{"id":62,"date":"2015-02-27T07:10:48","date_gmt":"2015-02-27T15:10:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/verycherry\/?p=62"},"modified":"2015-02-27T01:25:04","modified_gmt":"2015-02-27T09:25:04","slug":"neil-young-changes-his-tune","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/verycherry\/2015\/02\/27\/neil-young-changes-his-tune\/","title":{"rendered":"Neil Young Changes His Tune"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"IMG_20150226_232420\"<\/a>
Supreme New York posters\u00a0I saw at a\u00a0construction site in Hollywood, CA<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Last month, the PonoPlayer became available to the public. The Pono brand was created by musician Neil Young. The music players, along with songs\u00a0from the PonoMusic store, are\u00a0marketed as very high-quality music that’s remarkably better than what we hear on iPods, iPhones, and CD players. A number of articles came out last month strongly criticizing Pono\u00a0and recommending consumers not to waste money on this. Mario Aguilar at Gizmodo<\/a>\u00a0explained that the difference in song file quality cannot actually be heard by human ears. David Pogue at Yahoo Tech<\/a>\u00a0conducted blind listening tests, which did not result in Pono’s favor. He\u00a0also pointed out that\u00a0most of the songs on the PonoMusic store aren’t even available yet in this supposedly better format. He compared the player to The Emperor’s New Clothes.\u00a0Sam Machkovech of Ars Technica called it snake oil<\/a>.<\/p>\n

What I find interesting about this whole thing is that Pono is coming from Neil Young. The first song I remember ever hearing from him was “This Note’s For You,” a 1988 song that mocked commercialism and musical artists endorsing products. Among other scenes, the\u00a0music video mocked Michael Jackson’s hair catching on fire<\/a> while filming a Pepsi commercial, as if it’s somehow humorous for another artist to sustain medical injuries if done while “selling out”.<\/p>\n