Future of music-distribution and HiFi

[MajorFubar]

So where do we think music-distribution and HiFi will head in the next 10-15 years?

With music distribution, I don’t think you need to be Sherlock Holmes to see that CDs will go the way of records and become a niche format. The revenue from downloads overtook the revenue from physical sales for the first time this year, which marks an important milestone, albeit one which was clearly inevitable ten years ago or more; it was just a matter of ‘when’. Maybe CDs will become obsolete altogether, because unlike records, there doesn’t (yet) seem to be a big enough ‘retro’ or hipster-led affection for them to keep their future production cost-effective. Personally I find that prospect quite bleak, because nothing his come along to replace CDs as a mass-market solution for distributing audio losslessly.

But perhaps all of that is academic: maybe online streaming is the future, and the notion of buying and owning albums in either a physical or downloaded format will itself be consigned to history. When big players like Apple spend billions buying Beats Music and Beats Electronics so they can hit the ground running with their streaming service on June 30th, one can only assume their researchers have concluded it isn’t a fad that will quickly pass.

So where does that leave the hardware? It would seem that just as undertakers have the world’s only safe career, so loudspeakers are the only safe(ish) bet in the HiFi of the not-so-distant future; a future which by and large will have been liberated from the shackles of physical media and the hardware needed to play it. All you will need is some solution to access an online streaming service like Qobuz, Spotify or Apple Music, along with a facility to stream your ‘legacy’ CD rips from the NAS on your LAN. This solution could be an amp with streaming clients built in, or an amp without built-in clients equipped with Bluetooth and Airplay to interface directly with your mobile device. Both of these already exist. Maybe even have the whole lot built into a pair of digital active loudspeakers, controlled by an Android or iOS app, with no other boxes required. We already have active speakers with a built-in DAC, it’s only one extra step…

 

[matt49]

I think you’re right, both in your predictions and your misgivings.

One other question that this raises is: what happens to ownership? With physical media, ownership is fairly clear: so long as I own the physical medium, I can play it for free whenever and wherever I want (so long as I’m not broadcasting it in any way, shape or form).

Streaming music is quite different. I no longer own anything. I simply buy the right to connect to a streaming service. I may be able to store favourite tracks on a local device, and I might ‘curate’ my own playlists. But ultimately the music isn’t mine, and the right to listen to it can be withdrawn at any time by factors completely outside my control. If that happens, all the locally stored music, all my lovingly curated playlists, they’re gone.

There are other dimensions too. If I have music stored in ‘the cloud’, which legal jurisdiction is it in? Whose laws is my music subject to? What right of appeal do I have if I’m deemed somehow to have broken copyright law, or what redress do I have if my music is lost? (Answer: about as much as if Google deleted my gmail account, i.e. none.)

I wouldn’t want to suggest there are any imminent grounds for anxiety. But I do think we should be a little careful what we wish for.

 

[BigH]

I think there will more more streaming thats the future growth at the moment, peple have got used to it, lots of variety etc. With the growth of headphone sales recently I'm not sure speakers are even safe. Hifi is already a very niche market, can't see that changing.

 

[MajorFubar]

I think you’re right, both in your predictions and your misgivings.

One other question that this raises is: what happens to ownership? With physical media, ownership is fairly clear: so long as I own the physical medium, I can play it for free whenever and wherever I want (so long as I’m not broadcasting it in any way, shape or form).

Streaming music is quite different. I no longer own anything. I simply buy the right to connect to a streaming service. I may be able to store favourite tracks on a local device, and I might ‘curate’ my own playlists. But ultimately the music isn’t mine, and the right to listen to it can be withdrawn at any time by factors completely outside my control. If that happens, all the locally stored music, all my lovingly curated playlists, they’re gone.

There are other dimensions too. If I have music stored in ‘the cloud’, which legal jurisdiction is it in? Whose laws is my music subject to? What right of appeal do I have if I’m deemed somehow to have broken copyright law, or what redress do I have if my music is lost? (Answer: about as much as if Google deleted my gmail account, i.e. none.)

I wouldn’t want to suggest there are any imminent grounds for anxiety. But I do think we should be a little careful what we wish for.

Very true words. In another recent thread recently, I already related a tale whereby some songs on my Spotify playlists have greyed-out within the past few weeks, presumably because Spotify no longer have the rights to stream that song in either just my territory, or completely.

While a part of me is excited by the prospects of what will happen on the hardware-front, I remain deeply skeptical of the move away from physical media and downloads, and losing the right of ownership.

 

[Infiniteloop]

Streaming may be convenient and pretty much ubiquitous, but to me there's something missing. I'm preparing to buy a new turntable, to get back into vinyl, and have been shopping for LP's again. I have found the exercise surprisingly pleasurable. Chatting with people in music shops about particular LPs and new music makes the whole exercise much more 'human'. I actually found myself swinging an HMV bag containing the new Florence LP along as I walked the other day, just as I used to with my new Genesis or Pink Floyd LP as a teenager. It felt really good!

Maybe this is why Vinyl is on the up again? For me, physical ownership is far more meaningful, whereas music in the cloud (or as a file) is far more transitory and easily taken for granted.

 

[Anderson]

It's a new world.

I might be a bit younger than the rest of you so I don't mean any offence by what I say nor do I claim to speak for my age. I've grown up with YouTube, which to me was my first streaming service, when I was 20 I had a gaming PC a large HiFi and had many parties, everyone would crowd around the keyboard in the corner of the room to put on their music. At the time I had a big collection of music, something like 90Gb not all losless mind you. No matter how big your collection your always going to be missing something.

I've already explained before my disinterest in owning physical media so I won't go into reasons again, all I care about is access to music. With Spotify, Google or Apple in getting that access and its convenient, its more than convenient really. My entire music collection travels in my pocket, its in my tablet, my PS4 and my PC.

I can share music on any device to anyone in my contacts with a tap of the screen, "hey Dave, what you think of this song LINKY", or " Hey Dave, here's the link to that album I was talking about LINKY".

I used to pirate 95% of my music probably more, I'd maybe buy a couple of digital albums a year maybe £30 a year. Now, in spending 4 times that.

I'm very excited by the future of streaming as it becomes more powerful, I have no doubt that within 5-10 years nearly all services will be running losless as standard. My landline connection is what 160mbps, my mobile does 20mpbs and that's plenty for losless. We consumers will expect it.

So back to the age thing, my girls couldn't point out a CD player, we don't have one in the house, they can point out a streaming app very quickly. CDs are dead, Vinyl Records will probably limp on until the hipsters growout of their hipster phase and all the golden oldies have croaked it.

On the point of rights and songs popping in and out of existence, I agree that can be annoying, some services allow you to supliment your own songs but long term I see licencing being sorted worldwide. I imagine all the big media players will merge or die out making it easier to get worldwide distribution. Might even see some artists become streaming famous with contracts and then we'll see a massive shift in power.

All of the above are thoughts, not facts,

 

[chris_bates1974]

Not to get too deep here, but I don't think we should underestimate the concept of ownership of property here, and the effect it has had on the development of (particualrly western) society.... I think we are culturally now atuned to being "owners". For some of us, that will mean a lot more than to others....

On a lighter note, my kids know exactly what cds and records are, and getting a hifi together for my daughter for Christmas last year was awesome - and I still get thanked regularly....

I feel sorry for people who don't experience an entrie album as the artist intended, or get to look at wonderful art on the cover, or read the liner notes....

That said, we are all free to consume our art in any way we see fit. In the same way that some people will be happy to look at an image of a painting on their phone, rather than go see it in a museum, some people will prefer to only have that distant relationship with music. Who is to say what is right, and what is wrong. All I know is that my family has a growing collection of physical music, and I don't see it stopping.

 

[manicm]

Streaming may be convenient and pretty much ubiquitous, but to me there's something missing. I'm preparing to buy a new turntable, to get back into vinyl, and have been shopping for LP's again. I have found the exercise surprisingly pleasurable. Chatting with people in music shops about particular LPs and new music makes the whole exercise much more 'human'. I actually found myself swinging an HMV bag containing the new Florence LP along as I walked the other day, just as I used to with my new Genesis or Pink Floyd LP as a teenager. It felt really good!

Maybe this is why Vinyl is on the up again? For me, physical ownership is far more meaningful, whereas music in the cloud (or as a file) is far more transitory and easily taken for granted.

Agreed, ripping my own CDs just doesn't give the satisfaction of the cd itself, the sound is missing some magic. And I've tried EAC, dbpoweramp etc. There's something missing. I know the bit perfect police will shoot me down for saying it. Original master downloads do sound superb though, like Linn and Prostudiomasters. Streaming will only dilute musical enjoyment. Why must one settle for a Toyota when you've been driving a Ferrari all this time?

 

[Anderson]

I'm a musical communist.

 

[The_Lhc]

It's a new world.

I might be a bit younger than the rest of you so I don't mean any offence by what I say nor do I claim to speak for my age. I've grown up with YouTube, which to me was my first streaming service, when I was 20 I had a gaming PC a large HiFi and had many parties, everyone would crowd around the keyboard in the corner of the room to put on their music. At the time I had a big collection of music, something like 90Gb not all losless mind you. No matter how big your collection your always going to be missing something.

I've already explained before my disinterest in owning physical media so I won't go into reasons again, all I care about is access to music. With Spotify, Google or Apple in getting that access and its convenient, its more than convenient really. My entire music collection travels in my pocket, its in my tablet, my PS4 and my PC.?

I can share music on any device to anyone in my contacts with a tap of the screen, "hey Dave, what you think of this song LINKY", or " Hey Dave, here's the link to that album I was talking about LINKY".

I used to pirate 95% of my music probably more, I'd maybe buy a couple of digital albums a year maybe £30 a year. Now, in spending 4 times that.

I'm very excited by the future of streaming as it becomes more powerful, I have no doubt that within 5-10 years nearly all services will be running losless as standard. My landline connection is what 160mbps, my mobile does 20mpbs and that's plenty for losless. We consumers will expect it.

So back to the age thing, my girls couldn't point out a CD player, we don't have one in the house, they can point out a streaming app very quickly. CDs are dead, Vinyl Records will probably limp on until the hipsters growout of their hipster phase and all the golden oldies have croaked it.

On the point of rights and songs popping in and out of existence, I agree that can be annoying, some services allow you to supliment your own songs but long term I see licencing being sorted worldwide. I imagine all the big media players will merge or die out making it easier to get worldwide distribution. Might even see some artists become streaming famous with contracts and then we'll see a massive shift in power.?

All of the above are thoughts, not facts,

I think your vision of the future is probably pretty accurate, given time, and a suitably worldwide net coverage, streaming music will become as ubiquitous and normal as the water or electricity supply, it really won't matter who you get your music from, just as it's functionally irrelevant who you get your electricity from, most people will probably only be peripherally aware of which service they're using, especially if someone develops a service aggregator and relegates them to a background function.

Ultimately, you won't be listening to spotify or tidal or qobuz, you'll just be listening to music.

 

[The_Lhc]

Of course that sort of system will obviously be vulnerable to the sort of global level catastrophe that's sure to happen sooner or later, so the physical mediaphiles might have the last laugh but in that event we may not even have the electricity to be able to play our old time turntables and CD players anyway...

 

[chebby]

... some people will prefer to only have that distant relationship with music ...

Just as 'distant' from the original performance as any LP or CD after their respective recording and manufacturing processes.

I wouldn't confuse the physicality / tactility of the medium (some kind of plastic disc that you can touch and put in a wrapper) with closeness to the performance. It may be more appealling, as a 'thing' in itself, but the 'distance' from the performance is identical.

A CD player with a remote makes it easy to skip tracks, so the argument that only streaming or downloads lead to disrespect for the 'sanctity' of the artists chosen track order is carp. (And 32 year-old carp at that.) I can play a whole album on Spotify just as easily (actually much more easily) as I can on an LP.

 

[steve_1979]

Of course that sort of system will obviously be vulnerable to the sort of global level catastrophe that's sure to happen sooner or later, so the physical mediaphiles might have the last laugh but in that event we may not even have the electricity to be able to play our old time turntables and CD players anyway...

I'm already prepared for a global catastrophe. Well I'm not actually prepared in any other way but I do have a portable solar panel which could easily power my class D energy efficient DM5 speakers fed straight from the headphone output of my Sony MP3 player which contains my entire 5,000 track music collection on there.

Bring on the zombie apocalypse I say. Streaming's for reliant losers!

Nothin', not even zombies will stop me from listening to my tunes.

 

[chris_bates1974]

Chebby, I agree to an extent with you, that you can indeed easily stream an album, and indeed it is a little more convenient than having to flip a record... My contention though, is that many more poeple these days listen to tracks than albums. I'm not saying they are wrong to do so, just that that's what is happening.

I strongly believe that there will always be a group of people who prefer their music as "objects". I'll be one of them....

 

[Anderson]

It's a new world.

I might be a bit younger than the rest of you so I don't mean any offence by what I say nor do I claim to speak for my age. I've grown up with YouTube, which to me was my first streaming service, when I was 20 I had a gaming PC a large HiFi and had many parties, everyone would crowd around the keyboard in the corner of the room to put on their music. At the time I had a big collection of music, something like 90Gb not all losless mind you. No matter how big your collection your always going to be missing something.

I've already explained before my disinterest in owning physical media so I won't go into reasons again, all I care about is access to music. With Spotify, Google or Apple in getting that access and its convenient, its more than convenient really. My entire music collection travels in my pocket, its in my tablet, my PS4 and my PC.

I can share music on any device to anyone in my contacts with a tap of the screen, "hey Dave, what you think of this song LINKY", or " Hey Dave, here's the link to that album I was talking about LINKY".

I used to pirate 95% of my music probably more, I'd maybe buy a couple of digital albums a year maybe £30 a year. Now, in spending 4 times that.

I'm very excited by the future of streaming as it becomes more powerful, I have no doubt that within 5-10 years nearly all services will be running losless as standard. My landline connection is what 160mbps, my mobile does 20mpbs and that's plenty for losless. We consumers will expect it.

So back to the age thing, my girls couldn't point out a CD player, we don't have one in the house, they can point out a streaming app very quickly. CDs are dead, Vinyl Records will probably limp on until the hipsters growout of their hipster phase and all the golden oldies have croaked it.

On the point of rights and songs popping in and out of existence, I agree that can be annoying, some services allow you to supliment your own songs but long term I see licencing being sorted worldwide. I imagine all the big media players will merge or die out making it easier to get worldwide distribution. Might even see some artists become streaming famous with contracts and then we'll see a massive shift in power.

All of the above are thoughts, not facts,

I think your vision of the future is probably pretty accurate, given time, and a suitably worldwide net coverage, streaming music will become as ubiquitous and normal as the water or electricity supply, it really won't matter who you get your music from, just as it's functionally irrelevant who you get your electricity from, most people will probably only be peripherally aware of which service they're using, especially if someone develops a service aggregator and relegates them to a background function.

Ultimately, you won't be listening to spotify or tidal or qobuz, you'll just be listening to music.

Couldn't have put it any better, ultimately, I'm just listening to music and enjoying it.

 

[Anderson]

Chebby, I agree to an extent with you, that you can indeed easily stream an album, and indeed it is a little more convenient than having to flip a record... My contention though, is that many more poeple these days listen to tracks than albums. I'm not saying they are wrong to do so, just that that's what is happening.

I strongly believe that there will always be a group of people who prefer their music as "objects". I'll be one of them....

We can all agree that we all prefer to get our media they way we like to get our media. I'm not going to knock you for wanting to listen to records or CD's over a stream, you've got the choice and that's a good thing.

 

[Anderson]

I do imagine physical media choices will become limited over time as streaming becomes more dominant than it currently is. Time moves on, I won't shed a tear.

So enjoy your LPs while you still can mwahahahaha

 

[Frank Harvey]

I haven't read the replies, so just commenting on what I feel.

Streaming is all very well and convenient. It has it's place, and I'm not criticising anyone for using streaming services - I use one myself as part of finding new music. Whether physical media will completely disappear remains to be seen though. Whilst there will be always be streaming services around nowadays and in the future, it'll be interesting to see what happens when one of these services goes bust. This might change the view of some. I've got quite a lot of artists/albums/tracks saved on Napster (with a view to buying the reelevant software at some point) and if I lost that tomorrow, it would take me an age to find/rediscover it all again, and I dare say that there's a few artists in my list that I'd forget were there, maybe never to be heard by me again. I like physical ownership - once I've paid for it, it's mine and I can do with it what I want, and barring theft/fire, I will always own it. One or two albums won't suddenly disappear without me knowing, and I'll have everything I want to play, not 'a selction of'. Plus, I won't be paying for the privilege of being able to play it on a monthly basis.

Anyone putting their faith on one single streaming service is trusting them to be around for as long as they are in order to enjoy their "prized" collection. I've tried a couple, but they just don't have what I want to listen to, and even if they do, some tracks are only available to stream if I buy it from them - sorry, but I already own it.

 

[Frank Harvey]

Streaming may be convenient and pretty much ubiquitous, but to me there's something missing. I'm preparing to buy a new turntable, to get back into vinyl, and have been shopping for LP's again. I have found the exercise surprisingly pleasurable. Chatting with people in music shops about particular LPs and new music makes the whole exercise much more 'human'.

I tried to make a similar point the other day but was shot down, even though I was just relaying what I have experienced as we are now an independent record store as well as a hi-fi store. It creates more conversation about music and artists, making it much more enjoyable. It's like people are interacting again, rather than talking to each other via text.

 

[Frank Harvey]

I do imagine physical media choices will become limited over time as streaming becomes more dominant than it currently is. Time moves on, I won't shed a tear.

So enjoy your LPs while you still can mwahahahaha

Well those into vinyl are enjoying more and more LPs than they ever did as the choice increases. And given that vinyl is still around and has outlasted most formats, I'm sure we will all be able to enjoy it for many more decades to come

 

[Infiniteloop]

I do imagine physical media choices will become limited over time as streaming becomes more dominant than it currently is. Time moves on, I won't shed a tear.

So enjoy your LPs while you still can mwahahahaha

Well those into vinyl are enjoying more and more LPs than they ever did as the choice increases. And given that vinyl is still around and has outlasted most formats, I'm sure we will all be able to enjoy it for many more decades to come

+1

 

[Electro]

I would expect new Cd sales to end quite quickly but the sale of second hand Cd's will carry on for many years .

Buying and dowloading music will slow down and die not long afterwards and the majority of ordinary people ( people who couldn't care less how it sounds ) will sign up for one or more of the streaming services .

Vinyl will last a few more years longer than Cd but will eventually disappear apart from second hand sales .

As for the hardware it will change every year so that we have to dump it an buy a new one of whatever the latest thing is .

The losers will be the musicians ( financially ) record, Cd , and music collectors .

I recon I would get between £8000 and £10,000 if I decided to sell my record and Cd collection , not that I would but my kids probably will when I pop my clogs *smile*

The Cd will go down in history as the best all round collectable music medium ever IMHO .

 

[Covenanter]

I suspect it will be something we can't conceive of right now. As Nils Bohr said: "Prediction is very difficult, especially about the future."

Chris

 

[MajorFubar]

Guess I'm an old fogey but unlike some old fogeys I am happy to embrace change providing that change gives me improvements. I don't really have any romantic attachment to physical media, but I like the fact that when I buy a CD I've got it forever, not until some streaming service like Spotify removes it from from my territory's catalogue without warning.

 

[bigfish786]

In the immediate future, we are still adding gizmos and boxes to already established systems.

further in the future, music will probably be completely supplied through the Internet. Whether buying, renting, or trying.

probably played through a smart TV and speakers.

No more separates. But I think this is maybe ten years away.