Apple's decision to finally open source its Apple Lossless (ALAC) format is welcome news. 

For one thing, people who use iTunes to store and archive their CD collection, and take care to change the audio quality to Apple Lossless, will be able to stream their collection to a wider range of products.

For Linn, where we've been advocating FLAC, yet supporting an unofficial version of ALAC, it means we no longer risk the wrath of Apple HQ for letting people listen to their music collections through our systems.

Linn DS has supported both FLAC and ALAC formats (amongst others) for many years because our customers wanted it and there was no justification for restricting playback.

Apples opens core

But what has prompted this sudden outbreak of sanity from Apple?

Without meaning to sound uncharitable, I reckon there's a pure, commercial motive. And that is...24-bit.

As I reported from my visit with Neil Young, the momentum around 24-bit is growing. Artists want it. The music-loving public wants it. The majors see it as one last chance to re-monetise their back catalogues from the 50s, 60s and 70s.

Problem is, Apple owns the main route to the customer with iTunes.

So here's the deal. The majors offer Apple the 24-bit catalogue. Apple wants the format to be ALAC for the sake of iTunes compatibility. The majors demand ALAC be open source, so that the good stuff can be enjoyed beyond the Apple World to the widest possible audience.

In other words, I believe this is an essential piece of the jigsaw that will see iTunes offering 24-bit music downloads in 2012.

You might have noticed that the Linn website has changed in the last couple of weeks.

Out with the Old

Our previous website was conceived as an online catalogue. The structure neatly mirrored the areas of Linn's business and the categories of products. This was ideal for people who knew Linn and knew what they were looking for. The home page was used as a podium to display the latest products and upgrades. It broadcasted: 'Look at our latest offering.' It assumed knowledge of Linn, assumed that the latest offering made sense in the context of an existing understanding of our business and products.

Making it Easier

Our new website attempts to take a customer-perspective. We've flipped the approach from 'broadcast' to 'explore'; the new site invites you to discover Linn at your own pace. That's why the first menu item is Music - it's the fundamental reason Linn exists - to help you get better music at home. From left to right, the subject matter becomes progressively more detailed: Music, Our Systems, Try Linn, Buying Linn, Community and Support.

Within each main menu item, there is one continuous page offering more depth of detail flowing from top to bottom. It's designed so you can dip into the content and dip back out again as you please, with sections that make sense as standalone content. For example, Music lets you read the latest music blogs and album reviews, learn about and explore Studio Master downloads, purchase music from Linn Records, get into high quality Linn web radio and, finally, if you're digging deeper, understand how music shaped Linn's philosophy and why we do what we do.

All of the pages are structured the same way. From the most accessible information at the top, to the most detailed at the bottom. For those who don't need the earlier sections, any of the standalone sections can be bookmarked directly. So let's say you're interested in the product catalogue, you can bookmark it, even though it's within a larger section. You can also send a link to a specific section to a friend - for instance, if you've heard music on Linn DS then you'll already know it's better - here's a simple explanation why. 

News, Blogs and Forums are also now fully integrated within the site so you can always get at them from the top menu, or stay connected using the RSS feeds or automatic e-mail updates.

System Focus

For the same reasons, we present systems before we get into individual products. Without a hi-fi background, it's easy to be confused or intimidated by a product catalogue with too many options. I often walk out of a shop if I feel overwhelmed by too many choices without any context. If we want to welcome new people into our wonderful world of hi-fi, we have to lower the barrier to entry. I don't mean lower performance or lower price - I mean lower complexity.

The new range of DSM Systems should hopefully be easy for everyone to understand: They make anything you listen to at home sound better.

There are so many ways we get sound at home today: music, movies, computers, mobile devices, the internet; until now, you needed a high degree of technical comfort, or at least patience with technology, to join all these sources together through your hi-fi system. So we spend more time on the new site on the DSM Systems, and explaining how to unify all your sources through your Linn.

Your Feedback

Finally, we need your feedback so that we can improve the website. It's a huge change. I'd like to thank the many of you who have taken the time to email us or post on the forum with ideas for improving the site.

It's been developed by Linn, is completely owned and controlled in-house, so we can respond rapidly and we are working continuously to improve and update the site. Watch this space...

Following my last blog on music industry moves towards studio master, and Neil Young's blog on the same subject, I was both gob-smacked and terrified to be invited to Broken Arrow Ranch to meet with the man himself.

Neil Young's music was a soundtrack to my teenage years, especially Harvest. Inevitably, every time I was dumped by the seemingly-never-to-be-replaced love-of-my-life, 'Man Needs a Maid' with its heart-breaking story and dramatic orchestral backing felt like it was written for me. And 'Needle and the Damage Done' just had to be nailed on the guitar in order to have any kudos at all with my guitar-playing friends.

24-bit Harvest

So when we eventually pulled up outside one of the larger out-buildings on the Ranch -- a full ten minutes' drive from the gate of the property -- I had just enough time to shake Neil Young's hand and give him a bottle of half-decent Scotch before excusing myself to the restroom; the sound of laughter ringing in my ears implying I was not the first guest to arrive somewhat peely-wally, as we say.

The Buick had a laptop in the trunk loaded with music, connected to an outboard 24-bit DAC, and an iPad in the front which allowed Neil Young to select easily between studio master, CD-quality and two variants of mp3 (bad and worse!). We rocked out to the studio masters, the music so loud that one of the door panels removed itself.

Quality Matters

But whenever he selected a lower quality he would complain loudly and bitterly, turn down the volume, and curse that the music industry had allowed not just mp3, but even CD-quality to come into being and permeate the mass market. There was genuine sadness in his voice as he explained that Harvest Moon, his 1992 follow-up to the original, had been recorded at only 16-bit, the depth of emotion in the music lost forever during the process. (Sad really that the supposed breakthrough of the digital recording process has resulted in roughly fifteen years of recordings that can never be heard at anything better than CD quality.)

What struck me most was Neil Young's passion for the quality of music, not just his own, as we played through some other studio masters including Aretha Franklin and Otis Redding. The man is on a mission to demonstrate to the key influencers in the music industry the difference that quality makes to the listener's emotional connection.

California Dreaming

So as Neil Young drives the Buick around California, he is meeting with other musicians, producers and executives, and inviting them to hear the difference for themselves. From what I gather, he's been filming people and interviewing them before and after, in order to capture genuine, emotional reaction to hearing music at studio master quality for the first time.

As exciting as this all is, I have, however, one great fear; that the major labels may not be able to resist the temptation to put these studio masters out in a proprietary format. There remains a point of view among certain industry executives, totally misguided in my opinion, that the commercial potential can only be realised through an encrypted format, requiring people to buy new playback devices in order to experience these files.

It's been tried before, it's failed before, and it would be doomed to fail again.

The only way to offer a viable alternative to iTunes is for the music industry to provide Studio Master quality in an open format, easily accessible to all at a quality that blows people's minds. So that way everyone can share the same depth of emotion I experienced sitting in a Buick with Neil Young.

Pure, Perfect Sound Forever

Must Do Better

Streaming Studio Masters

A bright future

Back in 2007, when the deal was announced, Terra Firma planned to "accelerate the development of its digital and online strategy." The executive tasked with running EMI visited Linn at that time, when we were already seeing the ramp-up in demand for our Studio Master downloads. Naturally, we advised Terra Firma to launch a studio master download service. Sadly, they didn't take our advice.

And it's hard to find any evidence of an online strategy at EMI since then. The only toe-in-the-water of digital seemed more about extracting maximum profit from Beatles fans than a strategy; the "limited edition" USB stick of Beatles studio masters is still available 16 months after launch, and at a reduced price. Anyway, the impetus came from the Beatles' Apple Corp, not from within EMI itself.

The opening quote of this blog comes not from analysis of EMI's current woes, but from a BBC News article in 2003 about the race to consolidate the music industry. Not much has changed for the Majors, except perhaps being able to replace "falling profits" with "accelerating losses".

What we are witnessing is the beginning of a new phase of consolidation, which may finally see EMI bought by Warner Music. Ironically, it is the emergence and dominance of Apple and iTunes that may allow such a merger to gain the regulatory approval that was uncertain to Warner in 2003 on the basis of anti-competition fears.

Another contender to buy EMI is Apple itself; it's been apparent for some years that Steve Jobs sees Apple's endgame as becoming a media company with both hardware and software delivery mechanisms. Regardless of whether or not Apple buys EMI, iTunes looks set to secure a deal with the Majors for CD quality downloads, with huge ramifications for the future of the music industry Majors.

Why would the Majors allow this to happen, bearing in mind it cedes even more control of the music market to Apple? Well, Apple has the advantage that as soon as it negotiates a deal with one Major, the others topple like dominoes, for fear of missing out on their share. Furthermore, the Majors are unable to negotiate collectively, or even discuss a collective position, because, as one senior Major exec told me: "if the Majors are in a room together, an army of lawyers is present to ensure nothing remotely resembling cartel behaviour occurs."

Finally, as the EMI story tells us, the Majors simply can't compete directly against iTunes with their own branded download sites. Because they aren't consumer brands in their own right, attempts to develop their own portals are either too costly to pursue or failing to gain traction (Warner's Rhino.com). Right now, Apple holds all the cards.

Or does it...? The biggest music download site in the world, by far, is... YouTube! So perhaps the least bad outcome for the Majors is that Google enters the fray with a viable, alternative service to iTunes, introducing competition that would give the Majors some leverage in price negotiations with Apple.

A battle royale for control of the global mainstream music industry is looming.

P.S. To get an idea of the mind-boggling complexity of a "Major" record company check out the Wikipedia page of Universal Music Group (UMG).

Let me explain, and I can assure you it's not as dodgy as it sounds...

Winter Palace

Linn, together with our Russian partner Linn Prestige, brought Claire Martin to Russia for the first time to perform in front of an invited audience in St Petersburg.

Claire's band was the same elite line-up that I'd seen at Ronnie Scott's last year - Gareth Williams (of the Gareth Williams Power Trio) on keyboard, Laurie Cottle (Black Sabbath, Seal) on bass - with the notable exception of drummer Chris Dagley, tragically killed in a motorbike accident in July on the way home from a gig at Ronnie Scott's. Ian Thomas(whose credits include Eric Clapton, Tom Jones and Sting) was a fitting replacement.

My brief was to chaperone Claire and to try to make sure nothing went disastrously wrong before or during the gig.

On the morning of the gig, those of us who hadn't stayed up drinking until 5am went on a quick tour of the Winter Palace.

Then, back to the hotel for a meal and final preparations for the gig, during which time Claire Martin ironed my shirt. Apparently she's one of these people who enjoys ironing, and I'm one of these people delighted to take advantage of such a rare offer.

Tune Dem

Claire informed me on the way to the gig that, while the band was getting things sorted on stage, I was to be responsible for the sound in the auditorium. This involved repeatedly asking the sound engineers via a translator to make the drums quieter and the piano and Claire's microphone louder. Once I realised that the sound wasn't changing, not because of language difficulties, but instead because they preferred their own rock concert sound, I turned my persuasive powers up one notch and eventually arrived a pretty good result.

Meanwhile on stage, Claire had -- against my advice -- agreed to allow the mysteriously-present, nubile dancers of "Theatre of Sport" to join her during the performance for two songs, which they were now rehearsing, hilariously. Things were now threatening to get seriously out-of-control.

Backstage

Backstage, the band were getting hungry and restless. If the venue had realised they are all of Welsh stock, perhaps they would have held back the obligatory, but nevertheless impressive, fruit platter.

Emergency procedures kicked in, with Claire showcasing yet more hidden talents with this brutal back massage administered to a strangely-contented Gareth. A communal rendition of Michael Jackson's Man in the Mirror and some impromptu moonwalking by Laurie finally put everyone in the mood.

The concert itself went perfectly, with Claire and the band performing songs from A Modern Art and others from her collaborations with Richard Rodney Bennett, hinting at a new album. A highlight for me was a cover of K.D. Lang's Wash Me Clean, performed by Claire and Laurie.

Taxi!

There was one more surprise in store; our Russian hosts pretended the minibus had broken down, but had actually rented us a river taxi to take us back to our hotel.

As the latest debate on whether Linn should support a proprietary Apple format, this time the newly-announced AirPlay, flared up on the Linn Forum, it reminded me of the calls before the Klimax DS was released from some quarters for Linn to get on the bandwagon and support iPod docking, the latest "must-have" feature for home music systems.

We weighed up the pros and cons at length at the time, and once we'd agreed to abandon the dream of unimaginable riches by hitching our wagon to the iPod, and instead to pursue our own bone-deep belief in the network, I managed to get an audience with a cluster of Apple audio execs at their HQ in Cupertino.

Our view at the time (as it is today) was of a network-centric, not product-centric nor company-centric, world and we, perhaps naively, thought we could convince Apple to adopt open standards that would satisfy our shared customers without forcing Linn to join the "Made for iPod" program. (Picture the revised Linn new product launch: "This is the new Klimax DS; it's made for iPod.")

Apple's ethos can be summarised as follows, and I'll do my very best to quote directly from a senior Apple exec: "It's an Apple world, it's our party, and everyone's invited."

Now, I love my iPhone, and I love my iPad even more -- surely the best way so far to control a Linn DS system -- but I don't view ownership and enjoyment of these products as a subscription to an Apple World.

Where the iPad is at its best -- controlling my DS, watching YouTube (no Apple TV required), accessing my Dropbox, browsing the web (minus Flash) -- is everything to do with it being a great network-centric device and nothing to do with iTunes or the Apple World. It subtly but irreversibly changes our perception of any gadget being at the centre of the universe. Why put an iPod dock on a home music system? What about an iPhone dock, an iPad dock, and the whatever-gadget-I-buy-next dock?

It simply doesn't make sense. It never did. And I do feel a little sorry for people who were convinced to buy now-obsolete, so-called "high-end" iPod docks, sometimes embedded into the chassis of an expensive hifi product, sometimes embedded into the walls of their homes.

So what of AirPlay?

Well, it's the same again, except this time we're supposed to buy into the idea of iTunes at the centre of the universe. To take up the invitation to the party means Linn paying Apple to license AirPlay-compatibility rights so that our products stream wirelessly from iTunes.

That'll be the same iTunes that links to the iTunes Store that monopolises the low quality download market and keeps the lion's share of the revenues, the same iTunes that has confused almost all its users into thinking they can junk their CDs after ripping them to 128k.

The same iTunes that is a media server, CD ripper, media player and media controller all-in-one, as well as being a music store and an app store, not to mention a sync package, and now a proprietary wireless streaming hub too.

We're happy to support iTunes as a media library, in the same way as we're happy to support the Apple media formats, but Linn has a bone-deep belief in the open network. We won't license AirPlay because placing iTunes at the centre is an Apple-centric view, not a network-centric view of the home.

It's not an Apple World, it's a networked world. No product, no company occupies the centre of the home, people do. Understanding this fact is essential to anyone seeking to build a future-proof network at home.

My best friend Tim has an encyclopaedic knowledge of music. Growing up, Tim was a constant source of compilations, taped from vinyl, introducing me to most of the music that defined my teenage years. Much of it still ranks at the very top of my favourite music list today. As we got older, Tim graduated from tape to MiniDisc, and from MiniDisc to memory stick, allowing his musical tastes to influence an entire peer group through 'Birthday Specials', 'German Progrock Samplers' and 'Psychedelic Essentials'.

Now I reckon most of us have a Tim in our peer group, or perhaps you recognise yourself as the Tim of your group, so it's no surprise that the significance of last month's Spotify announcement of greater Facebook integration is not lost on Tim. Put simply, this integration reduces the process of making a compilation for a friend down to one step only: the preparation of the playlist. By sharing just that information via Facebook, other registered Spotify users can instantly stream music from the cloud. Now Tim can push out his latest compilation to all his friends simultaneously, and without doing anything that could be deemed to infringe copyright.

But Tim can go one step further and broadcast his playlists via his own radio station. Playdio -- a combination of playlist and radio -- allows him to add his own spoken links within his playlist, so he can for example explain why Kraftwerk really are the greatest band of all time, and share via Spotify and Facebook. Welcome to Radio Tim

Dark Skies for Quality

Whilst these are promising and exciting developments, there are significant problems that are yet to be addressed by the music industry.

Firstly, quality. So far, streaming services are limited to compressed, lossy MP3. By now even Tim has figured out that his friends are happier when he gives them full quality compilations so he may hold off on Spotify and Playdio for the moment.

Linn's own download site LinnRecords.com shows that when you offer people a choice of quality -- MP3, CD and Studio Master in our case -- over 80% choose the best quality available. So what's stopping mainstream cloud services going CD quality or higher? The standard argument they give against doing this is the cost of infrastructure for higher quality. Let's come back to this in a moment.

No Silver Lining for Artists

Second problem -- how do artists make enough money to survive in the "music-in-the-cloud" view of the world? This graphic illustration of the problemis both amusing and startling. As the terrifyingly large pink circles show, no-one has yet come up with a sustainable business model that doesn't involve selling physical media. Putting it mildly, streaming royalties from Spotify, iTunes and their like aren't exactly a source of riches for artists. Tim may be oblivious to this problem today, but he will care deeply when sources of new music dry up. Spotify is part owned by the major record labels, creating a real danger that indie labels will be shut out in the event that significant revenues are generated.

What's the Forecast?

Is music moving to the cloud? With the recent launch of Spotify in the Netherlands and the US launch planned for later this year, something has to change in order for cloud services to become more than just cool technology for wannabe Tims, and cheap or free music for the rest of us. In my opinion the obvious solution is to raise both quality and prices to pay for the increased infrastructure, leaving enough money for artists to survive and continue to create new music.

In the UK we have the unique situation of a compulsory license fee for every household in order to fund our public service broadcaster, the BBC.

How on earth then have we arrived at a situation where the BBC is using our money to lock down the way we access the very content we have paid for via its online iPlayer platform? For those who are unfamiliar with the BBC's policy, through the use of content protection it is purposely making it impossible to consume BBC online content legally through third party applications and products.

It argues this to guarantee quality delivery, the very argument Apple uses to shut-out a host of third party iPhone applications that happen to compete with Apple's own applications: "Since launch in 2007, BBC iPlayer has always used content protection in order to provide UK audiences with the most compelling content," it said in a statement.

Maybe it has, but the approach it is taking with iPlayer is unprecedented in the Corporation's history. To illustrate by analogy, Linn this month launches Radio DS in beta, making internet radio as easy to use as FM / AM, granting all Linn DS owners one-touch-of-a-button access to their favourite internet radio stations at the highest quality, including BBC stations; who would sensibly argue that content protection of internet radio stations, preventing innovation, high quality and simplification, would be somehow serving the British public?

Similarly, I can't see Samsung, LG or Sony cooperating if the BBC manufactured the Freeview digital television modules themselves and attempted to force those manufacturers to buy only from the BBC. Yet it seems that given half a chance, the BBC, via the iPlayer, can't wait to choose on behalf of the British public the washing machine as well as the washing powder, paid for with our own money!

This is a dangerous development. The BBC is, wholly inappropriately, taking a similar approach to shareholder-funded Apple. Prefer to use Windows Media Player? Too bad. Prefer to use the XBox? You can't. You must use the iPlayer, and only the iPlayer.

Even if the BBC were not licensee-fee funded, it is buying into a world-view where every corporation takes it upon itself to lock-down the customer experience and lock-out third parties. Taken to its logical conclusion, open standards are dead, interoperability is dead, freedom for third-party innovation is dead and consumer choice collapses to corporate sole-providers -- the self-professed authorities.

And what is the customer experience the BBC has chosen on our behalf?; the Home Computer -- hardly the ideal way to experience television, or one of their anointed iPlayer providers -- Sky, Virgin, or one of the mobile devices they've managed to release an application for.

Think of the amount of engineering resource the BBC is consuming in order to chase these various rabbits, as it attempts to make iPlayer a global standard. Who asked them for such a thing? It makes it impossible for anyone other than the BBC to decide how we, the licensee-fee payers, wish to access the BBC's online content. Short-sighted, authoritarian and unacceptable.

If instead the corporation simply publishes an open interface to its funded content, the interested third parties will allocate the engineering resource - surely this would be a scaleable model in line with the BBC's public service remit leading to innovation, high quality and consumer choice?

If you've been following Linn closely over the last couple of years, I doubt you'll have failed to notice our emphasis on Open. We do this in the knowledge that Open is best for the customer and at Linn we believe, as my father Ivor is fond of saying: What's best for the customer is best for the company.

Back in 1972, he created Linn around the Sondek LP12 turntable with:

1. An Open design ethos: Modular, expandable, upgradeable. Open to future improvement. Recognition that customers might wish to use non-Linn components. Compatible with any hi-fi system.
2. An Open manufacturing ethos: Anyone could learn how to build the LP12 from start to finish and develop expertise, as opposed to the more common production line tending to use humans like robots on only one part of the process.
3. An Open sales ethos: The TuneDem empowered customers to decide for themselves, and choose the hi-fi that was best for them, even if it wasn't Linn.

Why did Ivor take this Open approach? Why not deliver fully-loaded one-piece turntables off a production line through the mass market, using clever marketing to persuade people of its acoustic benefits?

Clearly he was convinced of the merits of his design breakthrough, yet at the same time he knew that it wasn't perfect, and so he gave the LP12 the ability to be improved in the future. He created a company filled with people who would be interested in making and improving the LP12 which still stands almost 40 years later. And because he was not afraid to have people compare his turntable against anyone else's, he ensured that those who bought his product did so of their own volition. Ivor showed that Open is a corporate attitude first and foremost, which pervades every activity of an Open company.

A Case of Open but Shut?

As CES 2010 comes to a close in Las Vegas, beware of those companies who claim to be Open because they adhere to an open standard. The adoption of open standards or technologies is only part of the story, and on its own does not imply an Open company, nor one with the long term interests of its customers at heart.

Many companies adopt open standards as a way to attract customers into other types of lock-in. For example, almost all automotive companies implement open standards within the vehicle, but increasingly some are attempting to introduce parts only compatible with their own diagnostic tools. In what was previously a very open market, those companies are deliberately trying to reduce the amount of open-ness in the engine and striving for sole supplier status. Sole suppliers are bad for both manufacturers and customers alike because they reduce choice and tend to limit value creation in the long run.

Many others use open standards where convenient — where they can be leveraged — and then layer unnecessary proprietary technology on top in order to lock customers into their platform. Apple, for example, has Wi-Fi in their iPod Touch / iPhone, which allows customers to access the entirely proprietary Apple App Store. For those not familiar, the Apple App Store hosts applications only for the iPod Touch / iPhone; applications are vetted via an opaque process by Apple staff before being admitted; the delivery mechanism is via an Apple iTunes account only; applications can only be created using Apple's development system. The reason for it all, of course, is to justify and allow Apple to take a third of all the revenue from application sales.

Designing for the Unexpected

The most crucial aspect of an Open corporate ethos is a commitment to looking after the long term interest of customers.

A closed solution does what the manufacturer defined and what they decided when they designed their solution, but it is impossible for the customer to stray outwith the bounds of that definition, impossible to extend or to personalise the solution beyond the confines of the manufacturer's design horizon.

The manufacturer-defined, closed solution can be alluring at the point it is purchased, because it can appear to meet the criteria today. However, the limitations will become apparent the very first time that the customer wants to add a feature or use the system in a way that the manufacturer did not foresee or permit. These companies hope you will replace the product or solution before that happens.

In total contrast, Linn, as an Open company, tries to take the longest term view of customer satisfaction at every stage. Choices are made at the design stage to allow for the unanticipated, the unintended — even the unwanted — uses of our products. By owning and controlling the key processes that affect the quality of our products rather than buying-in, Linn is able to continuously improve its products, improve its cost-versus-performance value and offer long service life. Linn allows its customers to extend the solution indefinitely as requirements change and new ones appear over the years.

Studio Master

This month we launch our Studio Master music package offer with the purchase of any Linn DS. Because of our Open ethos, we can work with the manufacturers of different storage solutions for each Linn DS, rather than force our customers into a one-size-fits-all package.

Our Open approach to our music label, Linn Records, means we offer Studio Master quality music, DRM-free, and indeed were the first to do so. We chose to offer music in FLAC because it is completely Open. After a fierce debate, the eventual basis of our momentous decision to allow customers to use Linn digital downloads as they saw fit, even though some argued it would lead to lost sales through piracy, was that it was undoubtedly best for customers, and in the long run would therefore be best for Linn.

Because we are Open, we host Studio Masters from a variety of independent music labels on our site and, with a transparent and simple non-exclusive contract, ensure we are easy to do business with and offer a fair deal to artists.

Don't Tolerate the Intolerant

Finally, as 2010 unfolds, I will be keeping a close watch on Google's Android mobile platform. It will be in direct competition with Apple's iPod Touch / iPhone and it may be more Open on many levels.

Indications are that Google will let the public decide (through some sort of a rating procedure) which applications are best for Android. Apple on the other hand is telling the public which applications the public wants. Indeed they have rejected quality applications on a number of occasions simply because they compete with Apple's interests and the interest of their chosen network operators, including music player applications, alternative developer frameworks and VOIP applications. We wouldn't tolerate this in government — why do we tolerate it in companies?

Whereas Apple have signed operator-specific contracts around the iPhone (it was O2-only in the UK until recently), Google's Nexus phone will be offered through all carriers. In addition, customers will be able to choose from a wide variety of Android-based phones. If Google takes the Open approach, Android stands a real chance of becoming the pervasive open standard in the mobile market.

A journalist I spoke to the other day said to me: "Your father, he's rather opinionated, isn't he?"

"Oh, how so?" I replied.

Journalist: "In the 1980's he said that CD would never catch on."

Me: "Well, he was right! It just took 20 years for his prediction to come true!"

The End of the CD?

Who — apart from Ivor — would have thought back then that vinyl would out-live CD? Yet who today would dispute that this is likely to be the case? In fact Ivor said two things; firstly, don't throw out your records because you haven't heard what's on them yet (and LP12 upgrades in 2007 and 2009 are the most recent vindications). Secondly, CD would be an interim format, before an eventual 'true' digital format would come along to rival vinyl. With Studio Master downloads and format-independent Linn DS music streamers, Linn believes Ivor's digital prophecy has been fulfilled.

Yet Linn is not claiming the end of the CD format. I have a good CD shop at the bottom of my street and still find it an enjoyable way to buy music. I take my new CDs home, rip them to my NAS and use the Direct Play feature in KinskyDesktop to play the music immediately. My guess is CD's will be around for a few years yet. So why end CD player manufacture?

CDs That Sound Better Than CD

Although over the years it did become progressively harder to source CD engines and loaders of the quality required, the real killer was performance. Once we proved out the theory that streaming a CD could and should sound better than playing the same CD, it was only a matter of time before we stopped making CD players. We now have Linn DS players at Klimax, Akurate and Majik level, as well as integrated offerings for various applications, each of which outperforms any CD player and offers more value than its CD-playing counterpart. We have far greater control over the supply-chain, with the benefit of far superior product reliability and longevity.

What about customers who want to buy a CD player? Is Linn turning its back on those people?

We thought long and hard about this. In the end, we decided that we'd rather take the time to explain to existing and potential customers why we believe the time is right to get into music streaming even if it means we risk losing a sale.

Of course we will continue to support our CD players in the market to the very best of our ability. Linn has a consistent track record of maintaining long product service life, and our decision to stop manufacturing new CD players does not jeopardise this.

When you bought a CD player, that's all you got — a CD player. When SACD came along we were told we needed to buy a new player. Same again with DVD, same with Blu-Ray disc.

Music streaming, and Linn DS, offers format — and resolution — independence and, crucially, upgradeability. That's why Ivor calls it the "digital LP12".

I'll be available for an online Q&A on 1st December from 5pm to 7pm GMT.

As I mentioned in my earlier entry on introducing Cara to Japan, Linn has been responsible for introducing music streaming into the Japanese audio market and probably because of that I was asked to speak to an invited audience of over 200 press and public at the Ototen show in the Akihabara district of Tokyo recently.

The seminar at Ototen is organised by the publisher Ongen, who owns around ten specialist audio-video titles. They, along with the StereoSound magazine group, dominate the Japanese specialist press. Ongen's audiophile website PhileWeb is the number one online portal and you can see the coverage the event received here.

The event took place as an-onstage dialogue between me and Yamanouchi, a highly-regarded critic, with discussion ranging from the story of Linn DS so far, to the future for downloaded music quality, to the future of the hi-fi industry, to the future for the music industry.

Yamanouchi-san pronounced this a time of great significance for audiophiles and the hifi industry, that will be looked upon in future as a critical turning point. We could not avoid the bare facts: CD players and printed disc media are on an unstoppable and accelerating demise, to be replaced with music streaming and downloading. The emergence of higher-than-CD quality downloads means, for the arguably the first time since the introduction of mass-market digital music, quality is finally on the rise.

And to drill the point home, following my seminar, was a presentation from a Japanese company called Kripton, who were launching a new download portal called HQM (High Quality Music).

For those interested in the details of my demo at Ototen:

We had a Klimax DS / Klimax Kontrol / Klimax Twin / Akurate 242 set up, allowing me to illustrate the differences between mp3 and Studio Master quality for the audience -- the difference sounding surprisingly clear in what was a very large auditorium. I used Claire Martin's "Everything I Got Belongs To You" from her new album A Modern Art that I'm becoming quite a fan of.

I also couldn't resist playing the whole of Alfie Boe "Love Unstuck" from his new album Love Was A Dream. I've never listened to operetta in the past, but I challenge anyone to listen to these traditional love songs from The Merry Widow and others without feeling incredibly uplifted. The quality of the recording, the lightness of the Scottish Opera orchestra, and the emotion in Alfie Boe's voice are all wonderfully joyous.

Here's a sample of what my "normal" hi-fi audience in Manhattan looked like:

• Owner of private equity investment company
• Portuguese first secretary to UN
• Entertainment lawyer to the stars
• Owner of chain of diamond jewelry retailers
• Deputy state governor (retired)
• Hedge fund manager

and

Craig Kallman, head of Atlantic Records, the most profitable record label in the world, which sold more records than anyone in the U.S. in 2008. Craig's a Linn customer, and he popped in to say "hi". Elliot Fishkin, owner of Innovative for over 35 years, has a personal friendship with Craig Kallman through supplying him with hi-fi equipment over the years.

Hats off to owner Elliot and his manager Scott Haggart (from Scotland, who drinks Scotch!), for the wonderful environment they've created below street level on E58th Street; a truly innovative use of space in an over-crowded, expensive city.

Craig has one of the largest private record collections in the world >300,000 vinyl (!) and a passion for great sound. He owns Linn, SME and Wilson: you can read this excellent interview he did with Stereophile for more info.

Here is a young, visionary leader of a record label, taking the fight to the Majors, unafraid of the digital future, embracing change and delivering success to his artists.

If proof were needed of Craig's commitment to high quality audio reproduction, he has bought a full floor of his apartment building in New York's upper east side which he's in the process of converting into top-spec listening rooms for Atlantic recording artists. He wants his artists to hear their music at its best. Expect to hear more about this come the new year.

Back to the evening itself. Sticking to my main presentation theme of the last few months, I talked about the improvements we're making to the recording process at Linn, and to demonstrate I played a sample of the latest studio masters from the Scottish Chamber Orchestra and Claire Martin. To my surprise, I was asked to make a straight Majik CD vs Majik DS comparison, which told me it was DS Day One for most people there. Having been expecting a confrontational audience, I was pleasantly surprised that everyone heard and agreed the improvement of the DS over the CD player.

As is often the case at Linn DS musical evenings, the conversation turned to the music industry itself, and whether Linn and other specialists were alone in fighting for the higher quality of digital music. Luckily, I could point to Mr Kallman as evidence of a mass-market future for high quality downloads.

In December 2008 we decided it was time to record a second EP. We have progressed considerably since our first release. Our arrangements are more mature with greater use of harmony. I suggested asking Linn Records' engineer Philip Hobbs if he would record us. If anyone could capture us at our best it would be him. I wasn't sure if he would have time for us amateurs given that he's usually travelling the globe recording more professional choirs and orchestras. But I knew that employing his expertise would give us the best chance of a great recording. He is renowned for his "golden ears" and, having attended his listening courses at Linn, and discussed choir recording techniques with him prior to our first recording, I'm fully aware of how finely tuned and focussed his hearing is. When he agreed to record us, and fixed a date for the recording, I suddenly became a bit nervous that maybe we'd bitten off more than we could chew. Were we really good enough to be recorded by someone of such high calibre? Could this end up being a complete disaster? Maybe we were about to find out the difference between a group of people who meet every week to sing, and a professional choir who really know what they're doing. Maybe by employing someone like Philip, we were setting ourselves up for a very big fall. Of course I never relayed any of this nervousness to the choir.

The recording took place over two days on 29 & 30 August. I met Philip at 9:30am and helped him setup the equipment before the choir arrived. He used 3 valve microphones equally spaced directly in front of the choir, and a centrally located stereo pair situated further back. These all routed back to his preamps and computer which were situated in the same room, beyond the mics, in front of the choir. He'd also brought along a pair of Linn 328A monitor speakers to let us hear each take after we'd recorded it.

We were expecting Philip to record us - we got much more than that. He adopted the role of musical director but not in a pushy way. After only one take he was able to pinpoint numerous flaws in our rendition. He highlighted pitch issues, inconsistencies in vowel pronunciation and consonant timing at the end of lines. He also explained how certain pitch problems were caused by the interaction of particular harmony parts and provided simple guidance on how to avoid such pitfalls. He introduced us to various techniques to help us focus and become more aware of how we were singing, such as performing a whole song without pronouncing any of the consonants. There were many takes, especially on the first song, while Philip bashed us into shape and we slowly became more focussed and approached the standard which he was pushing us towards. But all of his feedback was delivered in a very positive way, which encouraged and motivated everyone to perform at their best.

The choir were absolutely gobsmacked. We've never experienced anyone with such an ear for music let alone had the pleasure of working with them. His attention to detail was incredible. And although it was very hard work remaining focussed over the two days we had a great time. It was a very enlightening and fulfilling experience. The education we received was in itself worth the time and effort we put in. I can't ever imagine asking anyone other than Philip to record The Parsonage in the future. He is a remarkable person to work with, not only for his technical ability and musical insight but his great people skills too.

We recorded eight songs over two days, four by Hank Williams and four by Gram Parsons, whom we are named after. We're really looking forward to hearing the recordings once they've been edited and mastered. We know they're going to sound fantastic.