That's just one of many subtleties that in-depth knowledge of cutting-edge options afford. As Proffitt explains:

"I'm quite familiar with Liquid Audio encoding, we have it here, so I'll listen on decode for it. But you also need to test your stuff, which is where true mastering comes into play and why it is not cheap to do true mastering. You really need to go out and real-world test the stuff - on different kinds of speakers if you're just doing something for CD, and on different kinds of codecs if you're doing something that's going to go to the Net. If you're going to do MP3, for example, you need to keep up with the newer codecs that use very good variable bit-rate encoding. I've heard some people say that QuickTime 4 doesn't play back variable bit-rate encoding and I have to tell you I'm used to listening to things I've downloaded on MP3s that can play back variable bit-rate encoding, and I don't use QuickTime much for playback unless it's something that's already on the Net in QuickTime. I suggest to my clients that if you're going to send something via MP3 - and I'll tell you at the higher bit-rate MP3 is getting very good, especially with variable bit-rate encoding - the clients on the receiving end need to have the decoder that is like your encoder that can really play back well. It's also interesting to note that, for example, on Zing technology we were able to discover that there were two or three different implementations of it that sounded different at different encoding rates on different machines, like PC vs. Mac. So it's very important that if you're going cross-platform that you run a multi-platform facility so you can actually test and see what you're client's getting."

Recording For The Future
All this comes back to an earlier theme, adhered to by most successful recording producers - product life span. You want to design your recording to last, and hopefully provide royalties to your grandchildren. For that, you must think not only about current ad hoc, jury-rig Net recording technology, but also about the real-life standards of the future. A "near-CD quality" recording does not cut the mustard any more than an electric car that can do "near-freeway" speed. You're a wreck on the information highway before you begin. The coming audio standard, which will be with us through and sometime after the currently arriving version of "Convergence," is multichannel surround sound, replacing current stereo. Its production techniques and its technical requirements radically differ from today's essentially transition market. Part of it involves the fact that AC-3 (audio coding 3 compression, involved in Dolby-izing files) takes up a lot of space.