And AM/FM radio often have static and drop-outs, and low dynamic range. Even at it's best, FM radio is distinguishable from an LP - which itself is generally full of pops and clicks and sounds a bit worse every time you play it. Tape is distinguishable from an LP, and was usually played on a crappy deck. An 8-track is an abomination, with crosstalk where you could actually hear the other tracks.

Sure, Spotify streams are distinguishable from a CD under good listening conditions. But so are all of the other media he lists. The man is completely deluded. Good artists usually are. I don't really care, since the art is what matters and not the opinions of the artist.

Probably. I was born in the 70s, so "oldies" tend to be from the early rock-n-roll era, while "classics" tend to be from the 70s. When it is 2050, I'll probably still be calling 70s rock "classic rock".

So were car speakers, especially in the 70s and 80s. Clock radios. Awful 1980s walkman earphones. The man came of age and built his fan base in an era with really crappy audio technology by modern standards. His stance only makes sense when filtered through the "eccentric artist" point of view.

Now it is true that in 1980, one could pipe their cassette deck through a really nice amp and set of speakers. Just like you can do today with Spotify.

He might not need my money, but then neither does Bill Gates but they still charge money for Windows. I really have no idea whether this behavior is driven by greed or insanity or a little of both, but it doesn't change all of the classic music he has made.

If a print artist sold prints using an analog transfer process for 40 years and then someone came along and started making digital copies that were visually indistinguishable from the former analog copies? That's an almost perfect analogy, and yes, I'd also call that artist bat-shit nuts and completely ignore their opinion.

It's OK - great artists seem to be highly correlated with bat shittedness. Young has made some really classic music and his personality quirks do not diminish his prior works of art. Bill Cosby's 70s stand-up is still funny, even if he was a rapist the whole time.

Yeah, I'm perfectly capable of listening to his music (stealing, if need be) and tuning his insane ass out. Put his opinions in the same part of my brain as Michael Jackson and Jim Carey.

No, I don't see the difference. He's not happy how his music (input) sounds coming out of the streaming service (output). I also think you are missing the part where he talks about the format being below the standards he is seeking to "preserve" his life's work.

No, Neil Young is not being misrepresented. Straight from his Facebook page:

I hope for his sake that he is really just trying to push his magic sound machine and doesn't believe any of this.

You can own a condo. Land comes with property taxes. You have condo fees, but in general the economics work out for a big common space vs. a bunch of individual spaces. A tiny home on it's own parcel also implies low-density housing, which makes you dependent on an automobile. The city is not for everyone, but it is the best way to keep your ecological footprint low, if that is your thing.

Mark my words - the "tiny home" thing is a trend that will die like bell bottoms and pet rocks. You can already get a 700 sq. ft. condo for the same price - this is not a new thing. You are absolutely right that most of the growth will come from people currently living without glass windows or indoor plumbing, but if we can figure out the right free trade / labor balance there is plenty of room for growth right here in the developed world. It just won't seem like it because it will be in the low single-digit percentages.

Which is the point in the conversation where I need you to RTFA.

You have things waaaay too oversimplified. Raising productivity makes goods cost less, which makes people buy more goods, which makes more jobs. And the new jobs are higher skilled and better paying. The losers are the ones who don't have any skills. So rah-rah public education, but we shouldn't hold up automation and subsidize the guys who - if they came to class at all - sat in the back and farted.

You can't really compare Iraq to Germany or Japan. Germany and Japan are both racially and culturally homogenous (or nearly so). Iraq is a bunch of separate clans and was artificially stuck together. Japan and Germany were never in any danger of a civil war after the war.

Tariffs do help prop up the wages of the factory workers, but they do so at the expense of literally everyone else in the country. Japanese cars were a godsend to the American consumer. Cheaper and more reliable, they certainly did NOT make corporate America very happy and they did not make our factory workers happy, either. But we got good cars for our money, and eventually the superior imports forced the US automakers to improve. This happened in other industries as well, and now we still produce a massive amount of stuff with a huge industrial base, but we do so much more efficiently. That means lower costs for all consumers.

I do worry about labor, though. The problem is that free trade requires (a) free movement of capital, (b) free movement of goods, and (c) free movement of labor. While we have 'a' and 'b', we most certainly do not have 'c'. This is a major imbalance that is not addressed sufficiently in NAFTA (and I suspect the PTT). I think that labor needs more emphasis in these trade agreements.

More like "oversimplification strikes again". You have to admit that it was a pretty unique circumstance, and one where the structural problems were laid bare in the 60s and 70s. Also, regarding regulation, you have to compare it to your competition. You only need to be as regulated or less regulated than your competition - there weren't many countries with a competitive telecommunications market in 1950. I think taxis are not quite as vital to the economy, but I see no reason that Uber's superior dispatching and fleet could not operate with worker protections in place.

And this has nothing to do with the rest of the world's industrial base being completely destroyed 10 years earlier.