Adam Bowie said at November 2nd, 2006 at 12:55am

People may not care about audio fidelity, but then people are very often wrong. Just because most people seem happy to listen to a music station in 96kpbs mono or 128kbps stereo, does not mean that we should all have to accept it. Yes the most popular radios are mono, but then most kitchen, bathroom or clock radios have always been mono. My living room tuner is stereo, and aside from speech radio stations, since artists deign to make their albums in stereo, it’s quite nice to hear them broadcast that way.

FM radio is adequate for many people. Probably for most people. But then it has superior audio fidelity (in good conditions) to just about any DAB signal being broadcast in Britain. I don’t even have to put my radio near a window to get a signal!

It just seems a positive shame that in a digital world we’re too willing to accept inferior quality, be it music stations being broadcast in mono or in low quality stereo, or digital TV channels being overcompressed and inferior to analogue. I’m not trying to be some kind of audiophile who’d argue that vinyl’s better than CDs (it isn’t unless you’re a DJ). But music encoded at low bitrates is not good.

And in any case, if nobody really cared about audio quality, I’m not sure I understand why people are spending so much on 5.1 Dolby Digital set ups at home to go with their home theatre systems. I won’t even get into LCD v Plasma v good ‘ole CRT.

Personally, I think that it’s entirely likely that at some point we’ll be using AAC+ but we’re entering a chicken and egg situation, and it’s certainly going to be a way off before any major broadcasters start using it since the audience won’t be there.

The upgrade path isn’t as simple as you paint it. The main reason we upgrade our Sky boxes is because it’s been in Sky’s interest to make it easy and cheap for us. The cost was minimal and was subsidised heavily by Open… The same goes with mobile phones. For the most part we use one at a time, and it’s basically a deal we do with the phone company that we get a shiny new model in return for staying with them for another year or so.

A radio’s a radio. Consumers are used to them working for years and years. When was the last time a radio you owned actually broke? And if it did, was it because you dropped it from a great height?

3.5m sets in the market is great and 4m by Christmas is even better. But we can mostly cope with one Sky box at a time. One radio serves one room, and most people have three or quite probably more radios in their house and another in the car. They’re not subsidised and consumers are going to want them to be relatively future proof.

There have definitely been some harsh words reported in The Guardian about DAB of late, but I believe they’re closer the mark than you’d have us think.

Jack said at November 2nd, 2006 at 1:22am

Thanks, Uncle James, but I have not got the wrong end of the stick in either case.

> the wrong end of the stick in what motivates most
> people to listen to the radio.

No, I haven’t. In fact, I have not said anything about what motivates people to listen to the radio, and I do know what it is: it’s content. Even if the sound quality is bad, it’s still content that generally counts above all else.

However, people would rather listen to their chosen content with good quality sound than with low quality sound. That’s why they don’t rip all their CDs at 32kbps.

If you want to pretend that people go into shops and choose to buy products that they think sound bad in preference to things that sound good then you are mad, but that’s not what you are trying to say, is it?

I also have not got the wrong end of the stick re Ofcom. I have in fact reported *exactly* what they said, and just about all they said.

If they’d said something like you say on your blog I’d have been even happier to report that instead. However, they did not. And that’s their fault, not mine.

Otherwise, the commentary on your blog is both misleading and wrong about what I said above. In fact, I did NOT say it means that (”Ofcom is backing the UK into an outdated technology of MP2 encoding”), I said: “I JUST HOPE IT DOESN’T MEAN that” (emphasis added). That’s an entirely different kettle of fish.

All in all, a bit sad. I’m used to being bashed by idiots who can’t read a simple sentence without giving it a meaning that exists nowhere outside their own feeble brains. But having read bits of your blog, you are obviously not in that category and actually I don’t think our views are very far apart. But I do think that, perhaps just this once, you’ve got the wrong end of the stick ;-)

Cheers!

Jack Schofield
Computer editor
The Guardian

Jack said at November 2nd, 2006 at 1:43am

Specifically re your blog comment:

> There are no plans to adopt it - yet - but that’s a world away from
> Jack’s assumption that the UK will never broadcast it.

That’s misleading: I never assumed that, and I never said I assumed that. What I did say was that I *hoped* Ofcom did not *mean* that. (I think the only fair assumption you could make is that we will use it eventually “because in my view, AAC is unstoppable”.)

> His comment about asking whether a DAB radio will support a standard
> only ratified today is presumably there for blog baiting, too… damn,
> I fell for it.

That’s misleading: that is not what I said. What I said was:

> ask whether it can be upgraded to support AAC+. If not, does it come with
> a money-back guarantee?

It’s perfectly reasonable and, indeed, sensible to think about *upgrading* products to work with emerging standards, and AAC has been emerging for years. (Maybe you even noticed this iPod thing that’s been going around.) Also, “pre-standard” products are not unknown — see Wi-Fi for examples.

What do you think the industry should tell consumers? Here, buy this DAB stuff now because we tell you to (and we spend vast sums of money promoting this stuff advertorially) and don’t worry your pretty little head about tomorrow?

Sorry, that just doesn’t do it for me….

Jack Schofield
Computer editor
The Guardian

James Cridland said at November 2nd, 2006 at 12:23pm

Blimey, I’ve got someone going, haven’t I? Let’s break my rule of not commenting to other peoples’ comments…

> What do you think the industry should tell consumers? Here, buy this DAB stuff now because we tell you to (and we spend vast sums of money promoting this stuff advertorially) and don’t worry your pretty little head about tomorrow?

I’d say, personally, “Here, buy this DAB stuff now, because there’s tons of content on there that you like.” As I write this, there are absolutely no plans to switch any stations off MP2; absolutely no plans to broadcast any stations whatsoever in AAC+, and absolutely no DAB sets out there which are upgradeable to AAC+. However, just like an older iPod won’t play video, and an older television won’t pick up Freeview, so an older DAB set may not cope with *some* new channels in the future, or some new services (like the Electronic Programme Guide, or visual enhancements). Your advice to consumers is confusing, illogical, and shows a peculiar bias against DAB: would you advise people not to buy a new laptop now because there might be a computer program out in five years time which your laptop won’t run?

> However, people would rather listen to their chosen content with good quality sound than with low quality sound. That’s why they don’t rip all their CDs at 32kbps.

…good analogy. Not heard that one before, and I like it.

Most people don’t rip all their CDs at 320kbps either. People find a good enough audio quality which is a good compromise between cramming as many songs on their iPod, and sounding like crap. DAB services are, too, a compromise - but almost all DAB services are above that “threshold of quality” for most people; and as I argue elsewhere, there are plenty of other choices for higher quality should you be in the minority who require it.

(As with all comments in my personal blog, they’re personal and not the views of the company I work for.)

James Hamilton said at November 3rd, 2006 at 12:48am

I think it’d be foolish to try and say very much as you’ve both said it all. With all lossy codecs you need to find a happy medium - some think we have found that, others think we haven’t.

But what happens in another decade when audio encoding becomes more advanced again? We could change to AAC+ tomorrow, but it’d still be out of date one day. And you could bet your bottom dollar that someone would have to complain that we should change to that great new codec because then we could fit in another TV channel, or something else that’s not really anything to do with audio broadcasting.

So isn’t the solution this: make sure that all the new AAC+ devices are “futureproof”, and therefore can be upgraded to these new codecs over-the-air?

Nick Piggott said at November 4th, 2006 at 1:28pm

I was fairly close to the process that added aac+ to the DAB standard, and all of the issues you see here were raised and discussed at quite some length. It’s been a long and thorough process, and the technical work has been of the highest standard I’ve ever seen.

But I do wonder if we’d be having this discussion if DAB had originally launched on the basis of increased variety of content, rather than the original ill-fated attempt to position it as a quality upgrade from FM?

I’m also interested to hear how people describe what makes 128kbit/s MPEGII worse than FM. There’s a large variation of quality in the FM dial, driven by differences in processing, transmission kit, coverage and quality of the playout in the studio. Most of those items can also influence the quality of sound on DAB, and broadcasters have differing strategies on how to set up their chain. If there is a perceived difference, and that difference is perceived to be “worse”, that might be down as much to how the chain is configured as using a particular bitrate of MPEGII audio.

You can’t say that someone’s subjective opinion on something is “right” or “wrong”, but you can say if it’s in the minority or the majority. The situation with DAB now is that the majority of people are motivated to purchase DAB because of the quantity of services, not the quality of them and the majority of people who buy DAB think that it sounds great.

If that situation changes in the future, then the DAB standard is flexible enough to allow broadcasters to change their transmission strategies accordingly.

Jack said at November 8th, 2006 at 1:42am

Thanks for the comments!

> Your advice to consumers is confusing, illogical, and shows a peculiar
> bias against DAB: would you advise people not to buy a new laptop now
> because there might be a computer program out in five years time which
> your laptop won’t run?

I don’t agree that it’s a confusing or illogical bias: AAC+ is decisively better. Everybody knows DAB is inferior, and that AAC+ will allow more channels in better sound quality (ie better sound at lower bit-rates*). The only real argument for DAB is that we’ve sold almost 4m people radios that should now be scrapped. So, rather than admit this mistake and move on, we plan to sell another x million people sets that will also become obsolete. It’s an attempt to avoid short term pain that will end up delivering greater long term pain.

* I’d love it if Ofcom mandated 128kbps as the minimum for stereo AAC+ but don’t for one second believe it will.

And no, it’s not as honest as a laptop sale, because the PC industry delivers continuous advances and doesn’t pretend otherwise. If the DAB industry showed similar honesty then it would say: “Buy a DAB radio now and we plan to make it obsolete and sell you a better system in five years.”

I remain unimpressed by the argument for continuing to deliver a *known* inferior product on the grounds that people are sufficiently ignorant they (mostly) don’t complain.

It seems to me that UK consumers are either being betrayed and short changed (if we don’t move to AAC+) or conned (if we do). Neither is satisfactory.

Nick Piggott says:

> But I do wonder if we’d be having this discussion if DAB had originally launched
> on the basis of increased variety of content, rather than the original ill-fated
> attempt to position it as a quality upgrade from FM?

I think this is true, ie we wouldn’t.

> There’s a large variation of quality in the FM dial,

Also true, but BBC Radio in general and Radio 3 in particular probably sets the standard for most of us who are complaining, and a decent aerial/tuner/hi-fi can get an amazing amount of detail out of what’s broadcast, and anyone who has tried SACD knows that it’s possible to get noticeably better sound quality than that. Yes, a small minority of a very small minority! ;-)

But it’s wrong to present this as an elitist argument. Just moving to AAC+ would give everybody better sound quality (in which case the people who apparently don’t care might find they do care) *and* more stations for lower transmission costs. Move to AAC+ and *everybody* wins.

James Cridland said at November 8th, 2006 at 9:53am

Jack said:
> I’d love it if Ofcom mandated 128kbps as the minimum for stereo AAC+
> but don’t for one second believe it will.

In every single industry, if you make a crap product, people don’t consume it and therefore you go out of business. If you’re a radio station, and you sound crap, people won’t tune in and therefore you’ll go out of business. Why a government regulator needs to get in the way of these simple market economics, I don’t fully understand. (The BBC is, of course, a special case; but radio stations can’t pass a public value test if nobody’s listening to them).

> Move to AAC+ and *everybody* wins.

I don’t think anyone’s arguing that we shouldn’t move to AAC+ at some point. This all stems from an Ofcom press-office remark that (in my humble opinion) you’ve deliberately misread in order to write a sensationalist opinion piece. We need a British John C Dvorak; I’ve no problem with that at all. It is, however, premature to insist that nobody buys a DAB Digital Radio now; just as it’s also wrong to insist that people shouldn’t buy an FM radio now; or a film camera, or a CD player, or a SD television - all of these technologies will be obsoleted in time. (And don’t get me started on those analogue televisions which won’t pick anything up in three years’ time.)

However, this probably won’t be solved by repeated blog comments. I’m round the corner from most of the magazines you write for, and a short tube ride away from The Guardian; and I’d be delighted to show you round the commercial broadcaster I work for (for whom I am not speaking in this blog), give you a beer, and continue this argument offline - us (ex-)CIXen ought to stick together, after all…

Nick said at November 8th, 2006 at 11:00am

I’d agree with James that this debate is getting excitedly heated, and with any heated debate, there’s a risk of minor injury.

I’ll concurr with James. There’s no question that we’ll see use of aac+ in the UK *at some stage* (please note the emphasis). Receivers will come into the UK market that support both, probably silently - in so far as anything you buy off the shelves next year will probably support both, and may even have a little sticker to tell you so. The manufacturers are adept at following the standards as they are developed, so in fact they’re ready with product on the day the standard is finally published (usually 6 months after it’s submitted, and 18 months after everyone’s started talking about it).

What we could/ought/would enjoy debating the the role of the BBC as a foil to Commercial Radio. Commercial broadcasters are *bounden* to use the smallest amount of capacity for any service, because that increases profitbility. All digital broadcasters on all platforms work like this. (Look at Sky’s differing bit rates for Sky One v. Sky Sports). Therefore we make a calculated (and hopefully informed) decision on what quality to present a station at based on its target audience.

The Radio 3 audience is a very demanding audience. Small, but vocal. (Much like Mac owners….). How should the BBC respond to those demands for superior audio quality - both now and in the future? And should those demands impact on the much much wider audience to radio, on both DAB and other platforms.

I enjoy the discussion; much as I enjoyed the “CD v. Vinyl” discussion of the late 80’s. Eventually the market decided on that debate, and I am sure that eventually they will on this one too.

Mark said at November 10th, 2006 at 5:45pm

OK … so it’ll soon be Christmas. If I buy my Mum a new PC, I know the consequence … there’ll be a faster, cheaper one in a few months, Office 2003 will soon be Office 2007 etc etc. But apart from component failure, it’ll still be runing in 10 years time and be useful. At least the software I buy today will still work just as well (or buggily) in the future.

If I buy a new DAB radio this Christmas, again apart from component failure, it will still work in the future. But *if* AAC+ is adopted, then the radio will get a dwindling number of stations over time. Hardly a marketing success for “more choice” when you will be getting progressively less choice.

Ofcom have also touted DRM on VHF too. Then again, how many DRM sets are available? How would you market a DRM set, when people are confused enough about DAB?

The government appears to have backed away from a FM analogue switch-off timetable. That was their intention a little while ago. Anyone know what their real thinking is now?

And from a eco point of view … DAB sets use a lot more power than analogue ones (and probably generate more hot air too :-) )

Paul Webster said at December 6th, 2006 at 7:43pm

I’ve enjoyed reading the above comments - and I did read the original article by Jack.

However, one sentence from your blog somewhat surprised me
“Hasn’t anyone told The Guardian that their company also runs DAB Digital Radio stations too?” - maybe I am being too naive - but were you suggesting that Jack should not have written what he did because part of his employer’s empire is also actively involved in DAB?

I know that jokes are made in Private Eye about Sky references in Murdoch newspapers - but I would hope that things are somewhat different at the Guardian.

Would you like to suggest some approximate dates for when you think AAC+ will be used by European broadcasters for their DAB service - and when the first such station would launch in the UK?

Jack Schofield is a clever man even if he is wrong - blog - James Cridland said at November 15th, 2007 at 10:44pm

[...] instead of posting “Jack’s wrong”, again, perhaps I might simply link to this perceptive [...]

Richard Street said at November 26th, 2007 at 10:51am

Jack Schofield recently opined ‘convenience is DAB’s only real advantage’. I assume that he is not bothered by the vagaries of multipath reception and its effects on FM reception in a car. I rejoice in the 99+ per cent rock-steady near CD quality on the move and enjoy the wide dynamic range, especially on R3. Oh, and the car radio switches to FM on the few occasions when I pass through a bad patch.