The Future of Audio is Mono?

[thebes]

According to a recent blurb in The Washington Post, some company called 1010Data states that the Amazon Echo accounts for 25% of the entire US speaker market.

 

It's some kind of glorified tin can that accepts voice commands and has a 2 inch tweeter and a 2.5 inch woofer that's uses a "reflex port" in some sort of Bose radio arrangement.

 

Instead of calling it a mono setup they refer to it as a 360 degree sound system, I guess sorta like those circular tube speaker thingies Yamaha made back in the '70's.

 

I'm heartened to hear that the future of audio is a revival of the drive in movie speaker.

 

The voice activation is some new trend in just about anything geeky and smart phony.  I wonder what it will do if you give it a voice command to sound better.

[mike stehr]

I'm heartened to hear that the future of audio is a revival of the drive in movie speaker.

 

With a reflex port...

 

And I though the future of audio is listening to dirty Mp3s through a mobile phone. Some wear headsets, some just let the little piezo go squack, squack, squack!

[vipergts2207]

A quick google search and I found the article you're referring to.

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/innovations/wp/2016/06/01/what-you-are-doing-online-and-other-top-findings-from-an-exhaustive-study-of-the-internet/

 

Even assuming 1010data's information is correct. A speaker is a terrible way to categorize Echo. I would suspect most people only buy it for listening to music as a secondary reason. It seems to me that the reason most people buy an Echo is for asking questions and home automation, much like Siri and Apple's homekit. My phone contains a speaker as well, but I'd never describe it as such. No doubt some people will use them for listening to music, but they were never going to care about audio quality anyway. If they didn't buy an Echo, they'd just buy some other Bluetooth speaker.

[mustang guy]

Blue Moon beer optional:

 

[garyrc]

I guess sorta like those circular tube speaker thingies Yamaha made back in the '70's.

  ... or that Empire made 10 years before that.  JBL also made a 360 degree speaker in the early '70s.  See PWK's article "Ho Hum Another Major Breakthrough," in the Dope from Hope.

[DizRotus]

Ohm Walsh was 360 degrees, as was Zenith "Circle of Sound."

[jimjimbo]

Blue Moon beer optional:

 

OK, well that's the last time I let anyone take a photo of the system in my basement.....Sorry, but I had run out of Stroh's at the time....

[pzannucci]

Probably more like 25% of speakers sold through Amazon since it is so small and easy to ship.

[gmjungbluth]

In addition to Klipsch CF-4,s Heresys, Quartets, KLH Model 6s, Polk Monitor 7s and Polk Lsi7s, 3 AV receivers, numerous NAD separates and a restored Fisher 500c, I have an Amazon echo.

 

Guess what gets 90% of my music listening attention?

The Echo.

 

It's tiny and sits in my dining room next to the kitchen, which is where my family spends 90% of its time too. There's no room in there for a stereo or big speakers so before that we went without music. My kids and I can all ask Alexa (the Echo's personality) to play whatever we're feeling like listening too. For background music, it's easy. I go in to the kitchen to make dinner and ask the Echo to put on a mix or to play NPR, or to share the forecast or do some other internet searches.

 

I can say that my family and I have increased our music listening and discovery by an order of magnitude. We all have impromptu dance parties after dinner or on weekends (happens a lot with a 2 year-old and a 7 year-old) and each one of us is now exposed to more music genres and styles than ever before due to the ease of the Echo's voice-operated search and suggestion feature - I have Pandora, IheartRadio, and Amazon Prime Music linked to it.

 

Sometimes I'll discover music on the Echo that I'll then buy and listen to on the CF-4s. It's way nicer sounding.

 

But I've also rediscovered enjoying music for its ambience and fun, and not sitting down to discern imagining or decay or bass extension on a song I've heard a million times. 

 

The Echo's not bad for a small background music listening device. And it's turned my whole family on to enjoying much much more music. Which I think is the whole point.

I'll never get rid of my serious audiophile speakers but I probably won't get rid of the echo either, unless it's to get another one (or the Google or Apple equivalent).

[Coytee]

I wonder what it will do if you give it a voice command to sound better.

 

Copy the sound of your wife's voice?  (or do I have it backward and it will instead, hush up??)      

[babadono]

Stroh's

Stroh's? STROH'S?  Ah.... the good old days

[eth2]

I think they meant the future of audio is mononucleosis.

[eth2]

 

Stroh's

Stroh's? STROH'S?  Ah.... the good old days

 

 

We had many "Strohathan's" in my younger years.

[Schu]

I dont see a probalem with mono... specially when its the size of a small house.

[thebes]

A quick google search and I found the article you're referring to.

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/innovations/wp/2016/06/01/what-you-are-doing-online-and-other-top-findings-from-an-exhaustive-study-of-the-internet/

 

Even assuming 1010data's information is correct. A speaker is a terrible way to categorize Echo. I would suspect most people only buy it for listening to music as a secondary reason. It seems to me that the reason most people buy an Echo is for asking questions and home automation, much like Siri and Apple's homekit. My phone contains a speaker as well, but I'd never describe it as such. No doubt some people will use them for listening to music, but they were never going to care about audio quality anyway. If they didn't buy an Echo, they'd just buy some other Bluetooth speaker.

Good point, but Amazon thinks its a speaker. Maybe I should just think of it as one of those toys you used to ask a question, then shake it and get an answer.  Sorry can't remember what that was called.

[Zim.]

x

[thebes]

In addition to Klipsch CF-4,s Heresys, Quartets, KLH Model 6s, Polk Monitor 7s and Polk Lsi7s, 3 AV receivers, numerous NAD separates and a restored Fisher 500c, I have an Amazon echo.

 

Guess what gets 90% of my music listening attention?

The Echo.

 

It's tiny and sits in my dining room next to the kitchen, which is where my family spends 90% of its time too. There's no room in there for a stereo or big speakers so before that we went without music. My kids and I can all ask Alexa (the Echo's personality) to play whatever we're feeling like listening too. For background music, it's easy. I go in to the kitchen to make dinner and ask the Echo to put on a mix or to play NPR, or to share the forecast or do some other internet searches.

 

I can say that my family and I have increased our music listening and discovery by an order of magnitude. We all have impromptu dance parties after dinner or on weekends (happens a lot with a 2 year-old and a 7 year-old) and each one of us is now exposed to more music genres and styles than ever before due to the ease of the Echo's voice-operated search and suggestion feature - I have Pandora, IheartRadio, and Amazon Prime Music linked to it.

 

Sometimes I'll discover music on the Echo that I'll then buy and listen to on the CF-4s. It's way nicer sounding.

 

But I've also rediscovered enjoying music for its ambience and fun, and not sitting down to discern imagining or decay or bass extension on a song I've heard a million times. 

 

The Echo's not bad for a small background music listening device. And it's turned my whole family on to enjoying much much more music. Which I think is the whole point.

I'll never get rid of my serious audiophile speakers but I probably won't get rid of the echo either, unless it's to get another one (or the Google or Apple equivalent).

More good points.  So it's a smarter boom box or possibly a much smarter version of the old clock radios which were all mono.  Certainly with the sites you are streaming, you are getting exposure to a wide array of music, both new and old, so you could also consider it a new form of radio. And the way you are using it just how we used to use car radio in the heyday of FM radio to discover new music. Of course all that stuff was being pretty much being listened to in stereo, so can you get two of those cans and play them in stereo? I think not. And then, of course, the streaming services starve the artists and song writers, but that's another issue. 

 

Now quite frankly I don't like talking to inanimate objects.  And, of course, if I was me do the programming of these arstyficial intelligencias, I'd put some wiseguy responses in such as:

 

"You want me to play some Barry Manilow?  Oh boy, I can't wait to tell everyone on your email list."

[twk123]

From a conceptual standpoint- As for small speaker units I can see a better quality single driver being better than two that are 12'' apart which isnt really stereo anyway like proper speaker setup with a sound stage is. That being said, the echo sounds pretty gimmicky.

[Paducah Home Theater]

http://www.businessinsider.com/amazon-echo-speaker-sales-beats-bose-and-logitech-2016-1

interesting.

I mean, your speakers can order a pizza though. Klipsch should add that to the heritage line. I can see it now...

"Heresy, order some Domino's".

[Coytee]

Heresy indeed, everyone knows it should be Pizza Hut...