Guest on Business Rockstars
I apologize for not getting this announcement posted prior to my appearance today on Business Rockstars from 1:15 to 1:45 pm. My friend Ken Rutkowski and his team produce a daily program for entrepreneurs from their studio in Santa Monica. This show is a big deal. According to their site, they’ve done over 800 episodes, have 3500 hours of content, 2800 live interviews, reach 35 million TV households, 150 radio stations, and have over 750K followers on social media. Very impressive. I feel like a rockstar!
So you can see why I reached out to Ken back in September when I was in the midst of my Kickstarter campaign. It wasn’t possible to get on the show during the campaign, but I was thrilled to be part of his show today.
I met Ken over 10 years ago at one of his METal (Media, Entertainment, and Technology Alliance) breakfasts. At that time, he hosted a small gathering of entrepreneurs in the back of a restaurant in Venice, California. There were only 10-20 people at those early events…and I enjoyed it very much. You got a chance to let others know what you were doing and learned about their efforts too. Many of those original METal members are still friends of mine. The network of relationships has been invaluable over the past decade. METal is still active but it’s a much bigger group of guys and conflicts with my marathon training runs on Saturday morning.
I keep running into Ken at the Southwest luggage carousel late on Sunday evening. It’s happened a bunch of times. He’s given me some great advice regarding my business and hooked me up with some great opportunities. In fact, I (re)met Scott Page this afternoon following my appearance on his show…he’s a musician and guy that was involved in some of the original CD-ROM stuff back in the 80s. Who knew?
You can view the program by linking to the “Live” stream at Business Rockstars. The show looks and sound great…very high production values and a very talented team.
Years ago, when I moved into the building that currently houses my studio and warehouse, the METal group came to our grand opening. Ken got the chance to experience real high-resolution music in full 5.1 surround. Needless to say he was impressed and remembers the magic of the tracks I shared.
Today’s program will only be available for a short time…if you’re interested in checking out the interview, please visit the link above. Again, I’m sorry I didn’t get a chance to post this blog prior to the show. Things have been very busy with the office move, final presentations at the university, and now grading stacks of final exams.
Finally, I won’t be participating in the CEA 2016 Show in a few weeks. I will be there checking out the various venues and attending some of the conference sessions, but I’ve opted out of the Hi-Res Audio Tech Zone and wasn’t asked to participate on one of the panels organized by the Digital Entertainment Group. I’m not even sure if the Tech Zone for high-resolution audio is happening this year. I know the CTA was trying to get something off the ground. I heard from the sales representative some months back. But never heard back. It could be that they decided I’m not welcome at the CES Show because of my contrary position or the event was cancelled for lack of interest. Last year, there were only three companies attending…HDtracks, SuperHiRez.com and AIX Records/iTrax.com.
They will be presenting three High-Resolution Audio sessions spread over Wednesday and Thursday. The first happens at 11:30 am on Wednesday and is titled, “Understanding the Hi-Res Consumer” followed by two sessions the following day. On Thursday starting at 10:15 in the morning, you can attend “The Emerging Hi-Res Mobile Market” or “Meet the Hi-Res Music Makers”.
If you’ve attended a session on “so-called” Hi-Res Audio in the past, it’s likely that you’ve already heard the spin that the panelists will be restating. It’s the same people, from the same companies, saying the same things…that HRA is the next big thing and that it’s growing. The only thing that’s growing with regards to Hi-Res Audio and Music is the mistrust that audio consumers are experiencing due to the misinformation provided by these guys and the organizations they belong to. Unfortunate, it could be so much better.
Got to go…
“The only thing that’s growing with regards to Hi-Res Audio and Music is the mistrust that audio consumers are experiencing due to the misinformation provided by these guys and the organizations they belong to. Unfortunate, it could be so much better.”
Yes it is sad. They have turned off the public by shoving a bunch of lies down their throats on what HDA really is and what it sounds like. Even the much revered Neil Young has lost a lot of respect with his fans by having his buddies climb out of his Caddy talking about the sonic seas parting while listening to old analog recordings packed into big bit bucket HDA files. Then people listened on their own, but the seas never parted.
To bad, there was no need for this false marketing to get his Pono cash cow off the ground, in fact lying to people has done him much more harm than good.
The whole industry is sinking in a sea of it’s own BS. I think it will survive but only after the downloaders and streamers figure out we don’t need or want 3 file formats, MP3, RBCD, and HDA. Bandwidth is now cheap and easy, one HDA format, maybe MQA processed and sold at todays MP3 price levels or less may save the future of HDA and give the public a win-win situation.
Just watched your chat with Ken Rutkowski……….from a UK viewpoint the presentation is so very, well, American, but great to see you getting the message re hi-res out to more folk. Best bit though is how you named the company AIX – loved it ! Keep up the good work, Mark, I really enjoy learning more on this topic.
Thanks Mike…it was fun.
Mark, now that the CEA group has snubbed you, how about delving into the area of hi Rez, and the metrics of sites as yours, however worthy.
Also, I think the discussion of assembling viable 5/1 equipment, and setup, is long overdue. Seems the negative industry is wearing on all of us. Why not discuss the merits of making our “space”, the best it can be ?
A great suggestion…and I’m planning a series of posts on the studios that are being built in the front space of my building. Reading so much of the BS gets to me but you’re right the point has been made. I can’t abandon it completely but we’ll spread them out.