Here are some audio and video trends for 2019:
The global Hi-Fi Systems market was valued at million US$ in 2018 and is expected to grow. EISA Awards has selected Hi-Fi product category winners, but I did not see anything really fancy new innovations that would excite me there. The Hi-Fi speaker market has seen considerable consolidation over the years but is expected to grow. The global Hi-Fi speaker system market is highly competitive. Various established international brands, domestic brands and as well as new entrants form a competitive landscape. The market is expected to have higher growth rate as compared to the previous years due to the booming electronic industry globally. It is due to the rising income of individuals globally and increasing affordability of technology products globally. Due to technological adoption and smart gadgets, North America region is showing steady growth in the Hi-Fi speaker system market. On technology standpoint the Hi-Fi market is mainly based on pretty much stabilized technology as class D amplifiers have been on mainstream for many years.
Smart TVs are everywhere. The vast majority of televisions available today are “smart” TVs, with internet connections, ad placement, and streaming services built in. Despite the added functionality, TV prices are lower than ever. Your new smart TV was so affordable because it is collecting and selling your data. It is clear that TV companies are in a cutthroat business, and that companies like Vizio would have to charge higher prices for hardware if they didn’t run content, advertising, and data businesses. Google wants sensors and cameras in every room of your home to watch, analyze, you, patents show.
Streaming services competition stays high. Apple’s embracing the TV industry for the first time: Vizio and LG TVs will support AirPlay 2 and HomeKit, while Samsung TVs will get an iTunes Movies & TV app, as well as AirPlay 2 support. Google and Amazon are playing are important players on smart speaker markets.
4K video resolution is still as hot as in 2019 – it us becoming mainstream and getting cheaper. Peraso showcases 4K wireless video at CES 2019. LG has produced a market-ready rollable OLED TV. The new 75-inch 4K Micro LED TV announced at CES 2019 proves Samsung is serious about scaling the technology to do battle with OLED. But it seems that even in 1029 “4K” trend remains woefully deficient from a compelling-content-availability standpoint. CES 2019 is already full of weird and wonderful monitors.
But new higher 8K resolution is being pushed to market. The “8K” (resolution) tagline was apparently everywhere at CES this year. Samsung announced a 98-inch 8K TV because why not. LG has come strong to CES 2019 with an 88-inch 8K OLED TV, a 75-inch 8K LED/LCD TV, HDMI 2.1, new auto calibration features, Alexa built in, and many more features. It seems that this ongoing evolution is occurring out of necessity: as a given-size (and -pixel-dense) display becomes a low profit margin commodity, manufacturers need to continually “up-rev” one or both key consumer-attention-grabbing parameters (along with less quantifiable attributes like image quality) in order to remain profitable … assuming they can continue to stimulate sufficient-sized consumer demand in the process. I am not sure if they can stimulate 8K to mass market in next few years.
Wall size TVs are coming. Samsung announced a modular TV at CES. Samsung first showcased this MicroLED TV technology at CES 2018, showcasing how the screens were composed of millions of individual LEDs. Individuals screens could be combined to create massive displays, which the company calls The Wall TV. The wall-sized displays shown in recent years at CES are, in my opinion, quite ridiculous, at least for the masses.
HDMI updates are coming. At present, the HDMI equipment uses the 2.0 standard (adopted in 2013) tht provides support for example for 4K video. HDMI Forum announced a new 2.1 standard already in November 2017, but it just starter showing in CES in January 2019. 8K fiber-optic HDMI cables seen at CES 2019. The 2.1 standard is a big change in technology at the bus bandwidth increases from 18 gigabit to 48 gigabits per second. This enables up to 10K video transmission and up to 120 frames per second.
Bendable displays are really coming to PCs and smart phones. LG’s “rollable” display shown this year neatly showcased the technology’s inherent flexibility while also addressing the question of how to hide a gargantuan display when it’s not in use. Several foldable smart phones have been shown. Chinese company Royole was showing off the FlexPai at CES in Las Vegas.
Micro displays for VR and AR glasses have developed. MicroLED is better looking, more efficient and more versatile than any previous display tech. Now all Samsung, Sony, LG and others have to do is figure out how to manufacture it affordably.Nanoco Technologies and Plessey Semiconductors have partnered to shrink the pixel size of monolithic microLED displays using Nanoco’s cadmium-free quantum-dot (CFQD quantum dots) semiconductor nanoparticle technology. Microchips and organic LEDs that deliver 4K-like high resolution displays a quarter of the size and half the weight of existing virtual reality (VR) headsets have been developed under a European Union project. Marc Andreessen says VR will be “1,000” times bigger than AR even though VR seems to be the popular whipping boy amongst the tech community.
There seems to be no shortage of angst with the current (and unfortunately burgeoning) popularity of usage of the term artificial intelligence (AI). Intelligence has been defined in many ways which makes it hard to get good picture on what is going on. I am still waiting for sensible intelligent AI to do something useful. But the ability for a sufficiently trained deep learning system to pattern-match images, sound samples, computer viruses, network hacking attempts, and the like is both impressive and effective.
Potential problems related to the coming of self-driving car technologies and cameras are expected. A man at CES in Las Vegas says that a car-mounted lidar permanently damaged the sensor in his new $1,998 Sony a7R II mirrorless camera. Man says CES lidar’s laser was so powerful it wrecked his $1,998 camera because the LIDAR laser power rules ensure lasers are safe for human eyes—but not necessarily for cameras. Is this something that camera and car manufacturers need to figure out together?
2019 Will Be the Year of Open Source from software and even hardware. Open source video player app VLC has now reached 3 billions downloads.
When almost all AV products are pushing more and more features, it seems that almost Everything is too complicated for an average Joe.
1,491 Comments
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.circuitstoday.com/push-pull-amplifier
https://www.electronics-tutorials.ws/transformer/audio-transformer.html
Tomi Engdahl says:
A Transformer-Coupled Booster Amplifier for the AN214
Due to it’s inherently low power output design, does addition of a transformer-coupled booster amplifier to an AN214-based amplifier aid or hinder it’s sound quality?
http://the-an214-world.blogspot.com/2009/06/transformer-coupled-booster-amplifier.html?m=1
Tomi Engdahl says:
http://www.sereneaudio.com/blog/how-good-is-bluetooth-audio-at-its-best
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://nerdist.com/article/solid-state-3d-display-retro-future/?utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=social+flow
Tomi Engdahl says:
The world’s simplest phantom powered condenser microphone design!
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=jM2tdXXaa-A&feature=youtu.be
Tomi Engdahl says:
A second episode just happened for simple mic
https://youtu.be/LwYqTm2A5X8
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://hackaday.com/2021/04/05/music-production-studio-in-a-box/
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://hackaday.com/2021/04/04/decoding-s-pdif-with-a-microcontroller-brings-a-few-headaches/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Music experts give advice on how to play music in your business. Go from beginner to pro in 10 minutes by reading this article.
A guide to playing music in your business: From beginner to pro in less than 10 min
https://www.soundtrackyourbrand.com/guides/music-in-your-business-guide?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=guide%E2%80%93to%E2%80%93play%E2%80%93music%E2%80%93in%E2%80%93business&https%3A%2F%2Fwww.soundtrackyourbrand.com%2Fguides%2Fmusic-in-your-business-guide%3Futm_source=facebook&fbclid=IwAR0pvmvBD4u7260YHFGXvwvJ1uMnkzAqWHwd0OAj7qG6YALUdZTxCH_vmmU
Tomi Engdahl says:
Jacob Kastrenakes / The Verge:
YouTube says that 18 out of every 10K views in Q4 2020 were of videos that violate its policies, down from 72 out of every 10K views in Q4 2017 — ‘Violative View Rate’ fell steeply after 2017 — YouTube wants the world to know that it’s doing a better job than ever of enforcing its own moderation rules.
YouTube claims it’s getting better at enforcing its own moderation rules
‘Violative View Rate’ fell steeply after 2017
https://www.theverge.com/2021/4/6/22368505/youtube-violative-view-rate-transparency-stat?scrolla=5eb6d68b7fedc32c19ef33b4
Tomi Engdahl says:
Kyle Wiggers / VentureBeat:
Google open sources Lyra in beta, an audio codec that uses ML to create high-quality voice calls for low-bandwidth networks or archiving large amounts of speech — Google today open-sourced Lyra in beta, an audio codec that uses machine learning to produce high-quality voice calls.
Google launches Lyra codec in beta to reduce voice call bandwidth usage
https://venturebeat.com/2021/04/06/google-launches-lyra-codec-in-beta-to-reduce-voice-call-bandwidth-usage/
Google today open-sourced Lyra in beta, an audio codec that uses machine learning to produce high-quality voice calls. The code and demo, which are available on GitHub, compress raw audio down to 3 kilobits per second for “quality that compares favorably to other codecs,” Google says.
While mobile connectivity has steadily increased over the past decade, the explosive growth of on-device compute power has outstripped access to reliable, fast internet. Even in areas with reliable connections, the emergence of work-from-anywhere and telecommuting have stretched data limits. For example, early in the pandemic, nearly 90 out of the top 200 U.S. cities saw internet speeds decline as bandwidth became strained, according to BroadbandNow.
Lyra – enabling voice calls for the next billion users
https://opensource.googleblog.com/2021/04/lyra-enabling-voice-calls-for-next-billion-users.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+GoogleOpenSourceBlog+%28Google+Open+Source+Blog%29
The past year has shown just how vital online communication is to our lives. Never before has it been more important to clearly understand one another online, regardless of where you are and whatever network conditions are available. That’s why in February we introduced Lyra: a revolutionary new audio codec using machine learning to produce high-quality voice calls.
As part of our efforts to make the best codecs universally available, we are open sourcing Lyra, allowing other developers to power their communications apps and take Lyra in powerful new directions. This release provides the tools needed for developers to encode and decode audio with Lyra, optimized for the 64-bit ARM android platform, with development on Linux. We hope to expand this codebase and develop improvements and support for additional platforms in tandem with the community.
Lyra’s architecture is separated into two pieces, the encoder and decoder. When someone talks into their phone the encoder captures distinctive attributes from their speech. These speech attributes, also called features, are extracted in chunks of 40ms, then compressed and sent over the network. It is the decoder’s job to convert the features back into an audio waveform that can be played out over the listener’s phone speaker. The features are decoded back into a waveform via a generative model. Generative models are a particular type of machine learning model well suited to recreate a full audio waveform from a limited number of features. The Lyra architecture is very similar to traditional audio codecs, which have formed the backbone of internet communication for decades. Whereas these traditional codecs are based on digital signal processing (DSP) techniques, the key advantage for Lyra comes from the ability of the generative model to reconstruct a high-quality voice signal.
The Lyra code is written in C++ for speed, efficiency, and interoperability, using the Bazel build framework with Abseil and the GoogleTest framework for thorough unit testing. The core API provides an interface for encoding and decoding at the file and packet levels. The complete signal processing toolchain is also provided, which includes various filters and transforms. Our example app integrates with the Android NDK to show how to integrate the native Lyra code into a Java-based android app. We also provide the weights and vector quantizers that are necessary to run Lyra.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Regular headphones can detect a heart rate and hear your conversations
Read more: https://www.newscientist.com/article/2274025-regular-headphones-can-detect-a-heart-rate-and-hear-your-conversations/#ixzz6rZaQoTnw
Tomi Engdahl says:
Speaker wire guide
How to choose the right gauge, length, and type
https://www.crutchfield.com/learn/learningcenter/home/speakers_wire.html
Tomi Engdahl says:
You don’t need fancy cables for hifi, just keep away from the junk. Most ” fancy ” cables are just decent stuff with added cosmetics and braiding etc to justify its price.
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://sites.google.com/view/quipa/faq-hub/output-impedance
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.sweetwater.com/sweetcare/articles/what-normalling-what-difference-between-full-normal-half-nornal/
Tomi Engdahl says:
http://oldbird.org/mike_home-DIY.htm
Tomi Engdahl says:
http://www.lampizator.eu/lampizator/TDA1541%20corner/TDA1541.html
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://etn.fi/index.php/13-news/11999-huawei-demosi-8k-virtuaalikuva-siirtyy-verkkoon-pain
Pandemia on vaatinut monia erikoisjärjestelyjä tilaisuuksiin, mutta Xiamenin yliopiston 100-vuotisjuhlan aikana China Telecom ja Huawei näyttivät, miten nopeampi mobiililinkkivastaa koviinkin haasteisiin. 5G Super Uplink -yhteydellä juhlista lähetettiin vanhoille opiskelijoille VR-videokuvaa 8K-tarkkuudella.
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://hackaday.com/2021/04/12/microleds-lighting-the-way-to-a-solid-oled-competitor/
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://hackaday.com/2021/04/12/eyecam-is-watching-you-in-between-blinks/
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://controlgeek.net/blog/2021/4/2/backstage-with-the-bindlestiff-open-stage-variety-show-quarantine-edition-with-help-from-popsicle-kitteh
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://hackaday.com/2021/04/14/you-need-an-automated-overhead-camera-assistant/
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://hackaday.com/2021/04/14/history-of-closed-captions-the-analog-era/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Weird HDMI Cable Types (You’ve Never Seen Before)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5xM_PW9YGq8
You never knew these weird connectors existed!
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.uusiteknologia.fi/2021/04/16/parempaa-laatua-musiikin-suoratoistoon/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Ribbon Speaker
Based on JGJMatt’s Instructable.
https://hackaday.io/project/178434-ribbon-speaker
Tomi Engdahl says:
Why do some amps weigh so little?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tJxtZVooto0
Big beefy power amps weigh a lot and yet there are even bigger amplifiers that weigh next to nothing!
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://hackaday.com/2021/04/19/large-format-lego-camera-is-a-bit-near-sighted/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Micro-LEDs Have Complex Value Proposition
https://www.eetimes.com/micro-leds-have-complex-value-proposition/
Micro-LED displays are being over-hyped as a potential replacement for OLEDs, LCDs and quantum dot based displays, market research group IDTechEx (Cambridge, UK) is warning. The firm’s report focuses on replacing other technologies in the displays market but also considers creating a new market.
The IDTechEx researchers note that the self-emissive LED-based displays, often being considered as direct replacement for OLED displays, may not meet all the value propositions using the current technology, nor the cost expectations.
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://etn.fi/index.php/13-news/12023-huippuluokan-aani-vaatii-huippuluokan-muuntimen
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.rohm.com/products/audio-video/audio-converters/audio-dacs/bd34301ekv-product#designResources
BD34301EKV (New)
MUS-IC™ Series, 32-bit,768 kHz Sampling Stereo Audio D/A Converter
BD34301EKV is 32-bit high sound quality Stereo Audio D/A converter with ROHM original sound quality design, realizing excellent numerical performance (SNR: 130 dB (Typ) , THD+N: -115 dB (Typ) ) suitable for high-end audio. Favorite sound is selectable by switching 2 kinds of digital FIR filters (Sharp Roll-Off, Slow Roll-Off). PCM I/F supports up to 768 kHz and DSD I/F supports up to 22.4 MHz.
It is the masterpiece of ROHM audio IC which pursues both the numerical values and sound quality performance required in an audio device to the utmost limits and created through the ardency of ROHM engineeers. That is ROHM Musical Device “MUS-IC”.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Fly-eyed lens array captures dim objects missed by giant telescopes
https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2021/03/fly-eyed-lens-array-captures-dim-objects-missed-giant-telescopes?utm_campaign=ScienceNow&utm_source=JHubbard&utm_medium=Facebook
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://viccc42.wixsite.com/uld-audio
Ultra low distortion audio range fixed frequency sine oscillator assembled and tested PCB for distortion measurement applications. The fully analog schematic based on the OPA1656 opamp. Variable output voltage is provided by the automatic gain control circuit. Require single isolated DC 35V external power supply.
Tomi Engdahl says:
http://www.people.vcu.edu/~djbromle/color-theory/color01/Relationship-color-sound-joe_goldsmith.html
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8–5LwHRhjk
Stop what you’re doing and bear witness to an artist with astounding mathematical dexterity, actually explaining his craft like he wishes nothing more than for you to learn this magic.
There is so much right here. I’ve been exposed to this goop for decades, now I get it. WOW.
Tomi Engdahl says:
YouTube has developed its own video transcoding chips to break bottlenecks imposed by the slowing of Moore’s Law.
YouTube Designed Its Own Video Transcoding Hardware
https://www.extremetech.com/computing/322198-youtube-designed-its-own-video-transcoding-hardware?utm_campaign=trueAnthem%3A+Trending+Content&utm_medium=trueAnthem&utm_source=facebook
The rate of video on the internet has been exploding upwards, year after year, as has the number of videos YouTube serves per year. Unfortunately, CPUs and GPUs don’t deliver the kind of yearly performance improvements they once did. Faced with a slowing rate of silicon improvement and rapidly increasing amounts of video, YouTube decided to build its own video transcoding unit, or VCU, codenamed Argos.
The company has disclosed its Argos effort in both a blog post and a paper, depending on how deep into the details you feel like digging. According to YouTube, moving workloads to the VCU has improved efficiency by 20-33x depending on the exact particulars of the stream. YouTube’s new chip is designed to be capable of transcoding to one resolution target at a time, or of targeting multiple resolutions simultaneously.
https://blog.youtube/inside-youtube/new-era-video-infrastructure
Tomi Engdahl says:
AES3
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AES3
AES3 (also known as AES/EBU) is a standard for the exchange of digital audio signals between professional audio devices. An AES3 signal can carry two channels of PCM audio over several transmission media including balanced lines, unbalanced lines, and optical fiber.[
AES3 was jointly developed by the Audio Engineering Society (AES) and the European Broadcasting Union (EBU). The standard was first published in 1985 and was revised in 1992 and 2003. AES3 has been incorporated into the International Electrotechnical Commission’s standard IEC 60958, and is available in a consumer-grade variant known as S/PDIF.
AES42
https://www.soundonsound.com/glossary/aes42
An AES standard which defines the connectivity, powering, remote control and audio format of ‘digital microphones’. The audio information is conveyed as AES3 data, while a bespoke 10V phantom power supply conveys remote control and clocking information through an ingenious modulation technique.
Tomi Engdahl says:
AES42 digital microphone interface
https://www.prosoundnetwork.com/international/aes42-digital-microphone-interface
The AES42 digital mic interface consists of a standard AES3 interface with various added features, such as power for the microphone and control information. Unlike analogue microphone interfaces, most of which use 48 volt phantom power, the ‘digital phantom power’ used here is at a level of 10 volts applied to both legs of the balanced AES3 cable via a centre tap on the cable side of the transformer. Although the standard currently includes the option to use a modified ‘XLD’ connector for microphones using AES42, instead of the conventional XLR, these have not been implemented in practice.
Remote control data is sent to the mic using pulsed modulation of the power supply voltage. Positive-going pulses of 2 ±0.2 volts carry data at a rate of 750 bits per second when the interface is operating at the 48 kHz sampling frequency. You can use this data stream to control settings such as the mic’s directivity (cardioid, omni, etc.), attenuation (pads), limiting, gain, muting and high-pass filtering. Manufacturer-specific settings are also possible. The microphone’s status can also be sent back to the receiver by means of the user bit channel in the AES3 data stream. There are two modes of sampling frequency synchronisation for AES42-interfaced mics. In Mode 1 the microphone is self-clocking and generates its own sampling frequency reference, whereas in Mode 2 mics can be synchronised to a common reference signal using remote control information.
AES STANDARD
AES42-2019: AES standard for acoustics — Digital interface for microphones
https://www.aes.org/publications/standards/search.cfm?docID=38
Tomi Engdahl says:
Thanks for digital audio
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dKp0f8ItAfg
After years of staying away from digital in favor of vinyl, this reader thanks Paul for inspiring him to give it another go.
Comments:
“It pays to keep an open mind, but not so open your brains fall out” Carl Sagan.
Vinyl and quality tape can sound fabulous. They’re also VERY fiddly and fragile. Digital has been far from perfect, but in the last several years it has gotten better at more affordable prices, and gotten more accessible and convenient than ever. It’s now at the point where it sounds great at affordable prices with endless libraries available within a few easy clicks. We’re in the era of the best audio ever.
Instead of “Perfect sound forever…” CDs should have been truthfully flogged as “Consistent sound forever…” back in 1983. But 28 years on, the majority of my music formats still straddle between CDs and vinyl LPs.
I had pretty much sworn off listening to music. CD’s never sounded as good as LP’s for me, and my ears tired of the brightness. Thanks to this channel, and Paul’s recommendation of Shitt DAC and Audiovana I’m back in the game.
Nobody will convince me to go back to compact cassettes :p I also don’t like to call.
The dynamics of Vinyl remain inferior. And therefore the sworn vinyl lover is in fact only in love with the audio compression to easily hear details that in digital, or in reality, never was meant to come out to the listener…. unless as loud volume as in reality (>120dB)
Digital for convenient, vinyl for ultimate pleasure.
Buddy, you listen to your digital stuff and stop trying to tell others they are wrong. End of story.
Tomi Engdahl says:
How to download youtube video?
Comments
YouTube-dl. Free and opensource command line tool. Can do more than just YouTube too. Can also extract only audio, download whole play lists etc. Stop using those dodgy websites.
Downloading a youtube video is not by definition piracy by any means. If you intend to use it for piracy of music,… you should probably use something else. The audio quality of youtube is pretty bad anyway due to compression.
I use it to download videos of prior twitch streams so i can watch them offline.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Windows 10 Headphones Echo Issue – alternate solution
https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_10-hardware/windows-10-headphones-echo-issue-alternate/b1768a08-7f9a-4191-a864-645e5ccf4ce1
I resolved an issue where the sound coming through any headphones plugged into my headphone jack would have a persistent echo. It sounded like every thing was being played inside of a cave.
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://hackaday.com/2021/05/05/3d-printed-camera-crane-for-the-workshop/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Analog Vs Digital vinyl
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2X7LBXnGL7k
Is it worth buying vinyl today when much of it is digitally mastered or recorded?
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://hackaday.com/2021/05/05/a-wireless-speaker-pair-from-dead-earbuds/
Tomi Engdahl says:
https://hackaday.com/2021/05/06/coffee-stirrers-act-as-lens-for-this-digital-straw-camera/
Tomi Engdahl says:
The move was inevitable after it made mirrorless cameras dominant.
Sony discontinues its last DSLRs
https://engt.co/3vFpnKM
After helping make mirrorless dominant, Sony appears to have quietly stopped selling its A-mount DSLR cameras. As first seen by SonyAlpha Rumors, the A68, A99 II and A77 II have been removed from Sony’s website and are listed as “no longer available” from camera specialists B&H Photo Video. Sony hasn’t directly confirmed the news, but Engadget has reached out for comment.
Sony’s A-mount DSLRs (starting with the A100), sprung from its acquisition of Konica Minolta, so it really looks like the end of an era. Luckily, there’s a lot to look forward to over the next year including the possible release of Sony’s A7 IV, plus exciting new cameras coming from Nikon, Canon and others.
Tomi Engdahl says:
James Vincent / The Verge:
Sennheiser sells its consumer electronics division to Sonova, a Swiss company best known for its medical audio products like hearing aids and cochlear implants
Sennheiser’s headphone business has been bought by hearing aid manufacturer Sonova
From blasting your eardrums to assisting them in later life
https://www.theverge.com/2021/5/7/22424367/sonova-buys-sennheiser-consumer-business-headphones-soundbars?scrolla=5eb6d68b7fedc32c19ef33b4
Sonova, a Swiss company best known for its medical audio products like hearing aids and cochlear implants, is buying the consumer electronics division of German firm Sennheiser. That means Sonova is taking over Sennheiser’s portfolio of consumer headphones, wireless earbuds, and soundbars, moving into an expanding market for personal audio equipment.
Sennheiser announced it was looking for a buyer for its consumer business in mid-February “amid strong competitive pressure.” Although the company’s consumer products hit record sales in 2019, the firm still lost money with profit margins “under pressure” from global rivals. It cut 650 jobs and said “all options are open” to help the division.
Now the company has found a buyer in Sonova. In a joint statement by Sennheiser’s co-CEOs, brothers Andreas and Daniel Sennheiser, the pair said they “couldn’t have asked for [a] better” partner. “A partner who not only shares our passion for audio and a commitment to the highest product quality, but also very similar corporate values,” they write. “This is an excellent foundation for a successful future together.”
In an announcement of the deal from Sonova, the company said it will continue to sell products under the Sennheiser brand.
Tomi Engdahl says:
LiveLeak, the internet’s font of gore and violence, has shut down
After fifteen years in operation, LiveLeak is no more
https://www.theverge.com/2021/5/7/22424356/liveleak-shock-site-shuts-down-itemfix
Video site LiveLeak, best known for hosting gruesome footage that mainstream rivals wouldn’t touch, has shut down after fifteen years in operation. In its place is “ItemFix,” a site that bans users from uploading media containing “excessive violence or gory content.”
In a blog post, LiveLeak founder Hayden Hewitt did not give an explicit reason for the site’s closure, saying only that: “The world has changed a lot over these last few years, the Internet alongside it, and we as people.”
“Everything’s different now, everything moves on,” says Hewitt, before adding in an aside to the camera: “I don’t fucking like it. I liked it much better when it was the Wild West.”
LiveLeak has been a mainstay of internet culture for many years, its name synonymous with footage of murder, terrorism, and everyday incidents of crime and violence. A sinister doppelgänger to sites like YouTube, LiveLeak was founded in 2006 and grew out of a culture of early internet “shock sites” like Ogrish, Rotten.com, and BestGore: websites that hosted violent and pornographic content with the express aim of disgusting visitors.
LiveLeak, with its tagline of “Redefining the Media,” ostensibly added some nuance to this brutish appeal. Official statements from those involved sometimes defended its content in terms of newsworthiness or truth-telling
The range of justifications identified by Tait and other academics suggest that demand for such extreme content will always exist, even if individual sites like LiveLeak come and go.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Making a £13000 turntable
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vKFQ8B4cx64
Another daily grind video, this time the full construction process of a Garrard 301 turntable plinth from start to finish. These layered ply plinths are what I most commonly make.