Washington Post article on MoFi vs. Fremer vs. Esposito

I get everyone's feelings about the obvious misreprentation, but going forward shouldn't we ultimately judge them by the value proposition of their products, i.e. the incremental quality relative to the incremental price?

Going forward simply stream the digital. Band limiting the digital to fit on vinyl in order to charge more is ridiculous. If you want to reduce fidelity , limit it with EQ. 

Given the excellent reviews on the MoFi albums, the experts involved, and the astronomical bit rate now possible, I would say that gerryah930 is likely correct that "the digital masters probably sound better than the aged tapes."  Even though I don't own any MoFi albums, I have no doubt they sound fantastic, and as they say, "It's hard to argue with results."

In general, my preference is for clean original copies, as they were likely all analog (depending on the era) and produced when the tapes were in the best possible shape.  In the case of Thriller, which is cited in the article, a NM original can be had for less than $30, maybe even less than $20.  Given how good my copy sounds (which cost less than $5 more than 20 years ago), it's hard to believe it could be significantly improved on.  So the justification for the price of a one-step reissue isn't clear (at least not to me).

As the article mentioned through a quote, anyone who believed 40,000 copies of Michael Jackson's "Thriller" were all done through the "one-step" process needs help. They obviously don't understand the limitations of analogue tape. Put differently, most of us who are vinyl fans knew that digital was being used. Fremer wrote about this again, again, and again. Were you folks that are now complaining not reading?  Granted, the marketing terms and the one-step diagram ARE misleading. Absolutely. But the reality was there for all to see. 

As the article also points out, MoFi got rescued/revived after BR by Music Direct and though profitable now has only a "handful of full-time employees". Being a small operation without good management leads to this type of publicity debacle.