Why Audio CDs in 2024?

 I had the misfortune of talking with a young attractive girl at a bar in Kabukicho lately.  My first impression was "Wow this person is well put together", but after talking a bit, I realized that it wasn't the glow of confidence, but that of feeling she was too good for the place we were in.

Leaving that aside, based on her comments, she must have thought I was in my 60s or so.  

Firstly, there was a music video playing on the TV.  I had never seen this group, and didn't know who they were.   The video was both soft and grainy, much like betamax or VHS old rock videos from the 80s, but it was more soft than grainy, much like videos I have seen from the 70s.  Presumably taken with old vacuum tube video camera subject to blooming and then transferred to tape.  Plus, their hair cuts and outfits looked to me like late 70s, early 80s.  

I said "Hmm this looked like maybe from the 70s?"  I was apparently making fun of her favorite band, because she said "Oh no, this is at most 5 years old - and were you around watching music in the 70s?"  Uhm, no.  I laughed and said "Well I'm glad I didn't say I thought it sounded classical music from the 1800s.  I wasn't around watching music videos in the 70s, but I have seen plenty of videos from that time period.  Disco fever and all".

We continued the discussion, and she asked me if I was into music.  I said "Sure, in fact I have a lot of CDs".  She responded with something like "Oh, you're from that generation."  Again, no.  Well, actually yes, perhaps, but the reason I have lots of CDs isn't because I was buying them back in the 80s or 90s, but because I've bought (and rented) them much more recently.  I didn't exactly have a job and money (or a CD player) when I was a small child.  

Interestingly, though, sometimes someone I meet somewhere (even that very bar) will be into music, and notice my Walkman or headphones something (I often listen to music on the way) and start talking to me about music.  If they bring it up, it's typically because they are also into music, and so they understand why one might want a dedicated music player, decent headphones, or CDs.  

But this entry is more for those of you who might not know why this all makes sense - the CDs in particular.

Among younger and simpler users, many people just use streaming these days.  This is both because mobile phones have internet and therefore can stream, and also because streaming is convenient.  You can listen to anything you want, at any time you want (almost).  

Streaming typically falls into one of two categories:

1.Lower quality services that are free, cheap, or bundled.  This might be things like Youtube, Amazon Music, etc.  Typically only MP3 or similar is supported.

2. Higher quality services that offer FLAC, high bitrate AAC, or similar high quality files, but charge considerably more (Apple Music, Tidal, QoBuz).

I apologize in advance if I have miscategorized any of the above.  I actually don't use any of them, and they are just meant to be examples.  

But streaming isn't all positive, there are numerous drawbacks:

1. Streaming requires a monthly or yearly payment for services that aren't free.  

2. Free streaming services typicaly bombard you with advertisements.

3. Streaming services generally require an internet connection, and use your data.

4. Streaming services are not available in all regions.

5. The availability of songs varies by platform and region, and can change over time.  

6. The quality of the audio varies by song and platform.

Now, let's look at each one of these in detail.

1. The payment problem.  Assuming you are fincially independant, a streaming service isn't going to break your budget - but then again, $10 a month for 10 years is $1,200.  If you stop paying, you typically lose access to the entire catalog.  To put it simply, no matter how much you pay, and for how long, you lose it all the second you decide not to pay.  There is no investment component, just expense.  If you decided to buy your favorite music instead, say one CD per month, you would own 120 CDs after 10 years, and could continue to listen to that music after you stopped paying.  You would also be able to buy more or less music each month according to your budget and music taste if you wanted to.  Unless you always need the latest releases, you can easily find CDs you like for $10 each.  In fact, you can find a lot of CDs for a lot cheaper than that.  In Japan, renting and copying CDs for personal use is perfectly legal, and much cheaper than $10 per CD.  Purchasing used CDs can be cheaper still.

2. The advertising  problem.  One way around paying for streaming services is to use free services, such as youtube.  Besides limitations such as not being able to play in the background, audio quality limitations, catalog limitations, etc., there are intrusive advertisements.  If the point of listening to music is enjoyment,  then advertising ruins that somewhat - unless, of course, you actually enjoy listening to ads.  Sure, there are ways around this such as Grayjay, etc., but you are now spending time instead of money for solutions that are often temporary.  

3. The data problem.  Streaming requires data.  This isn't a problem if you are using your computer to listen to music at home and you have a reliable landline connection.  It can be a problem if you are using your phone.  Why?  Well for one thing, you will need a higher plan, which will cost you more money even if the streaming service itself is free.  I myself use a plan that has 170MB per day, and I don't want to waste that all on streaming music.  Many of the services have apps that will let you download music for offline listening, but only within their app.  This also requires you to think about it ahead of time, and typically doesn't work for internet radio style services.  Streaming music is also a wasteful use of the cellular infrastructure in general, since half of the streamed content will be duplicated.  This basically means that the more people use streaming services, the slower and/or more expensive mobile data will become in general.  Downloading songs to the app will solve this problem if you can download the songs where you have WiFi connected to a land line, but there are often limitations here as well.  For example, I had subscribed to Google Play Music long ago.  I downloaded a bunch of songs before going overseas, and then found that I couldn't play them once I got to my destination country.  The app needed an internet connection, and then verified your location.  It would be better if you could download music in a free format that could be played with any app, apps that don't call home and check various things before deciding if you are allowed to play your music.  

4. The region problem - Music licensing is complex.  There are artists, record labels, media conglomerates, tech companies, etc., and they have carrved the world up into regions and decided what is allowed and not allowed by region through the use of licensing contracts.  For example, Spotify may be licenses for the US and Canada, and not work in Afganistan.  Qobuz is available in Japan now, but wasn't until recently - maybe they will decide to pull out in 5 years time.  If you travel a lot, then this might be an immediate problem.  Also, certain songs and artists might be covered by different contracts in different regions, so Amazon music might cover Madonna in the US but not in Canada, etc.  

5. The availiability problem.  Even if you don't travel overseas, you may lose access to the service you use, or lose access to certain songs randomly.  For example, if Sony decides Apple should be paying them more for access to their catalog and Apple refuses, then all songs from Sony music might suddenly disappear from Apple music starting next month.  It doesn't matter that you are paying the same $10 every month.  The same problem exists with ebooks and streaming TV & Movies, but the difference with music is that you often want to be able to listen to the same song again and again over the years, whenever you want.  

6. The quality problem.  If we're being honest, most people streaming music don't need the best quality all of the time.  Whether you're listening to music with wireless earphones during your daily commute on a noisy train, playing music through your phone speaker while you clean the living room, or blasting "mo' money" while driving through the ghetto in your old beat up Subaru, you're not going to notice the difference between mediocre audio and excellent audio.  On the other hand, if you are closing your eyes and donning your high quality wired headphones plugged into your primo DAC & amplifier in a dark quiet room to really concentrate and enjoy your music, you may well notice the difference.  Actually, better audio equipment and listening environments makes mediocre audio sound downright bad.  You can hear so much more detail, including things like mp3 artifacts.  

    Most modern services use fairly high rate AAC files or similar, which at a high enough bitrate are barely distinquishable from the original audio, and so things like the mixing matter more - but there is another factor - which is that converting between "lossy" audio formats like MP3 and AAC always causes quality loss- much like making a photocopy of a photocopy.  It's always better to start with the original when making copies, and this applies for converting between audio formats as much as photocopies.

As an example, I had a lot of music in ATRAC format (a Sony format) that I had purchased from Sony's old music store using Sonic stage (Horrible software...).  Sony eventually shut down the service, and their recommended work-around was to burn the songs to audio CD and then rip the CD to mp3.  But doing that would mean double-compressing the audio, boubling the artifacts.  

Likewise, back when hard drive space was expensive, I ripped a lot of CDs to OGG format, and then found they wouldn't play in iTunes on my Mac, so I had to convert them to AAC, again doubling the quality losses.  Perfect sounding OGG files made less than perfect sounding AAC files.  Since you don't know what hardware you will have in 10 years, or what advances will be made in the audio compression space, It's better to retain the original master, which for consumer audio is the original CDs, or equivilant non-compressed copies.

Given that storage space is cheaper now than it's ever been, it makes sense to actually use uncompressed (or losslessly compressed) files on your audio equipment - but if you have a space constrained device like your phone, you can always keep the original files on your computer and keep lossy compressed copies on your phone.  

I've been asked once or twice about the legality and morality of copying rented CDs.  I'm not a lawyor and all that, but my understanding is:

1. In the US, you can make copies of purchased CDs for personal use, but you should destroy or transfer the copied when you sell the CDs.  (You won't find rented CDs in the US to begin with...)  If you throw the CDs out, you presumably can keep your digital copy.  This means if you go to a yard sale and buy a box of 100 CDs, you can copy them and then keep them in a big box in your attic, or toss them in the trash, but selling them again on eBay while keeping the digital copies might be legally dicy.  

2. In Japan, there are lots of CD rental shops (and online services), where you can rent CDs, copy them, and return them with no hassle.  Not only is this completely legal, but they will rent you a specialized CD ripping device that will connect to your smart phone via a cable or WiFi to save the ripped music for you.  

Given that for older CDs, renting can actually cost more than purchasing the CDs, I don't see a moral problem at all.  the main factor is whether or not you want to keep the CDs for backup in case your computer suddenly dies.  If you have your music synches between several devices, or have a NAS, then a giant box of CDs might be unnecessary - especially if space it at a premium.  

Likewise, since you can make copied of rented CDs, I would assume that you can keep copies of music from CDs you have sold (since buying and then selling a CD is effectively "renting" it).  

What about "Supporting the artists?"  Well, if you buy a used CD, sonmeone paid full price for it at some point, and the artist probably made a lot more moeny from it than they would from a streaming service.  The pervious person probably didn't keep a digital copy, and if they did, it's on a single old device, and they'll lose it soon enough.  If you buy a new CD, they are almost certainly making a whole lot more.  Rental services pay much higher than retail prices to factor in the fact that the CD will be rented out, so the artists make money there too.  I would be more worried about things like the people in Ukraine than music artists, if you buying or renting CDs, they already got, or will get their cut.  

The last thing to cover is services that let you pay a one time fee to download losslessly compressed (or uncompressed) non-DRM music to keep forever.  These include services like Qobus (formerly e-onkyo), Mora, Apple Music Store (Formerly iTunes Music Store), etc.  

I think these services are great, and I have used both Mora and e-Onkyo - but often times the cost is quite a bit higher than just buying the CD would have been.  In that case, I think buying the CD would be the better option - particularly for older titles.  These services often have special re-mixes and/or High Resolution audio for sale.  The special remix versions  can be awesome, and I recommend you try them out.  The high resolution versions are typically not worth the money since you won't hear any difference - but sometimes they are actually cheaper than the CD quality versions so it can't hurt to check.  You can be fairly certain that these tracks are watermarked in some way to detect piracy, but that isn't my intention, so I don't mind that so much as long as they aren't DRM protected so you know you can play then with whatever devices you want for the forseeable future.  Some of these services will allow you to re-download the file at any time, while some only allow you to download it once, or for a limited period of time after purchase.  

    If you do want to use the services, I recommend you have a NAS to keep your files on for backup since you won't have a physical CD to re-rip in the worst case.  

    There has been much talk of the "tactile experience" in vynal record circles, but of cours ethe same thing applies to CDs since they are physical objects.  I am not so much into this, but I do like the fact that CDs come with physical art, which you can make into posters to hang on your wall, etc.

Finally, some music is simply only available on CDs.  I went to a musical recently, and they were selling CDs of the music, only there, only then - no online version.  I also went to see a small indie band, and they were also selling CDs at the show.  Again, while you could also buy  the CDs online, there was no download or streaming option.  I have CDs given away as freebies, and with magazines, where that music (or that version of the music) was available only then and there, and never again.  (I still have my J-Phone promo CD frm 2000).  These kinds of odd finds are things you'll probably never find on streaming services or even BitTorrent.  

Let's have a closer look at the economics:

Right now, Tsutaya Discas will let you rent 8 CDs per month for 2000 JPY (roughly $20).  

That comes out to $2.50 per CD, less if you rent 2 CD albums (which count as a single CD).  More per song if you rent Maxi CDs.  This is cheaper than most used CDs, especially if you listen mainly to newer music, and much cheaper than buying new CDs at retail.  

Assuming you rent and copy these, you'll only have 8 CDs worth of music, but after 12 months, you'll have 96 CDs.  Assuming each CD has 12 tracks, that's 1152 tracks.  If you only like 10% of the tracks, that means only 115 songs.  But, the second year, it'll be 230 songs, and so-on.  Sure, the streaming services may have 10s of thousands of songs, but that includes the ones you won't  like, and most people only listen to a small fraction of that, so after 10 years, when you have 11,000 tracks, all of artists you chose yourself, you'll have a pretty much unlimited library, with more songs than you have time to listen to.   You can stop renting (or buying) whenever you want.  If a new album comes out that you like, you can of course buy the CD at retail, buy it from a download service, wait to buy it used cheap, or wait for it to be available for rental.  

By comparison, for example, Qobuz costs 1280 JPY per month for their "Solo" plan, which lets you access unlimited streaming from their library at high quality (on one device only).   

So one way of looking at it is that I could get steaming (with more tracks) for cheaper than what I pay for Discas, but with Discas I get to keep everything I rented forever, whereas with Qobuz I lose access the month I decide to quit.  

Also, Qobuz charges more for their "Duo" and "Family" plans, so if you have multiple people in your family who might want to listen to music, then it costs more.  (Other services such as Youtube Music are similar in terms of cost).  

One final caviet, some devices simply don't support streaming to begin with.  For example, I own Shokz OpenSwim Pro.  These have storage to be able to play MP3 files without needing to connect them to a phone, etc., so that you can go running (or cycling) without your phone, and they will work under water where radio signals like bluetooth can't reach.  This is afantastic feature, but it requires you have non-DRMed MP3 files to put on it.  I can easily convert my favorite music from FLAC to MP3 and load them up, but a streaming service won't help with that.  

In summary, if you want to listen to all of the very latest music, have an unlimited data plan, are very bad at managing digital data, and don't mind that songs might disappear and you'll paying forever, then maybe streaming is for you.  

If, on the other hand, you want to build a library of songs you own in high quality that you can play forever on any device you own now or in the future without using up your data plan, then renting CDs is proably a better option.  If, like me, you have a backlog of hundreds of CDs you want to own, then it'll take you a while so you'll be paying monthly anyway.