]

Why capturing is a steal and ripping not?

I think that both are technically illegal.  I think that ripping your own cd for your private use (and not sharing it online) is ethically fine.  But capturing a stream is definitely not.  That crosses a line, you never owned that music.  Subscribing to Spotify doesn't make you the owner of all recorded music.

[DavidW]

For me the chief boon of subscribing to Apple Music is having my iTunes catalog at my fingertips wherever I might be.

I own a streamer (Bluesound Node) and with my collection on usb loaded on the streamer, I then have access to all that music.  No need for iTunes.  I'm sure what you're doing works for you, but I wanted you to be aware that there are other options.

Apple is very good about reducing friction to keeping you locked into an ecosystem or paying for something you don't need to.

[DavidW]

I have only used streaming by youtube

That is painfully clear because the variability you're talking about is the variability that only appears on youtube.  If you pay actual money for a streaming service you'll have much more consistent sound quality.  I've even encountered remasters that never made their way to cd.

I am shocked how often even official sources will have uploads on YT with that most awful sound you've ever heard.  And if you listen on any streaming platform it will sound amazing with no difference from the cd release.  On Idagio you can even choose between remasters of the same album.  They'll just have all of them!

[aukhawk]

Why capturing is a steal and ripping not?

Because if you rip a CD or needledrop a vinyl, you still have the original hard media that you bought.  That's OK, for as long as you retain (or destroy) the hard media.  It becomes not OK if you subsequently sell or even give away the hard media.

If you record a stream you don't have that paid-for copy, so that's not OK.  At the least, it contravenes the music supplier's Ts & Cs that you signed up to.

[prémont]

@Spotted Horses and @Another Spin: I would not be able to pursue my completistic appproach by streaming alone. Collecting as well as all existing recordings also OOPs of any work (which I aim for within quite a few different genres) is only possible by finding some of them in the shape of CDs at obscure vendors. I need some luck to find these, but if I acquire them I may listen to them when I want to. With streaming rare recordings if they can be found there may disappear without warning.

[prémont]

That is painfully clear because the variability you're talking about is the variability that only appears on youtube.

I'm somewhat aware of that and use youtube most for orientation. But I have also noted the many discussions at GMG about the sound quality or lack of quality of many streaming sites. At a certain point however I decided to try Spotify but got the answer from them, that the service wasn't represented in my country. This was probably a mistake, but I didn't know how to tackle it and gave up.

[AnotherSpin]

@Spotted Horses and @Another Spin: I would not be able to pursue my completistic appproach by streaming alone. Collecting as well as all existing recordings also OOPs of any work (which I aim for within quite a few different genres) is only possible by finding some of them in the shape of CDs at obscure vendors. I need some luck to find these, but if I acquire them I may listen to them when I want to. With streaming rare recordings if they can be found there may disappear without warning.

I've written already - it's especially important to me that with the switch from CDs to streaming I got rid of the illusion of ownership.

[prémont]

I've written already - it's especially important to me that with the switch from CDs to streaming I got rid of the illusion of ownership.

Well, that's you. On the contrary I worship the illusion of ownership which at least enables me to decide for myself.

[AnotherSpin]

Because if you rip a CD or needledrop a vinyl, you still have the original hard media that you bought.  That's OK, for as long as you retain (or destroy) the hard media.  It becomes not OK if you subsequently sell or even give away the hard media.

If you record a stream you don't have that paid-for copy, so that's not OK.  At the least, it contravenes the music supplier's Ts & Cs that you signed up to.

I am aware of this logic, heard it before. However, I think that buying a subscription is not fundamentally different from buying a plastic carrier. In both cases I get access to the music, and the method of transmission is secondary. After all, even in the case of buying compact discs, I'm not paying for plastic.

[AnotherSpin]

Well, that's you. On the contrary I worship the illusion of ownership which at least enables me to decide for myself.

Fine. I quit here, otherwise, we will inevitably fall into arguments about whether we really have the freedom to decide and whether we own something or whether something owns us

[71 dB]

(sometimes it is hi-rez, which I don't find to be noticeably better).

Hi-res is better only if it is made from a different (better) master. Technically CD quality is already better than needed in consumer audio. It can cover the whole frequency range up to 20 kHz children can hear and older people can't and also provides over 90 dB of dynamic range and up to 120 dB of perceptual dynamic range if shaped dithering is used while about 80 dB of dynamic range is enough for ANY reasonable listening scenarios due to the properties of human hearing.

Higher bit depth (say 24 bit versus 16 bit) does not allow lower distortion or higher perceptual fidelity. Dithering in digital audio nullifies (yes, to zero) distortion for any bit depth and trades it to increased noise floor. We only need enough bit depth to ensure the noise floor is low enough (inaudible). In practice the required bit depth is about 13 bits. CD quality is 3 bits more than needed. That's a nice safety margin of 18 dB. Using shaped dither the perceptual margin is much bigger because a lot of the noise energy is hidden in frequencies human hearing is least sensitive.

Anyone who tells Hi-res sounds better for any other reason than being made from better master is

1) Ignorant of the technical and physiological facts involved
2) Misled by confirmation bias/place effect
3) Lying because they are in the Hi-rez business.

Hi-rez formats have their place, for example in studio. While it is possible to produce excellent sounding music using only 16 bits, using 24 bits is much easier and more flexible. Higher sample rates are also beneficial in some situations, but once the music is mixed and mastered, consumers will receive 100 % of the quality perceptually at CD quality.

That's why you haven't really heard any difference and if you have it is different masters or placebo effect.

[Florestan]

What if the internet connection is poor, or non-existent, or breaks down for a few hours? What if the power supply breaks down for a few hours? Streaming makes one's listening dependent on much more factors than CDs or downloads.

[AnotherSpin]

If there's no electric power supply, it's unlikely you can listen to CDs, as far as I know, steam-powered CD players are still too rare....

If there is no wi-fi coverage, data could be used, which is what I do when I walk on a street and listen with headphones.

I also import albums into my smartphone or computer, Qobuz has import option. I always have a several dozen albums in my offline library. Importing is easy and very fast, easier than hassling with download and transfer.

As per my experience streaming gives much more opportunities for enjoying music.

[Florestan]

If there's no electric power supply, it's unlikely you can listen to CDs, as far as I know, steam-powered CD players are still too rare....

FYI: portable CD/FLAC players are battery-operated. 

[71 dB]

What if the internet connection is poor, or non-existent, or breaks down for a few hours? What if the power supply breaks down for a few hours? Streaming makes one's listening dependent on much more factors than CDs or downloads.

That is a relevant point of course if one lives in an area where electricity and internet connection are unreliable. Luckily I don't suffer much from those issues. Blackouts in Helsinki are very rare and don't last for long. Last winter people were warned that planned blackouts might be necessary because the war in Ukraine had messed up the electricity/energy markets in Europe, but in the end they were not needed. I lose internet connection maybe once a month after midnight for 15-30 minutes due to maintenance done by my operator. I only experience/notice those because I am a night owl. Most people are sleeping.

Given the facts above, from technical point of view streaming is totally okay for me, but I don't like streaming much from emotional point of view. I like physical media (CDs, Blu-rays) and I like the feeling of ownership of my favourite music/movies. That's just how my head works. 

[Holden]

I subscribe to two streaming services - Spotify and Qobuz. When I took up a Qobuz subscription I kept Spotify because I needed to use it at school for things like dance tracks for primary aged students as part of my HPE lessons.

This is no longer the case and as Spotify has yet to advance past lossy tracks in what equates to 320 kbps (though in reality they use Ogg Vorbis) I'm going to give them the flick.

One of the great things about streaming, as has been mentioned previously, is access to music that you can no longer buy. Qobuz (and Spotify for that matter) now allows me access to almost all of the APR catalogue and as a fan of historical piano recordings this is a boon. I imagine that Apple, Tidal and Idagio also have this access but I'm happy with Qobuz.

As was also said there is some music that never made it past LP and I've found that the only streaming platform that gets around this is Youtube.