Do people actually want lossless music streaming?

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[mdreid]

Apple Music already chooses different quality depending on your connection. Go into Settings > Music > Audio Quality. Now you can choose what format your music is when you are WiFi Streaming or Data Streaming, or what format to use to Download to your device. The options for each are: High Efficiency AAC, High-Quality AAC (256 kb/s), Lossless (ALAC up to 24-bit/48kHz), and Hi-Res Lossless (ALAC up to 24-bit/192kHz).

[palebluedotstudios]

I find it ironic that many consumers (most, nowadays?) will be listening to lossless music with Bluetooth earphones, which compress the signal again.

[l.a.beltranmusic]

Growing up in the 80's and 90's, everyone had a "house" system with huge speakers and crazy amps. Now when someone says listen to this song, and the play it through a phone speaker, I want to cry. Lol

[cianbrady]

I really like these short informative videos!

[MrMichaelfalk]

Stop dynamic compressing the music to death - that would be more important..

[DavidRavenMoon]

First off, let’s be honest; you won’t hear a difference.

Regarding Apple Music, on your iPhone go to the Settings app, then to the Music settings.

You have the choice to use Lossless for Wi-Fi streaming. Then for Cellular streaming you have the following options: High Efficiency (HE-ACC with low data usage), High Quality (ACC 256 kbps) - the default setting, Lossless (ALAC up to 24-bit/48 KHz), and Hi-Res Lossless (ALAC up to 24-bit/192 KHz).

It’s pretty well established that you get zero increase in quality over 48 KHz. This is proven in null tests.

I listen to my mixes compressed to 256 kbps AAC files, and compared them to the uncompressed AIFF or WAV files. You won’t hear any difference even with high quality head phones (like my DT 770Pro). And for casual music listening who cares?

[Hlecktro]

We're all audio people here so for the most part we'd want lossless? But that's like .001% of the public. It makes the most sense to stream compressed files appropriately in order to save bandwidth, money on server costs. If we just send out the maximum quality files to everyone at all times it's a huge waste of internet traffic. That would be like upscaling every single video on Youtube/Netflix etc to 4K by default, imagine how much data that would consume, being sent to people who don't even have 4k screens. As a producer myself, I actually only care about lossless for purposes of mastering audio and playing back mixes on club PAs. If I'm just biking around town or on the bus I really don't care about the quality of the audio as it's just there to be in the background.

[erikkroll]

I want lossless but I am not holding my breath.

[BluffMunkey]

I really hope this style of video isn't the future for this channel. They're useful from time to time, just having 'shorts', but I subscribed because of your genuinely unique style of presentation. I doubt I'll stay subscribed if this is just going to become another 'Pro Youtuber' content delivery system with content churned out as hastily as possible.

Geninely (potentially) constructive feedback.

New studio looks ace though! :)

[UltraLowMuzik]

I differently want lossless playback at a lower price as well, I personally am tired of listening to anything under 320kbps

[higltypig]

I'm quite happy with 256kbs mp3. I don't think people will 'feel' a real difference, maybe a placebo effect. That said 320kbs mp3 would be a happy medium so why not.

[martinvetter]

You can configure it in apple music, i have it so that lossless is active when there's a wifi connection and off when it's running off my data plan

[TazzSmk]

depends on what devices people use to listen,
on good monitors on headphones, the quality is often very obvious when doing comparisons, I basically stopped using YouTube due to the quality crippling (not just lossy audio, but of course also dynamic range reduction)

[Gregorovitch]

I think the return of high quality audio to the mass market is dependent on one thing: social listening. Back in the day, before most of you lot were born, we all listened to music together at each others houses and we bought the best hi-fi we could afford or abused our parent's systems. The album era. Led Zep and Jimi Hendrix def annoyed our parents, especially at the volumes we played them at, but since we didn't have any other way to play our LPs really we could get away with it to a certain extent. Living in Brixton in South London later in the 1980's there was a sound system culture around reggae and soul. Folks would open up playing the latest cool tunes and everyone nearby would open their windows to catch it. This don't happen anymore. The difference now is there isn't really an excuse to listen to music socially through proper speakers anymore except at a gig or a club (or through studio monitors if you're making music yourself). So to me this debate is really about whether or not the culture of social group listening returns or not. If it does then the demand for high quality source files will rise. But I won't be holding my breath. Parents today can tell their recalcitrant offspring to "Turn that shit OFF already, right now!" and get away with it 'cos they know, since they've already forked out an arm and leg for them, they've all got their phones and their earbuds and as far as they're concerned that will do and peace is at last restored. The same argument applies to neighbours. Perhaps even more so for neighbours.

[LoveItDirtyOffroad]

Apple music does give you choice settings and more than before. Chosen within music settings; very cool

[laz]

Well summarized with a great solution. It makes a difference. Take Satellite radio, I drop my service years ago since they placed some channels on low bandwidth low res and it sounded terrible. Good for talk radio bad for good music.

[Mynameislol]

I'm definitly looking forward to Spotify's lossless streaming, because for some reason alot of the music i listen to have been uploaded to spotify as mp3 transcodes, because i don't enjoy listening to double-transcoded music.

Have a listen to the Skyfall theme on spotify for an example, it sounds dreadful.

[nettydrone]

When my "audiophile" friends hear my "home" system with 1978 Infinity Quantum 2 surround and "direct disk" or "half-speed" master vinyl - they kinda go into shock for awhile, with eyes bugged and mouth agape. :D

[gimmenames]

Have been on Qobuz lossless streaming since 2015 or so. Nice, espc. with classical music. With Pop it doesn't matter really.

[aswinbeats]

I think that most people dont want lossless. I have good quality earphones and still I’d prefer 320 kbps mp3 over lossless. Because, you can reduce storage space and network usage. You can’t hear any difference between 320 kbps and lossless in a blind test.