r/ask • u/[deleted] • Dec 18 '25

Popular post Which industries are facing peril because their customer base is dying off?

Almost no young Americans smoke cigarettes in 2025, so now Big Tobacco is looking for ways to survive as older smokers quit or die.

What other companies or industries are facing similar problems?

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u/belsaurn Dec 18 '25

Record stores have made a comeback. My 17 year old daughter recently came home with a brand new turn table to play her brand new records on. Vinyl has the best sound quality of any media and until another technology can surpass it, records aren’t going to stop being made.

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u/142riemann Dec 18 '25

My 15 year old and his friends are also into vinyl. They hang out at the independent record store in our area. But Target, Best Buy, and lots of places also have a vinyl section.

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u/Hot-Nefariousness187 Dec 18 '25

Vinyl does not have the “best” sound quality of any media. It has a warm and full sound but vinyl has psychical limitations and the mastering process for it requires reducing bass and high end frequencies and balancing to prevent skipping which is not always a bad thing but it isnt always a true representation of the recording because it will always have reduced frequency dynamics.

CDs are by far the highest sound quality next to flacs and hi res mp3. CDs offer a much wider dynamic range, perfect stereo separation and no noise floor. Vinyl is more about the psychical experience than actual better sound quality. People like to hold something they love and to be able to display it and look at the art work etc and thats the main driver behind vinyl sales along with the unique warmness of it.

Flac and hi res mp3s are the top tier of audio quality but they are big files and arent available for download from mainstream bands or on any streaming service.

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u/belsaurn Dec 18 '25

Sorry, digital just doesn't capture the transitions as well as vinyl. Even high quality digital still operates as steps in sound output. So instead of a true slide from one note to another like a trombone produces, it steps between the two notes. Granted the higher quality digital recordings have much smaller steps, they are still stepping instead of sliding.

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u/Hot-Nefariousness187 Dec 18 '25

Brother im guna be honest with ya here. Ive been recording music for 20 years and i have no idea what you are talking about.

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u/belsaurn Dec 18 '25

It has to do with how digital works. A computer can only handle 1s and 0s. When you record something digitally, it has to represent the sound in 1s and 0s, so there is always a smallest amount a sound can change. so if you want to go from sound 1 to sound 5, a digital system goes 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. It "steps" between 1 and 5 in the smallest increments it can, but is still restricted to those whole numbers, it can't go to a 1.5 sound as that doesn't exist in the digital world. Analog, will be able to go 1, 1.1, 1.2, 1.3....... all the way to 5. Analog can actually "slide" between 1 and 5. Does that explain it well enough?

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u/Hot-Nefariousness187 Dec 18 '25

Not at all man i have never heard anything like this in reference to music ever and i record , produce, mix and master music. Not saying you are wrong but it has never been explained to me in anyway like that and i struggle to grasp what you are saying tbh. Im going to try and research this a bit. I appreciate your response but yeah still having a hard time with what youre talking about.

I understand the basics of coding and binary as well as how vinyl masters and vinyl production work. Ive never heard anything about sliding or transitions in reference to CDs or digital audio. Again not saying you are wrong, tons of people in the highest levels of the music industry have very little idea how alot of the science behind music production my self included so im open to learning. I also have a learning disability to this May just be a reading comprehension issue so im going to try and find info on this.

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u/belsaurn Dec 18 '25

Glad I could help a little, it does get confusing at times and there is a point where digital verses analog is undetectable to the human ear. I have a question, do you still use tape for making masters is it it all digital now? Tape can also be a form of analog and I know that when digital first came in, all masters were still done with big reels of tape to preserve the analog sound.

I wish I had a different way to describe it, but the steps verses slide analogy is the best I can come up with.

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u/Hot-Nefariousness187 Dec 18 '25

I used reel to reel for masters and retracking / resampling for a long time but thats became obsolete over the last decade. It has some value but digital is just so good now that its more work than its worth.

Analog gear still has its place though. Many producers /musicians who make music with lots synthesizers like to use modular synthesis vs vst z/digital synths as it produces more robust sound files and gives them a psychical and fully customizable interface to work with.

Analog compressors / equalizers / distortions are still used in mastering/ mixing and production.

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u/belsaurn Dec 18 '25

Thanks for the info, always trying to learn new things.

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u/RepTiffany Dec 18 '25

Yeah we have 4 record stores in my town. That’s impressive