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Topic: Is this forum dying? (Read 20118 times) previous topic - next topic
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Is this forum dying?

Reply #50 –
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Maybe, but I'm not admin there, and I'm interested in the future of Hydrogenaudio more than I'm interested in the future of Doom9...

you sound like the forum is REALY dying...   
what about summer-hole stuff and the like, as discussed above?
Nothing but a Heartache - Since I found my Baby ;)

Is this forum dying?

Reply #51 –
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you sound like the forum is REALY dying...    
what about summer-hole stuff and the like, as discussed above?

Well.. The stats imply that HA is not dying, but I'd really like to bring in something new to keep the interest up for both users and staff..
Juha Laaksonheimo

Is this forum dying?

Reply #52 –
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Well.. The stats imply that HA is not dying, but I'd really like to bring in something new to keep the interest up for both users and staff..

but don't you think that the title of this board makes the idea of adding video-stuff is not very very far fetched, but just not in harmony with it?
it would mean to more or less become or brand new forum... I can't see how a good morphing process should get going... please share your thoughts in that matter.
Nothing but a Heartache - Since I found my Baby ;)

Is this forum dying?

Reply #53 –
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Well.. The stats imply that HA is not dying, but I'd really like to bring in something new to keep the interest up for both users and staff..

but don't you think that the title of this board makes the idea of adding video-stuff is not very very far fetched, but just not in harmony with it?
it would mean to more or less become or brand new forum... I can't see how a good morphing process should get going... please share your thoughts in that matter.

Well lets wait and see what Dibrom has to say about it.  He is the ultimate authority here.
gentoo ~amd64 + layman | ncmpcpp/mpd | wavpack + vorbis + lame

Is this forum dying?

Reply #54 –
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Well.. The stats imply that HA is not dying, but I'd really like to bring in something new to keep the interest up for both users and staff..

but don't you think that the title of this board makes the idea of adding video-stuff is not very very far fetched, but just not in harmony with it?

Regardless of the forum name, and web address I'd like to see some video related stuff here. Since I don't know one thing about video codecs, quality, etc., on a PC it would add to my knowledge.

Is this forum dying?

Reply #55 –
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Well lets wait and see what Dibrom has to say about it.  He is the ultimate authority here.

Well. I know that so far Dibrom has been reluctant about video.. and obviously something like this wouldn't happen very instantly..
What comes to the "ultimate authority", maybe, but we haven't done any bigger decicions which we both wouldn't agree with.
Juha Laaksonheimo

Is this forum dying?

Reply #56 –
Fascinating topic, and JohnV's torrent idea is certainly innovative (and absolutly necessary considering the bandwidth required for source video), but let's not forget that because video compression is "hot" right now, the SNR on doom9 is pretty crappy.  We don't want that to happen here.  It seems selfish, but this site is a relatively small community, which is nice.  I wish it to stay that way.  Too many noobs will certainly drive away the knowledgeble that are too busy coding and testing to deal with bullshit.  Doom9 forums really are mayhem! 

But since this place has probably the most scientific discussion about coding, I say let the tests begin!

By the way, I spent about a year on doom9 before I came here.  Being a musician, I've got a bias towards audio.  That's what landed me here... plus a desire to code something myself (probably never happen).

mobius
Gur svggrfg funyy fheivir lrg gur hasvg znl yvir. Jr zhfg ercrng.

Is this forum dying?

Reply #57 –
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Actually, Monty is working on Audacity.

LOL!!!! I can't believe it.

@Bond (wherever you are): I guess I won't be able to wait for vorbis 1.0.1 for my test



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i don't think it's dying but it's boring lately. nothing new, no development going on, although there are a lot of thing that could be done. :-(

maybe i will go to doom9 soon, because i don't know anything about video encoding and it seems to be interessting.

hm, there is also not much really big going on at doom9 at the moment imho (perhaps just because i have to work this month and havent really the time to check regularely whats going on...)


i would say that we are in some sort of "summer-hole"
when the exams will come and its time to study again, people will also tend to visit the boards more often instead of learning, lol

to the audio-video board discussion, i really like it the way it is now, with hydrogenaudio for audio and doom9 for video, no need to change that imho as these two pages are specialised for their stuff with the real pros/developers hanging around there
of course a single forum dealing with audio-video related issues would be nice (like the audio one on doom9) but nothing big as there is no need to invent the wheel again imho

and as someone else already mentioned mp4 (aac) is very interesting at the moment,
it would be great seeing faac evolving much more, becoming the successor of lame...
I know, that I know nothing (Socrates)

Is this forum dying?

Reply #58 –
Hehe. A video forum, eh, Juha? I see...

Re: Video quality tests.

IMO, such test would be very hard to conduce. Besides, it would be hard to please everybody about the test methodologies. Finally, it would be hard to come up with usable results.

Hard to conduce: There's no good source of uncompressed video as we have with audio. Therefore, we would have to rely on DVD sources, that are already compressed. So, it would be a transcoding test.

Also, it would be hard to distribute the sample files. VOB, as JohnV suggested, simply would not do. VOB can only contain MPEG2, therefore, it would be a second transcoding (MPEG2 -> DivX -> MPEG2). A solution would be HuffYuv encoded files inside AVI, but file sizes would skyrocket.

Difficult methodologies: AFAIK, there is no published specification like the ITU R.BS 1116-1 dealing with blind visual tests. Also, there's no application similar to ABC-HR that allows you to promptly compare the reference against the encoded file. Although it's theoretically possible to conduce a visual test asking people to compare the videos playing them back on their favourite media player, I personally wouldn't think this is a very reliable method.

Uninteresting results: Differently from audio, on video encoding few people settle for a favorite bitrate or quality mode and encode everything with that. They usually do two pass encoding to fit a video in 700Mb, and let the encoder choose the optimal bitrates.

So, it would be hard to define what is the preferred setting to be used on the samples.


Anyway... Just my thoughts, given the experience I already gathered stressing myself over blind tests. If you feel you're up to the challenge, go for it. :B

Best regards;

Roberto.

Is this forum dying?

Reply #59 –
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IMO, such test would be very hard to conduce. Besides, it would be hard to please everybody about the test methodologies. Finally, it would be hard to come up with usable results.



Also, it would be hard to distribute the sample files. VOB, as JohnV suggested, simply would not do. VOB can only contain MPEG2, therefore, it would be a second transcoding (MPEG2 -> DivX -> MPEG2). A solution would be HuffYuv encoded files inside AVI, but file sizes would skyrocket.

Difficult methodologies: AFAIK, there is no published specification like the ITU R.BS 1116-1 dealing with blind visual tests. Also, there's no application similar to ABC-HR that allows you to promptly compare the reference against the encoded file. Although it's theoretically possible to conduce a visual test asking people to compare the videos playing them back on their favourite media player, I personally wouldn't think this is a very reliable method.

I'm not talking about any group testing similar to rarewares audio group testing, with all the statistics and all.. I'm simply talking about place where you could see what certain codecs and settings can do.
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Hard to conduce: There's no good source of uncompressed video as we have with audio. Therefore, we would have to rely on DVD sources, that are already compressed. So, it would be a transcoding test. Also, it would be hard to distribute the sample files. VOB, as JohnV suggested, simply would not do.
Well.. imo MPEG2 DVD VOB source would be the most reasonable for this purpose. Majority of home video encoding is done from this source anyway.

And, you seemed to understand wrong my idea that we suddenly start doing huge group bling video codec testing. Well.. maybe at some point, but that was not what my suggestion was about. I was mainly thinking a smaller scale "Lame alpha" -type of testings with submitted results using video codecs.
Juha Laaksonheimo

Is this forum dying?

Reply #60 –
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Hehe. A video forum, eh, Juha? I see...

Re: Video quality tests.

IMO, such test would be very hard to conduce. Besides, it would be hard to please everybody about the test methodologies. Finally, it would be hard to come up with usable results.

Signal to noise measurements for video encoders can go a long way in determining the quality of an encoder, much more effective than in audio.  That's one of the reasons why ABXing in video is not a big necessity.  Unlike audio, the advances in current video encoding are not in how much and how well video data can be removed without you knowing (akin to removing masked audio frequencies), but how can frame to frame redundancies be exploited to transmit less data (motion estimation etc.). This is a much easier process of which to determine the quality than psychoacoustic masking.

Is this forum dying?

Reply #61 –
well... I think the summer low hits everybody here and then.. but we're still doing a 200+ user average which isn't too shabby I guess.

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- still image tests (I'd pretty much compare this to spectral analysis on audio)
actually, you (and many other people) are mistaken on that. The latest codec comparison is based entirely on impressions when watching the video. Only if I saw an artifact on screen to illustrate my point did I refer to the image, but all my comments derive from notes taken when watching the clips over and over.

I have nothing to counter the one many only point.. that is in fact the sad truth.

As for sharing only settings, not videos.. that is mostly a copyright issue.. we are dealing with a very hot and touchy subject after all and we get more than enough unwanted attraction already. And, since we do talk about DVD encoding, obviously the source would have to be a DVD, and a real movie, not something synthetic like scenes cut together for testing purposes (c't did such a test in their video comparison article.. I think it doesn't serve much purpose to test stuff that you're never going to encode anyway). The idea of taking a common set of VOBs to encode them was raised a couple of times already, but it never really took off. We also considered taking copyrighted material that many people have.. once again that was a failure.

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Doom9 forums really are mayhem!
You should see my competition then..  I think we're still doing pretty good despite the size.
Go to www.doom9.org for the web\'s most comprehensive collection of DVD backup articles.

Is this forum dying?

Reply #62 –
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Maybe, but I'm not admin there, and I'm interested in the future of Hydrogenaudio more than I'm interested in the future of Doom9...

So am I, and more than that, the future of audio compression (lossy or lossless).
flac > schiit modi > schiit magni > hd650

Is this forum dying?

Reply #63 –
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Maybe, but I'm not admin there, and I'm interested in the future of Hydrogenaudio more than I'm interested in the future of Doom9...

So am I, and more than that, the future of audio compession (lossy or lossless).

Problem is that we are quickly reaching the limits of audio compression, and discussion becomes boring for the technically oriented crowd. In video there's much more to explore starting from new codecs like H264, and many codecs including MPEG4 can still be tweaked nicely.
Juha Laaksonheimo

Is this forum dying?

Reply #64 –
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Problem is that we are quickly reaching the limits of audio compression

True, which probably explains the slowdown. So then, we transition from audio compression to video to keep the forum going?

I would like to see lossless compression produce file sizes that are 25% of the original. I suppose that's theoretically impossible, so there is no point in trying.
flac > schiit modi > schiit magni > hd650

Is this forum dying?

Reply #65 –
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I would like to see lossless compression produce file sizes that are 25% of the original. I suppose that's theoretically impossible, so there is no point in trying.

Actually some easy to encode music already goes down to ~25% (try encoding old Glenn Gould recordings),  whereas some metal songs can't even get down to 80%, so you can't really pick a ratio that you would like to see lossless get down to, because there is such a wide range in the possible compression ratios due to the differences in source files.
gentoo ~amd64 + layman | ncmpcpp/mpd | wavpack + vorbis + lame

Is this forum dying?

Reply #66 –
Seems like there is some room for improvement, eh 
flac > schiit modi > schiit magni > hd650

Is this forum dying?

Reply #67 –
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Seems like there is some room for improvement, eh 

I actually have no idea how much farther lossless compression could go.
gentoo ~amd64 + layman | ncmpcpp/mpd | wavpack + vorbis + lame

Is this forum dying?

Reply #68 –
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I actually have no idea how much farther lossless compression could go.


There are many options still to be explored here, particular with the hybrid options with Wavpack and Optifrog-Dualstream. I think there are many interesting possibilities with these that can be discussed, considered and with some luck actually coded. 

Current lossy encoders have quite disappointing performance at the upper end of the bitrate range. ie if you have a problem sample with mpc at q5, it often presents problems at q9 or 10 as well. This is not the case with Wavpack lossy or Dualstream. If you ever come across a problem sample with these, you can just throw more bits at it, and it will always fix the problem eventually, although in same cases you may end up with a near lossless or lossless file. Who cares? You have at least fixed the problem.  B)

The last release of Dualstream showed the power of combining a lossy version of a lossless encoder with a decent form of quality managment so that it can throw more bits at a problem sample. If this was beefed up further, it would be possible to have a lossy encoder that can go lossless when required to nail artifacts. I look forward to that day...Wavpack 4 perhaps?

There has been an increase in newbie noise here recently, but hopefully we can find a balance between being helpful while not developing newbie fatigue. That Wiki we keep reading about would be very cool. (and perhaps it will come before Vorbis gets bitrate peeling  )

As for video at HA, I am also a complete vidiot, and have a large collection of various forms of compressed video, but I don't really want to see video stuff here directly. Perhaps we could explore more on the audio compression side of video, but I think leave the video for Doom9. (I actually don't go to Doom9 much as I don't find it as useful as HA, but I also don't have as many questions regarding video either. I have a format that suits me...)

My 2 cents.

Is this forum dying?

Reply #69 –
i wouldn't say this forum is on the brinks of collapse, but it's obvious that a lot of regulars simply lost interest. the reason? perhaps it's because those who have been long time members have already seen it all. i mean, we've discussed an awful lot of stuff here, covering a lot of different topics, doing all sorts of listening tests, trying to understand the technology as much as we can and educate others. having said that, i think people are beginning to lose interest because the same topics are being brought up. i mean, how many more times can people answer questions like "what's the difference between stereo and joint stereo?" and "why is format x better than format y?", etc.

also, people have things to do outside this community. obviously you can't earn a living by arguing here all the time about what encoder to use to archive music. people get busy with jobs, go on summer vacation, etc.
Be healthy, be kind, grow rich and prosper

Is this forum dying?

Reply #70 –


What a "Useless Waste of Ressources" to discuss a Thread "HA is dying", facts speak for themself.

69 Posts since 27. August

*LoL*

Pardon me, for this useless Post.

PS: next Patient please *hehhe*

Is this forum dying?

Reply #71 –
It's a fact that people evolve. Three years ago I was happy to tell people in Winamp forums that installing a gapless plugin would help them remove gaps listening to CDs.
Two years ago, I wasn't insterested in gapless plugins anymore, but I spent my time explaining that offsets were relative to an arbitrary reference in EAC mailing list. I was happy when JeanLuc and Sikkek came and answered newbies questions that I used to answer before.
One year ago I was fedup with answering the same thing over and over, so I gathered the best threads into a FAQ, to save me the time of searching for them everytime I want to answer with just a link.
Now, I'm discussing the effect of CIRC implemetations in drive chipsets on CDS200 mastered errors with Tigre  ...

I think that what moves people into helping the community is to give back what they just learned. At least that's how things work for me. When I learn something interesting, it makes me happy. So I give it back. I like to explain things. But I learn something new everyday. Thus I want to explain something new everyday !

That's why people pass through different stages during their forum life :

-Newbie
-Newbie helper / Midrange student
-Midrange helper / Expert student
-Expert helper

Therefore we ought to think about recruiting new people in the forum crew in order to replace people as and when they are leaving.
There is an interesting text about Gaming Clans there : http://www.atomicwarrior.com/clubs/clanbib...ible/page3.html
I think the paragraph 5 of this page can very well apply to a forum crew :

Quote
THE REASONS WHY MOST CLANS FAIL: (the COLD HARD TRUTH)

(...)

V. You FAILED to recruit any new members:

""A clan is like a sack of sand with a hole in at the bottom that is slowly losing it's contents.""

People have and will ALWAYs LEAVE clans, no matter how good they are.

We have had people leave our clan for just about any reason you can think about. We have had : a member that went to to jail, a member had his Wife yell at him to "Turn off the computer or she would leave him", people in serious auto accidents, people loose their jobs and not able to pay their ISP, people have their phone disconnected for not paying, one guy had his phone disconnected for 3 weeks because of a construction backhoe, people bored with games, people doing poorly in school, people going away and starting college, people moving, misunderstandings, and of course FIGHTS.

To avoid this:
You have to CONTINUALLY RECRUIT new QUALITY members if your clan is to survive. Make sure several LOYAL people in the clan spend a few hours recruiting in open forums and in games each week. Be careful NOT to spam messages anywhere. Make someone responsible for this section of the clan, make sure that they are 100% loyal to your clan.

Is this forum dying?

Reply #72 –
I guess Pio's right. At a certain point, you get bored by doing the same over and over again. So someone else has to pick it up... And the better you ensure others take over the job of someone who leaves, the beter the more continous the forum will be.
[span style=\'font-family:Arial\'][span style=\'color:red\']Life Sucks Deeply[/span][/span]

Is this forum dying?

Reply #73 –
I think on a forum like Hydrogen Audio there is only so much that you can cover, before you reach the point where you run into new members with the same basic essential questions all of the time with reguards to preset standards, ABX listening test's, programs, etc. I will however say that adding the Scientific R&D forum to the board's has brought about some more interesting and unique topics that I haven't seen elsewhere with reguards to questions about FFT blocking effects, polyphase quadrature mirror filters, wavelets, etc.  Despite the fact these are more Scientific/Engineered oriented discussions they still bring about a wealth of information reguarding physcoacoustics modeling and DSP, while it is safe to say the forum might be dieing a little on the general side. I think there are still more interesting technical discussions to be had reguarding research and development or explaining.  I can't say I am up for the challenge all of the time for explaining things on technical oriented level, but like Pio 2001 I don't mind shareing thoughts or ideas with the community as the appear. Don't forget about the idea of adding a forum in with reguards to music in general to liven things up a little generally if Dibrom decides to add one in.  ;-D
budding I.T professional

Is this forum dying?

Reply #74 –
Thanks to Pio for pointing out the importance of attracting new forum members to offset attrition.  I'd like to emphasize also that I think it's important to attract the right type of new members to a forum with HydrogenAudio's standards.  Basically, I see new members as one of three different types:

A. The classic "newbie know-it-all".  A person fairly new to audio encoding in general, and completely new to the better technologies and methods (LAME vs. Xing/Blade for encoding, EAC vs. WMP9 for ripping, etc.), but who think they know more than the average HA veteran.  These types of people also comprise the highest risk of becoming flamers, soon ending up with one warning, then two, etc.

B.  The benevolent, inquisitive newbie.  Someone who may or may not be new to audio encoding, is new to the better methods mentioned in the paragraph above, but also a person who is generally kind, tolerant, curious, not overly insecure, and always willing to learn.

C.  The audio encoding veteran who has been using EAC, Wavegain/MP3Gain/VorbisGain, and LAME/Vorbis/Musepack/FLAC/etc. since these technologies were released, but who has strangely enough been living in a cave and wasn't previously aware of HA's existance.  Maybe they have no internet access, but their cave has AC power, a PC, and someone who mails them music CDs plus a CD-R containing EAC.exe, lame.exe, tag.exe, flac.exe, mppenc.exe, and so forth.

Type A's are the ones to avoid attracting if possible, and would likely end up abandoning HA anyway out of frustration, or at worst would end up banned.

A type B is someone who would hopefully be welcome at HA, but who generally "knows their place" and strives to learn more and gradually move up the "tiers" that Pio defined in his post above.  I consider myself a type B (and at the lowest tier of knowledge).

Type C's would be a rare find, I would think, but should be invited to HA, and if they choose to stay they would most often become "experts" quicker than type B's, if not immediately depending on their level of knowledge, attitude, and other factors.

So, the big question is how can HA attract and retain a balance of type B's and type C's while avoiding type A's?  And the attraction and retention rates should together match the attrition rate in order to keep the member population level, or exceed it to enable the member population to grow.


[span style='font-size:7pt;line-height:100%']Edit:  Typos...[/span]