Totally Ridiculous....Auditions on YouTube!

Whipsaw...Com'on Man!...You know the difference. The Photographer is "One on One".......Same as a musician mixing a recording on his computer with his monitors right there in front of him......The Photographer isn't using a Micky Mouse camera to send a photo over the internet through who knows what routers and who knows what receiving monitor , for a real time appraisal....

Its not about bit rate… its about the recording microphone being used and the playback equipment on the other end. No way on Gods green earth can anyone accertain anything from these videos.

When a YouTube developer used this tactic to demonstrate a piece of equipment, all faith in his ability to review Hifi gear goes out the window and he is unsubscribed. 

The first sentence is the key point, but the second is false. 

If you can decern a difference between two highly regarded pieces of HiFi equipment, after being recorded by even an extreme high end microphone into some type of recorded medium, through the internet, through routers, and ultimately played back through more routers and audio equipment.......Then something is really wrong with one or both of the devices being auditioned.....We have a hard time decerning "differences" of better HiFi equipment when we are in the same room with them!.....Yes, we can easily decern over the internet, the cry of a lion to that of an elephant......But Higher End HiFi gear....PLEASE!!!

At this point, I'm totally shocked that folks that would subscribe to this forum, and know a thing or two more about HiFi than the average bear, and the reproduction of quality sound,  would still defend this nonsense........

It seems you are moving the goal post. You started with complaining about Youtube but now you claim it is the bad recordings. That can happen with loss less formats too. And some Youtube videos have excellent recordings.

And these YouTube reviews are not "recorded"....When the reviewer is playing a Beatles cut, I doubt it is live!......:-)

You just have to find the good ones. Lots of critisism here based on little experience.

Let us not forget, we are not talking about listening to a YouTube music stream.....We are talking about a reviewer setting up a microphone or his cell phone Infront of his system, recording the music, changing a piece of equipment and recording again, then downloading it to YouTube, most likely through his router....and then it goes over the internet, through your router and your amplifier and your speakers/headphones/IEM.....And you really think none of this is influencing the sound quality. And you think you can differentiate what piece of equipment at the reviewers end sounds better?...........

But it absolutely is possible to glean valuable insights from such videos.

Total nonsense.....You are not listening to what was recorded....You are listening to everything between what was recorded and your ears..... I can't believe you are continuing to defend this foolishness..... But its your right and I appreciate the feedback.

a) utilize a high-quality recording

b) play it through high-quality, well-matched components

c) record the results in a high-quality audio/video format and post it online

or...even if the three above steps are taken, the audio quality of Youtube is insufficient to allow listeners to discern anything meaningful about individual components.

I couldn't have summed it up better......This is EXACTLY my position.....Now, this said, I'm done with this subject. On to other bigger and better topics...Be well my friend!