4 ms·

The Western World perspective on this platform generates quite funny statements sometimes. Outside of it, mp3 is still quite popular and normal. Even within th

The Western World perspective on this platform generates quite funny statements sometimes. Outside of it, mp3 is still quite popular and normal. Even within the Western World, there are many people who like to own their digital music.

geerlingguy 1y ago
I still encode everything in MP3. The files work on my 20 year old SanDisk player, my original iPod, my iPhone, Mac, Chromebook, Windows laptop, MP3 CDs in our 08 minivan... It's nice to have that consistent ubiquity, something very hard to find these days. Especially if you're entire audio library (audio books, podcasts, songs) comes from some streaming service that requires an app!
- frollogaston 1y ago
  The poor quality is a dealbreaker for me. Yes it's fine with a high enough bitrate, but there isn't ubiquitous support for that.
  - encom 1y ago
    What decoders don't support VBR MP3 at this point? You would have to go back at least 20 years to find software that breaks on VBR. Maybe some very very terrible hardware decoder chokes on it? Incidentally, breakage on VBR bitstreams is buggy behaviour, because some lazy developers assumed frame sizes would never change. VBR is completely within spec, and decoders do not have to explicitly support it. Lastly a note on bitrate: 320 kbps CBR (the max allowed in spec) is often wasteful and pointless. In many cases, an encoder will pad out frames to conform to the requested bitrate. Indeed tools exist that will losslessly re-encode a CBR file to VBR by removing the padding, producing a smaller file. MP3 (as good as it is) has certain problem samples that aren't fixed by throwing more bits at them. A competent encoder with proper settings, like lame which defaults to -V4 is transparent in most samples to most people. If you disagree you should double-blind test yourself.
    - frollogaston 1y ago
      I'll have to check again, but my issue wasn't VBR, it was CBR above 128kbit/s I believe? 2012 Maserati GranTurismo, which has notoriously not-so-good electronics.
  - voidUpdate 1y ago
    What settings are you using with MP3 for it to be low quality enough to be a dealbreaker? I save all my music in MP3 and it all sounds perfectly fine to me, and have done forever
    - frollogaston 1y ago
      128kbit/s constant rate
- ryandrake 1y ago
  MP3 is still "good enough." I wasn't smart enough to keep FLACs around, and I'm not going to go back through my hundreds of CDs in boxes in my attic somewhere and re-encode every single one to a "modern" format for slight but noticeable quality gains. As you say, they also work everywhere, including my 16 year old car.
- aidenn0 1y ago
  The same is true of ogg vorbis though[1], and you can have files about 30% smaller (or same size and better quality if you are at 192kbps or lower for your mp3s). Okay, my SanDisk player (an m300) is only 17 years old; nevertheless it plays Vorbis files just fine.
conradfr 1y ago
Like when someone says spending $1000 to learn to code effectively using Claude or any other AI is nothing.
fastball 1y ago
People that like to own their digital music in the Western World are generally not storing the files in mp3. Where outside the West are you seeing many people that are specifically storing audio files in mp3 (vs just streaming/ storing in a better digital format/storing physical media)? I live in SEA and most people here are not storing their own mp3s. Most people don't have computers at all – they have budget Android phones that don't have much built-in storage. What they do have is cheap internet, so they are either using Spotify (Free)/YouTube/etc. Many people still use CDs (mostly in cars) but those aren't mp3 either.
- Krasnol 1y ago
  > People that like to own their digital music in the Western World are generally not storing the files in mp3. Sure they do. I know them personally. They don't even know what FLAC is. Buy music on bandcamp, download as mp3. A format known to them since the beginning of the 21st century. > Where outside the West are you seeing many people that are specifically storing audio files in mp3 (vs just streaming/ storing in a better digital format/storing physical media)? I feel like the whole former East Block is doing just that. Been to Egypt last year. They share that stuff all over the place.

geerlingguy 1y ago

I still encode everything in MP3. The files work on my 20 year old SanDisk player, my original iPod, my iPhone, Mac, Chromebook, Windows laptop, MP3 CDs in our 08 minivan... It's nice to have that consistent ubiquity, something very hard to find these days. Especially if you're entire audio library (audio books, podcasts, songs) comes from some streaming service that requires an app!

frollogaston 1y ago
The poor quality is a dealbreaker for me. Yes it's fine with a high enough bitrate, but there isn't ubiquitous support for that.
- encom 1y ago
  What decoders don't support VBR MP3 at this point? You would have to go back at least 20 years to find software that breaks on VBR. Maybe some very very terrible hardware decoder chokes on it? Incidentally, breakage on VBR bitstreams is buggy behaviour, because some lazy developers assumed frame sizes would never change. VBR is completely within spec, and decoders do not have to explicitly support it. Lastly a note on bitrate: 320 kbps CBR (the max allowed in spec) is often wasteful and pointless. In many cases, an encoder will pad out frames to conform to the requested bitrate. Indeed tools exist that will losslessly re-encode a CBR file to VBR by removing the padding, producing a smaller file. MP3 (as good as it is) has certain problem samples that aren't fixed by throwing more bits at them. A competent encoder with proper settings, like lame which defaults to -V4 is transparent in most samples to most people. If you disagree you should double-blind test yourself.
  - frollogaston 1y ago
    I'll have to check again, but my issue wasn't VBR, it was CBR above 128kbit/s I believe? 2012 Maserati GranTurismo, which has notoriously not-so-good electronics.
- voidUpdate 1y ago
  What settings are you using with MP3 for it to be low quality enough to be a dealbreaker? I save all my music in MP3 and it all sounds perfectly fine to me, and have done forever
  - frollogaston 1y ago
    128kbit/s constant rate
ryandrake 1y ago
MP3 is still "good enough." I wasn't smart enough to keep FLACs around, and I'm not going to go back through my hundreds of CDs in boxes in my attic somewhere and re-encode every single one to a "modern" format for slight but noticeable quality gains. As you say, they also work everywhere, including my 16 year old car.
aidenn0 1y ago
The same is true of ogg vorbis though[1], and you can have files about 30% smaller (or same size and better quality if you are at 192kbps or lower for your mp3s). Okay, my SanDisk player (an m300) is only 17 years old; nevertheless it plays Vorbis files just fine.

conradfr 1y ago

Like when someone says spending $1000 to learn to code effectively using Claude or any other AI is nothing.

fastball 1y ago

People that like to own their digital music in the Western World are generally not storing the files in mp3. Where outside the West are you seeing many people that are specifically storing audio files in mp3 (vs just streaming/ storing in a better digital format/storing physical media)? I live in SEA and most people here are not storing their own mp3s. Most people don't have computers at all – they have budget Android phones that don't have much built-in storage. What they do have is cheap internet, so they are either using Spotify (Free)/YouTube/etc. Many people still use CDs (mostly in cars) but those aren't mp3 either.

Krasnol 1y ago
> People that like to own their digital music in the Western World are generally not storing the files in mp3. Sure they do. I know them personally. They don't even know what FLAC is. Buy music on bandcamp, download as mp3. A format known to them since the beginning of the 21st century. > Where outside the West are you seeing many people that are specifically storing audio files in mp3 (vs just streaming/ storing in a better digital format/storing physical media)? I feel like the whole former East Block is doing just that. Been to Egypt last year. They share that stuff all over the place.