Ask The Experts: Am I a Digiphobic?

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Paul McGowan:

I was surprised at the search results I got when I Googled Digiphobic. One of the first things that comes up is a website called Digiphobia with but one page that reads -noun a persistent irrational fear of all things digital.

I figured I thought the term up to explain a loathing of digital audio, but that’s not true! It’s apparently used to describe everything from people wanting nothing to do with computers and cell phones to vampires. Not sure how vampires figure into this. But then again, vampires and zombies seem to figure into everything these days. Might be a conspiracy by the vampires and zombies. Yes, I am sure of it.

We all know someone who believes it’s never possible for digital audio to best analog/vinyl sound quality. I would suggest this is an unreasonable attitude but I certainly understand it. If you’ve heard only bad audio coming through a digital based source and only good audio coming out of an analog source, then that makes perfect sense. Only, how many people who can’t ever imagine listening to one medium or another have really given what they don’t like a chance?

Putting our prejudices and biases aside, most of us are interested in reproducing the sound of live unamplified music in our homes irrespective of the medium used to play it back. As close as we can get, that’s what floats our collective boats. We listen through the clutter and errors of our mediums to hear those instruments reproduced properly. Vinyl lovers listen through some degree of ticks, pops and reduced dynamics to get to the heart of the music. Digital lovers listen through some degree of glare, sterility and increased dynamics to get to the heart of the music.

We all tolerate the shortcomings of our playback systems to arrive at the heart of the music.

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