World Service podcast bit rates

[Owen Smith]

I used to hear the electronic chattering in the background of Classic FM's MP3 stream (128kbps), it was so intrusive I listened to FM instead even given the difficult reception conditions I had. Analogue hiss was more tolerable. Classic FM seem to have changed their encoding  a couple of years ago, the electronic chattering is gone and their MP3 feed now easily beats my bad FM reception.

-- 
Owen Smith <owen.smith at cantab.net>
Cambridge, UK

> On 18 Aug 2017, at 13:32, Simon Morgan <s.morgan at skm.org.uk> wrote:
> 
> Peter,
> Thanks for putting me right about the needs of some people for better than
> 96kb/s. It was something of which I was totally unaware.
> Rgds
> Simon Morgan
> 
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: get_iplayer [mailto:get_iplayer-bounces at lists.infradead.org] On
>> Behalf Of Peter Corlett
>> Sent: 18 August 2017 12:55
>> Cc: get_iplayer at lists.infradead.org
>> Subject: Re: World Service podcast bit rates
> 
> 
>> <SNIP>
> 
>> Not everybody perceives and comprehends speech the same way; it is
>> known that people on the autistic spectrum have difficulties separating
>> speech from background noise even when they have otherwise excellent
>> hearing, for example.
>> At low bitrates, high-frequency components are mangled by MP3,
>> introducing errors that manifest themselves as sibilance, pitch shifts,
>> and in extremis an electronic "chattering" in the background which can
>> be quite distracting.
>> 
>> If your hearing and brain are able to filter out the artifacts, well,
>> good for you. Others aren't so lucky and need higher-bitrate audio to
>> be able to hear and enjoy it properly. The BBC presumably agree, given
>> they now make 320kb/s audio available.
> 
> <SNIP>
> 
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