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Blind test: we have a volunteer!!!

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tmtomh

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Frankly, this is a PR disaster.

Don't get me wrong @amirm, your objective reality is my objective reality. I am typically unable to hear the differences @GoldenOne hears/claims to hear. I also do understand the near impossibility to check a remote test for cheating. Not implying that @GoldenOne would cheat, just that even if he doesn't, a remote uncontrolled/weakly controlled test will not convince anyone anyway. However, that was clear from the start, and going all-in with a $1000 bet was probably unwise, if spectacular.

Some of the back-tracking/conditions make sense and were actually graciously accepted by "our blogger". And that's when the PR tide starts to turn. Whenever he calmly and confidently accepts something, you add new requirements, change the nature and the scope of the test. The net PR result is very negative: while "our blogger" builds his "nice accomodating and confident guy" image, you now appear to wiggle frantically in damage control mode, mostly because you trapped yourself in proposing a flawed challenge in the first place... :(

:facepalm:

Well stated.
 

raif71

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I have found this is very common, and is often the only way to "beat" a blind test. There's often a "ting" or a "ding" that occupies a slightly different point in 3D space. The test thereby becomes visual rather than auditory, with better retained memory and absolutely quantifiable impressions - not, "Does that "ding" have a subtly altered harmonic structure?" ... but "Is that "ding" physically lined up with point A in the room, or point B?"
If there is no blind test or we are actually waiting for one, let's see this blindfold fighting instead :D . There's a wind chime in the clip, not sure it's a ding or a ting when the wind blows...
 

Sharur

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Frankly, this is a PR disaster.

Don't get me wrong @amirm, your objective reality is my objective reality. I am typically unable to hear the differences @GoldenOne hears/claims to hear. I also do understand the near impossibility to check a remote test for cheating. Not implying that @GoldenOne would cheat, just that even if he doesn't, a remote uncontrolled/weakly controlled test will not convince anyone anyway. However, that was clear from the start, and going all-in with a $1000 bet was probably unwise, if spectacular.

Some of the back-tracking/conditions make sense and were actually graciously accepted by "our blogger". And that's when the PR tide starts to turn. Whenever he calmly and confidently accepts something, you add new requirements, change the nature and the scope of the test. The net PR result is very negative: while "our blogger" builds his "nice accomodating and confident guy" image, you now appear to wiggle frantically in damage control mode, mostly because you trapped yourself in proposing a flawed challenge in the first place... :(

:facepalm:
You're not giving solderdude justice
 

Blaspheme

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If there is no blind test or we are actually waiting for one, let's see this blindfold fighting instead :D . There's a wind chime in the clip, not sure it's a ding or a ting when the wind blows...
That is masterful clip selection: I now imagine the test exactly like this (haven't reached the end yet). Can someone change the blue outfit to gold though?
 

bboris77

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Since this is turning into a bit of a farce, I would suggest taking the charity angle out of it. It seems kind of cruel to mix something as noble as donating money to people in need and then put all kind of conditions on it that are unlikely to be met. If people want to donate money to charity they ought to do so unconditionally and unrelated to any silly audio blind test.
 
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Blaspheme

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Since this is turning into a bit of a farce, I would suggest taking the charity angle out of it. It seems kind of cruel to mix something as noble as donating money to people in need and then put all kind of conditions on it that are unlikely to be met. If people want to donate money to charity they ought to do that unconditionally and unrelated to any silly audio blind test.
I must admit I gloss over that bit every time—"money on the table" comes across to me as American bluster, restorer-john may be right about national predilections.
 

BrEpBrEpBrEpBrEp

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Since this is turning into a bit of a farce, I would suggest taking the charity angle out of it. It seems kind of cruel to mix something as noble as donating money to people in need and then put all kind of conditions on it that are unlikely to be met. If people want to donate money to charity they ought to do so unconditionally and unrelated to any silly audio blind test.
Amir already stated he would donate $300 regardless of outcome for performing a "more controlled test", and that he would give $1000 if a test more along the lines of what he proposes were passed. So there's some motion in that direction.

I'm inclined to agree the "$1000 to charity for passing the test" was a mistake in the first place - there's no way to properly authenticate that kind of thing remotely.

On the issue of the bet, this is what I am willing to do. For merely taking the initiative to perform a more controlled test, I will donate $300 to your charity regardless of the outcome! I want to encourage people to do more formal and controlled testing. So whether you are able to tell the difference or not, the money will be donated.

To earn the rest of the money for your charity, you need to follow the proposals we are making, not what you want to do.
 

artburda

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Since this is turning into a bit of a farce, I would suggest taking the charity angle out of it. It seems kind of cruel to mix something as noble as donating money to people in need and then put all kind of conditions on it that are unlikely to be met. If people want to donate money to charity they ought to do that unconditionally and unrelated to any silly audio blind test.
Why is it cruel to offer a donation in case you lose a bet? How are you exactly hurting the people in need? Without the bet there wouldn’t even be the possibility of an additional donation in the first place.
 

Blaspheme

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Why is it cruel to offer a donation in case you lose a bet? How are you exactly hurting the people in need? Without the bet there wouldn’t even be the possibility of an additional donation in the first place.
Unwitting pawns in a chess game, perhaps. Which may be elevating this thing unduly. Not actively cruel though, just a bit perverse.

* I see the usage of cruel to mean spoil or ruin may be an Australian idiom, so that particular flavour of meaning may be unfamiliar elsewhere
 
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raistlin65

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Well, he said it was easy to figure out who he is and it indeed is seeing how he uses the same unique alias elsewhere. See: https://forum.electricunicycle.org/...th-or-poole-area/?tab=comments#comment-259328

View attachment 134419

I can never remember his bloody alias :) so decided to use his real first name.

Yeah, but that post is where someone else chose to use his name. That's not where he publicly disclosed his name.

And he didn't choose to publicly share his first name on ASR. You just took that choice away from him.
 

BrEpBrEpBrEpBrEp

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Yeah, but that post is where someone else chose to use his name. That's not where he publicly disclosed his name.

And he didn't choose to publicly share his first name on ASR. You just took that choice away from him.
Pretty sure that is him, using his own name on another forum. If not, then that's a whole other situation.

I'm generally of the opinion that if someone publicly associates their own name to their pseudonym and tells you it's easy to find, it's no longer sacrosanct - however, I personally wouldn't use someone's name in this manner (without them bringing it up).
 
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raistlin65

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Pretty sure that is him, using his own name on another forum. If not, then that's a whole other situation.

I'm generally of the opinion that if someone publicly associates their own name to their pseudonym and tells you it's easy to find, it's no longer sacrosanct - however, I personally wouldn't use someone's name in this manner (without them bringing it up).

Oh, I guess you're right. That is him.

That being said, I strongly disagree. It's one thing to let people know if they really want to dig, they can find out who you are. But if they wanted their name posted on a forum, they would use it.
 

BrEpBrEpBrEpBrEp

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Oh, I guess you're right. That is him.

That being said, I strongly disagree. It's one thing to let people know if they really want to dig, they can find out who you are. But if they wanted their name posted on a forum, they would use it.
It's a mixed bag IMO. If GS did say it's easy to find his name, that seems (to me) like an invitation to do so. You can't really blame people for doing that when they're told they can.

However, like I said, I personally wouldn't.
 

Blaspheme

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So apropos PierreV's post, I really can't hear differences between my DACs (no separate pre-amp involved) when I try very hard and listen either.

When I lay back and chill though, after a while it dawns on me that this one is smooth and has soundstage for days, where the last one did the latter pretty well but was a bit spitty. Something similar but different happened with a pair of amps a while back. Took me by surprise.

Feel free to post about the psycho part of the psychoacoustics, and I'll give you the standard discount. Whether said reverie is objectively verifiable and AB/X is giving type 2 errors is an interesting avenue to explore (given idle curiosity, spare time, etc) versus the confirmation bias hypothesis, so if GO can do what I am unpracticed at, that was the main reason for my curiosity here.
 
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raistlin65

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It's a mixed bag IMO. If GS did say it's easy to find his name, that seems (to me) like an invitation to do so. You can't really blame people for doing that when they're told they can.

However, like I said, I personally wouldn't.

False equivalency. An invitation to find it ≠ an invitation to publicly disclose it.
 

Inner Space

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... I really can't hear differences between my DACs (no separate pre-amp involved) when I try very hard and listen either ... When I lay back and chill though, after a while it dawns on me that this one is smooth and has soundstage for days, where the last one did the latter pretty well but was a bit spitty. Something similar but different happened with a pair of amps a while back. Took me by surprise.

I got no dog in this specific fight, so this is for my information only, because I'm fascinated by this issue. Is it possible that the trying-very-hard type of listening makes you focus on the obscure barely-there kind of stuff, so that somehow you hear past the problems you'll notice later? Your experience seems shared by many. Definitely happened to me once.
 

BrEpBrEpBrEpBrEp

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False equivalency. An invitation to find it ≠ an invitation to publicly disclose it.
I don't really have a dog in this fight, honestly. However, those who don't want their name out there generally avoid inviting others to look for it, or putting it out there for that matter.
 

BlackTalon

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Kind of odd that you would have a show where you review products and you don't actually tell people your name.
 
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amirm

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I think this changing of the goalposts is disingenuous.
What is this talking point you all keep using? Seems there is total confusion on this front.

There has been no specific test for him to run with. I created a thread specifically to *discuss* how we would go about doing the test. Nothing was signed off on. I asked membership to provide feedback specifically due to difficulty of setting up such a test. As we were going through it, different proposals are being put together. Cameron himself suggested to test DACs at some point. How is that not a "shifting goalpost?" Did you call him disingenuous?

Nothing has changed whatsoever in the initial challenge: show that everything you said was true in your video in a controlled test. Cameron has not propose any test to do that and instead running a different experiment of whether any difference exist. I didn't ask for this. His video was not about this.

It is not like I started this thread, outlined the whole test and now I am asking for a different test. So you are completely out of line with your comment and falling for the debating tactic that recruited you. It is disingenuous on your part to not have contributed to the process and only show up to complain.

Do you really have no interest in knowing if anything he said in that video is factual? That the Magenuis raises the "low level signal loudness to reach the upper ones and hence has low dynamic range?" You think he has proposed a test that shows this? How about how fast its bass is? How about the fact that it causes him to have listener fatigue in a few minutes?

All you can do to verify these is an AB test to see if there is a difference at all? Nothing you could imagine would let us figure out how to test his actual claims? You are just going to be a commenter with no interest whatsoever in what the challenge was?
 

Blaspheme

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Nothing has changed whatsoever in the initial challenge: show that everything you said was true in your video in a controlled test.
The challenge was not expressed as "everything". The text you used was "any of these observations". You are repeating this error. I assume a slip of the pen, but please correct it now.
 
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