We were recently notified by a reader that [Tom Evans] had filed a copyright claim against [Mark]’s repair video on his Mend it Mark YouTube channel, taking down said repair video as well as [Mark]’s delightful commentary. In a new video, [Mark] comments on this takedown and the implications. The biggest question is what exactly was copyrighted in the original video, which was tough because YouTube refused to pass on [Mark]’s questions or provide further details.
In this new video the entire repair is summarized once again using props instead of the actual pre-amp, which you can still catch a glimpse of in our earlier coverage of the repair. To summarize, there was one bad tantalum capacitor that caused issues for one channel, and the insides of this twenty-five thousand quid pre-amp looks like an artistic interpretation of a Jenga tower using PCBs. We hope that this new video does stay safe from further copyright strikes from an oddly vengeful manufacturer after said manufacturer event sent the defective unit to [Mark] for a repair challenge.
Since this purportedly ‘audiophile-level’ pre-amplifier uses no special circuits or filtering – just carefully matched opamps – this is one of those copyright strike cases that leave you scratching your head.
Not receiving a decent explanation for their takedown is pure G@@gle.
I saw the original. Certainly not £25K worth of kit. A generous description of the construction would be amateurish.
“We got some modules someone else made, we sanded shit off of some of the semiconductors, and we replaced a cap or two. Glued it all together, put it in a plastic box w/ cardboard pieces. Boom, 25,000 quid please.”
Google and YouTube slowly but surely became a dumpster fire. What a sad ending to the ‘do no evil’ motto that, in the past, would see them fight back this sort of abuse.
They shortened it by taking the middle word out
“What a sad ending to the ‘do no evil’ motto”
Google’s true origin partly lies in CIA and NSA research grants for mass surveillance
The intelligence community and Silicon Valley have a long history
December 8, 2017
https://qz.com/1145669/googles-true-origin-partly-lies-in-cia-and-nsa-research-grants-for-mass-surveillance
Intro:
Two decades ago, the US intelligence community worked closely with Silicon Valley in an effort to track citizens in cyberspace. And Google is at the heart of that origin story. Some of the research that led to Google’s ambitious creation was funded and coordinated by a research group established by the intelligence community to find ways to track individuals and groups online.
The intelligence community hoped that the nation’s leading computer scientists could take non-classified information and user data, combine it with what would become known as the internet, and begin to create for-profit, commercial enterprises to suit the needs of both the intelligence community and the public. They hoped to direct the supercomputing revolution from the start in order to make sense of what millions of human beings did inside this digital information network. That collaboration has made a comprehensive public-private mass surveillance state possible today.
The story of the deliberate creation of the modern mass-surveillance state includes elements of Google’s surprising, and largely unknown, origin. It is a somewhat different creation story than the one the public has heard, and explains what Google cofounders Sergey Brin and Larry Page set out to build, and why.
But this isn’t just the origin story of Google: It’s the origin story of the mass-surveillance state, and the government money that funded it.
I have a video on youtube that uses a 100 year old recording of violinist Jascha Heifetz as the sound track, (which I transferred from a 78 rpm record that I found at a rummage sale) I specifically chose music from an ancient record to avoid any takedown issues.
Youtube dinged me for copyright.
I argued, my video is back up, but now “blocked in unspecified countries.”
Hitler, Stalin, and Mao would be envious of Google’s power, I think.
But 100-year-old recording can still be copyrighted because it’s based off the death of the copyright holder. He’s only been dead <40 years so in most countries his works would still be copyrighted.
This depends on a few things mostly if his estate is involved, if not they usually go based on the marked creation date. Older things use purely creation date in the USA prior to the 1970s.
YouTube and Google get away with shrugging and doing it anyway, because it is too hard for the little people to fight them.
My YouTube account was made in 2012.
A game was released in 2018 with the same name as my account.
The company publishing the came contacted me and “advised” me to change my name, because they have a copyright on it.
I told the company to pound sand.
So they went to YouTube directly.
All my videos got monitized without my consent, with the revenue going to that publisher, despite having nothing to do with their game.
I just removed all the videos rather than let that publisher profit from them.
What was I going to do, spend thousands of dollars to fight it?
Even more stoopid – Big Clive (since stone age YT handle bigclivedotcom) recently got a warning from YT and had to change his handle, for having a URL (his) as part of his handle. Face palm.
His YT handle still is bigclivedotcom.
Actually not receiving a proper explanation for a copyright takedown is the law…
The actual issue is between the person that posted the content and the person that filed the complaint, the channel (YouTube in this case) must simply remove the content until the dispute is settled, any attempt by YouTube (google) to pass info to the poster could be seen as an attempt to manipulate an ongoing legal dispute, this is the same reason details are rarely revealed to 3rd parties during ongoing trademark disputes.
Except the law requires that Google is required to provide notice of who made the claim and what was claimed, and if the defender claims it’s not a copyright violation, Google is to provide that counter notice back to the plaintiff at which point they can both duke it out in court. Otherwise how would someone with a strike ever be able to counter?
The law doesn’t say someone can have your content permanently banned, or worse yet, take redirect benefits from you just by filling out a form. It also doesn’t say this can be done without full notice to you and without an information to respond. Google and others struck a deal with the major publishers to take their word for it so that they didn’t get stuck having to be responsible for actually monitoring their content. It was a bad law that the big players got around by agreeing to extra legal methods.
What’s going on here is not under the DMCA, though it’s a DMCA-like process. In reality, it’s all under Google’s Terms of Use, so they are free to do whatever they want in response to a copyright claim, including not passing on the reason for it when asked. I’m sure that little detail is buried somewhere deep in the fine print of the click through license when you sign up for a channel.
It’s not at all fair, but it’s Google, so go ahead and sue them.
You can say “Google”. It’s not going to offend anyone.
Could he copyright Overpriced Scam Level Audio (OSLA) equipment and issue copyright strikes back?
Some kind people have posted links to the original video down below (goes to show – once on the internet, always on the internet). Many thanks to those persons!
So, having watched the original and wondering how copyright is infringed, I finally hit upon the answer – it’s because he showed the rip-off of the ‘intel inside’ sticker that old-mate had stuck on the case… ;)
And a follow-up: just watched the Louis Rossmann video about this takedown, and he is not at all complementary to Evans – in fact dares Evans to takedown his (Rossmann’s) video. Rossmann doesn’t mince his words, and it is a very good watch!
https://odysee.com/@rossmanngroup:a/tom-evans-audio-proves-that-their-30,000:1
The emperor has no clothes.
Sounds about right for how the BS-peddling companies in the “audiophile” sector operate.
I agree, as an electronics tech, I see about 95 percent of what goes on in the audiophool world is pure bs. There is no preamp circuit that is worth 25,000. Not when you can buy really decent “audio grade” opamps for a couple bucks! NE5532, OPA2134, etc. Sorry, whatever they’re sellin’…. I’m not buyin’!!!
We make wire for a high-end speaker wire seller. Their prices are INSANE compared to what it takes us to make the actual cables…
A preamp?
So for use with noisy, lousy sounding turntables and records?
$25K?
Opamps?
This is for the same people that spend $2K on a power cord.
Proud morons, aka audiophiles.
EEs laugh at them.
Everybody laugh…even if you’re a compsci.
Your on hackaday, close enough.
Truth is these things are stupid and at some level they know it.
But status symbols are important, if you want to score with status seeking women. (Hint. You mostly don’t.)
If I was considering spending $25K for a preamp, I’d first build a dedicated listening room with no parallel sides, then buy electrostatic speakers.
But I’m an EE, what do I know.
I can’t even define ‘warmth’ for music…not that they can.
You’ve read the sad story of the man who built a $1M+ listening room in his home? It also cost him his marriage.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/he-spent-his-life-building-a-1-million-stereo-the-real-cost-was-unfathomable/ar-AA1mUqsx
“A woman is just a woman, but a good cigar is a smoke!”
If it cost him his marriage it probably saved him money in the long run.
But it WAS a great f’ing sound system though. The guy did his homework and a bunch of experimenting. There was solid engineering
and very little woo about it, as far as I know.
The sad part is the story of anyone whose obsession crowds out their personal relationships.
Cocatenated regulators feeding quality op-amps which have a good cmrr is a complete waste of components, degrades reliablity and is engineering nonsense.
Lookup the voltage output of MM and MC phono heads. Your taking a handful of microvolts up to 2v territory. In order to do that well, it takes a lot of circuitry and component matching. It’s neither cheap, nor snake oil. Not defending Tom Evans here, for clarity.
I watched the original video before it was taken down. He used circuits that are right out of old textbooks the video author even referenced them. He did use some nice components but no where close to the 25k range. Also the build quality looked very similar to the dumpster fire of toys that he used to describe the insides to begin with.
yes he did do it well but nothing original or crazy expensive about it pure ego is all it was.
if you start looking at the application notes in data sheets you start to recognize lots of things you see on consumer electronics pcbs. 9 times out of 10 they just copied the schematic verbatim.
Reference circuits are usually a good idea to follow – but try to just follow a reference that has any analogue elements a few times carelessly (as in without spending lots of time matching all the components, and testing them) and measure the difference in results!
What you are paying for in cases like this (assuming the work is actually done) is the manhours required to test every component and the potentially huge percentage of rejects that might still be in the manufacturers tolerances but not good enough for yours.
Same reason you can get a multimeter or O-scope for a handful of shrapnel that are entirely functional, add another zero to the price for the un-calibrated, not certified but vastly better, safer decent brand, OR spend an extra probably two zeros for functionally the same hardware but with certification and all the features and maximum resolution officially unlocked, rather than unlocked by you with no certainty of its accuracy.
Though do please note when it comes to ‘audiophille’ stuff I am rolling my eyes at the prices folks will pay for the things that possibly are genuine and measurably better but that 99% of humans wouldn’t hear the difference between anyway in the most ideal conditions. Especially how much emphasis is put on minor improvements to the amps but very rarely is it mentioned that you need a decent listening room set up, which will much more noticeably improve the sound reproduction and might just make that extra zero on the price compared to the decent but consumer grade product noticeable!
Apparently he didn’t test every tantalum cap before putting it into the circuit.
And stacking PCBs with plastic stand-offs? A plastic enclosure for a low noise circuit?
Hmmmm.
I would say it depends, without testing documentation it all could very well be snake oil. Does this guy provide any such info to prove his hard work and delivery? Nope, it’s also an extremely sloppy build, at best a test/concept level! Copyright strike seems to be just a way to it off youtibe, bet the guy doesn’t realize internet remembers everything. While at first he got mixed opinions, now it is outright bad publicity for him. Audio stuff, particularly audiophile gear is very subjectvie as well but this kind of behavior us really bad, which he will soon learn.
@expired56k
Unless you can actually verify the tests yourself a bit of paper that says ‘This be good stuff’ is as meaningless as the marketing spiel that potentially conned you into buying it – with anything analogue most folks are just going to have take it on trust. If you’re faking the devices with just barely a high enough quality to not be immediately busted faking a testing document is trivial.
@mrehorst
I didn’t say this specific example was good, just that it could be at least somewhat justified in price if it is – as without actually having the testing equipment and it in hand we have no real way to know. Odd but not obviously incorrect at the most basic level construction choices are not inherently a mark against it actually being good. Heck if you’ve ever looked inside any bit of industrial equipment you’d probably be very very disappointed, those frequently are very basic and have similar oddities (that may be for a good reason that isn’t apparent till you ask the engineers why – for instance shipping with springier more cushioning elastic plastic mounting solving failures in shipping (or causing them till you add more slack the the cables etc)…
Tom Evans could have built that piece of gear on a single PCB and cut his manufacturing and assembly costs significantly. That he did not is an indication that he doesn’t understand low noise PCB layout.
Ditto! That or he doesn’t even do his own pcb design, probably just taking already made boards and at best change out some parts, but I honestly didn’t see much in terms of precision components, etc.
My ancient Carver C1 preamp is a single PCB. In addition to two phono stages (MM and MC) it has tone controls, input switching, and Sonic Holography. Oh, and the power supply.
I suspect that the phone stage is as good as this 25K monstrosity.
They could have split the functions on different boards to either make it look more complicated and justify the absurd price, and/or order them from different pcb manufacturers to add some security by obscurity.
Really? You can buy a smartphone for less than $100 that has a dozen radios operating in the ghz range able to recover signals below the noise floor (GPS) and yet you think science hasn’t found a way to amplify a 10khz wave without it costing $25,000? Come on.
Digital signals (especially when you can guess the content in advance) are easy to recover from a noisy channel. Analogue, not so much.
Someone should invent a way of losslessly storing audio in a digital format. Maybe a spinning disc could somehow store 1s and 0s to be read by like a laser or whatever.
😂
I’ve seen audiophiles argue that such spinning optical discs store analogue audio. Yes, I did need protective mits for the facepalm of that one.
Oh snap! we could recycle the old drum memory from yesteryears computers!!
It’s not easy, but it has already been figured out and there are plenty of good amp designs available with schematics and all. It’s not $5 cheap, but it is not $25000 expensive either.
medicines referred to as snake oil usually were quite effective, at circumventing liquor laws. the term fits oh so well here. the thing is they add synthetic value in order to hike the price. the thing is a well built amplifier with some serious attention given to detail, but i dont think it makes it worth $25k.
Well, this amp only looks substantial which is what they bank on to justify the cost. Inside it is anything but and seriously, who builds a high end rf device with out of plastic and barely any shielding inside?
It doesn’t take a lot of components, I’d even say it’s relatively easy for audio because you can block the DC path. Just got to be willing to use feedback and not go for ridiculous open loop designs. Honestly, as analog designer I always have to laugh when I see audiophile designs.
Disclaimer: I alternately laugh at and am frustrated by audiophile snake-oil such as oxygen-free cables, and I am no friend of the leeches who attach themselves to high-end audio.
That said, you may want to be careful about disparaging “ridiculous open-loop designs”. Granted, open-loop is fraught with problems, which NFB solves. But it introduces other, insidious problems which are glossed over by the way in which THD is currently calculated.
Back before THD existed as a standard metric, its adoption was the subject of controversy among the heavy-hitting engineers of the day. DEL Shorter, of BBC engineering fame, was among those who advocated for less-forgiving standards.
They knew from experience that odd-order and higher-order harmonics both were audible, and had an outsized negative effect on sound. They also knew that negative feedback increases such harmonics. They wanted these harmonics to be weighted by the square – or even the cube(!) – of the order. They would represent a larger portion of the final figures, most of which would be a LOT higher. They lost that battle to marketing forces, and we were stuck with the flawed THD standards we now have.
Bottom line – THD calcs allow for crappy-sounding amps which “measure well” because their audible flaws aren’t reflected in their THD specs. Open-loop is a problematic, and possibly futile, attempt to address these real shortcomings. Bottom line number two: not all distortion is equally objectionable, and two amps with the same (low) THD can sound VERY different.
If you’re interested enough, have a look at this: http://www.nutshellhifi.com/library/FindingCG.html . You’ll likely be put off by the first few paragraphs, so just do a text search for “Shorter” and read from there. BTW, as of about a year ago Shorter’s papers were still available in archives accessible on the BBC website.
Thanks for that link, what a wonderful and highly informative read! I enjoyed reading that entire write up!
The goal of the endeavor is to find what sounds better.
We have come up with analyses and terminology that try to describe and measure the ways in which audio gear deviates from perfection (THD, IM, TIM, etc), but at the end of the day, if something sounds better, it is better. So one has to have the honesty to do the listening tests for themselves, double- blind wherever possible, and go where that leads. This cuts both ways; you will find “audiophile” products that offer no discernable improvements, but you will also find esoteric gear that does sound a little better, and you have to be honest enough to say that it’s better, but that in your life you can’t justify the 10x price increase to have that small improvement.
tldr: the honest audiophile doesn’t buy on published specifications, but on the results of their own listening tests, and their goal is to find the best sounding system within their budget.
THD has also been gamed for many decades.
Some measured at rated power, some at -40 dB (Sansui).
I was working as EE for Tektronix in the service département for 4 years doing service on the most expensive test equipment digital frame scopes signal processor and generators etc.
To amplifier a very little signals 1-2 millivolts or less the designers used a lot of layers of shield materials some very expensive.Even do the ground noise level always was in constant consideration.My conclusion is that unit doesn’t represent the market value and Mr Mark expose this issue, that’s why Mr Evans was offended .
A problem so tricky the rest of the industry can only manage it with a handfull of basic components costing 1/1000th of the price of this hunk of junk.
i listen to black metal so no warmth permitted. no sound quality either. somehow still sounds better than normal people music.
I can define warmth. It’s called “midrange.”
Source: me, who worked in the audiophile world for years.
Citation…
No you can’t.
‘Warmth’ does not show up on a frequency response curve.
It’s ‘I know it when I hear it’.
You cost posit your definition, but the audiophiles would just roll their eyes and start arguing.
You need to have vacuum-refined, oxygen free copper Litz wire cables, I know that. Gold plated unobtanium connectors, too.
I once worked with a “golden ear” hifi guy on a project. Nice guy, but definitely “on the spectrum”. I spent an entire career working in the electronics design industry and I far prefer the late Jim Williams’ articles on analog design to anything Tom Evans has to say. If you can’t show it by measurements, it may very well be snake oil. In this case, almost certainly.
Nice echo chamber you got there ;)
Please contact an organization like EFF and consider taking this as far as it can go.
These types of frivolous and wilfully wrong copyright violation claims need to be put to an end.
To quote Steve Martin…..
“So now I have a googlephonic stereo with a moon rock needle. Ok for a car stereo, wouldn’t want it in my house.”
(also the term googlephonic used here is from 1979, so it predates Google)
Can Steve Martin sue Google for copyright infringement? :-)
Perhaps “googol”-phonic, referring to the very large number?
While the contents and build quality isn’t most people’s idea of value, you can’t fault Tom’s gear on how it sounds. A guy up the road has one, used with about £15k worth or Avid turntable, SME arm and Benz LP cartridge and it’s as good as any vinyl front end I’ve heard anywhere north of 5k.
You can find better for less, sure, but you can also pay more for worse. High end hi fi isn’t about vfm.
Dick move by the brand though.
If you spend enough, a proper analog setup almost starts to sound as good as a CD!
But then there’s the wear problem…
But build and component quite is all but expected when you sell a product positioned as ultra high end audio gear. I get it, end customer is unlikely to open it, but should they? If the firm is proud of what rhey built, they would be proud to show the insides, McIntosh does for example. In this case, they even filed off markings on some components. So legitimate question is whether it’s better than say a high end preamp that costs 1-5k (just an arbitrary number), or maybe 300? Well known hifi companies have proven themselves, what do we have here?
I watched it before the takedown, I can see why the co. wanted that taken down, the general build quality and crufty design decisions were something to see! It is as the commenter said about the emperor being bereft of attire. Anyone with 25k bleeding a hole in their pocket who found that video might decide to staunch that stupid outlay.
Indeed, but that is not a copyright issue.
Someone should put it up on IA. This copyright claim is clearly frivolous.
A similar type of problem is youtubers writing an honest review, and getting sued for it. At the moment there is an ongoing struggle between [@AlloffroadAu] and the battery company [DCS]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6fSp_Lu9qk
Yeah, this seems to be a pretty clear case of weaponizing the DMCA. There is no way I can believe he violated a copyright by uploading a video of his own work on repairing something.
If that is a correct take, then he should counter the claim and take it all the way to court.
Except it’s not the DMCA. Youtube is not a public entity and can’t be forced to host a video, and has provided an easy route for rich people to take down content they don’t like. That it’s called a “copyright strike” has no legal meaning, as it doesn’t have any of the same rules and restrictions that the actual copyright laws do (as excessive and onesided as those are), it’s all up to Youtube’s discretion.
That’s not how it works.
One side files the claim. The other side files a counter claim, the one side has either a week or 14 days to respond (can’t remember exactly). If they don’t, the video goes back up automatically and the claim is closed. If they do respond, the otheride can decide to take it up in court. That’s usually the point where the other side sends a letter from their lawyer explaining how the oneside is wrong and how they are going to lose in court and otherside is going to file a counter suit for misuse of DMCA. That’s usually the point where the other side backs off if it was frivolous.
I think the problem here is that there is no specificity to the claim…which, BTW, is required by Youtube’s rules. And Mark hasn’t received any details despite asking for them. Will be interesting to see if he does ever get any. One thing’s for sure: Tom Evans is getting a load of bad press from their actions.
Original video: https://archive.org/details/the-gbp-25-000-pre-amp-that-went-wrong-tom-evans-mastergroove-sr-mk-iii-rjbp-fsfzi-i
That is a fascinating video. His diagnosis skills are prodigious!
It is funnier to watch the “redacted” video and then watch the original version!
Downloading that one in case it gets nuked.
Better than downloading it, torrent it (archive.org has a torrent download option), this way even if it’s taken down from archive the video is still available.
Thanks very much for this. I watched the video the first time around, and wanted to have another look. I’ve just downloaded it from the link you provided, so now I can watch it anytime I want.
i expect schematics within the week. streisand effect in progress.
Google and YouTube slowly but surely became a dumpster fire. What a sad ending to the ‘do no evil’ motto that, in the past, would see them fight back this sort of abuse.
Anyone who’s made youtube videos knows copyright strikes are used to take town legitimate content all the time. Youtube obviously does not give a damn. Just one of the many ways they treat creators like sh*t. I recommend using Odysee instead whenever possible.
odysee mirror is available here, fortunately:
https://odysee.com/The-%C2%A325,000-Pre-Amp-that-went-Wrong—Tom-Evans-Mastergroove-SR-mkIII:c
i think the problem here is that audiophile equipment is mostly snake oil, and the manufacturer doesn’t want its guts published so others can rip them to shreds or copy it. they have simply weaponized the copyright strike algorithm to get their way. whether or not the claim is legit, and i really dont think it is, its never going to be investigated by anyone at youtube.
I won’t rise to the defense of a $25k phono preamp, but there is a problem in technology generally where some company puts in the effort to create a superior product, then a horde descends – disassembling and reverse-engineering. At a minimum, the originator’s IP gets revealed; more often than not someone spots what they think are the key components or innovations, they whip up something less rigorous but with the same component/innovation, that doesn’t actually rise to the quality of the original, but they still walk around thinking “lookit me, I’m Tom Evans”.
Some of the best-regarded $$$ professional outboard mic preamps are not much more complex than reference designs, but the builders optimized everything- the best possible components, optimal layout and housing, overspecced power supply etc. It does make a difference.
Christ, imagine being so embarassed that you couldn’t fix your own product that you had to raise a copyright strike against someone who can.
Or was it maybe “wouldn’t” fix it in the hope of an upsell…
Exactly, should’ve just fixed it or sent a new unit and be done with it. That’s a lot of money to just throw away for the customer, and for such a miniscule reason. If you can’t even give that much of a customer support for that money, hey well, that’s your own personal hell.
Imagine leaving your livelihood up to the whims of a company like YouTube/Google/Alphabet: any fart-knocker who walks by and doesn’t like one little thing about you (or your video), BAM! Copyright strike. No investigation, no communication, nothing.
Oh, and that ad revenue you were perhaps depending upon? Might take that and give it to the copyright troll, just to rub salt in your fresh wound.
I hope Mark fights these clowns, and wins.
All ridiculousness aside.. the build quality, etc, while that preamp has less than a couple hundred dollars in parts, and some work went into matching parts (mind you, I can get most of assives binned to .1% tolerances from digikey.. semis probably need testing) the schmo making the amp is running a company based on scarcity and cache.. how many amps a year? Need a big markup to support that. And to afford ads in the right places.
Embarrassing build quality though.
I agree with YouTube copyright claims has major problems. But what’s really wrong is Tom Evans filing a false claim to begin with. I work in audio repair. And see a lot of over priced amps from companies who offer new help in repairing there boutique stuff. It’s sad.
Perhaps it was banned because of the way he layed down the polishing paste (here including delivery from the recipient and the distribution on the working surface).
Not to get banned, I’ll say this was a professional way of polishing an aluminium foil ball (AFB).
Great audio delivery. When obvious AFBs are discovered/shown, I like how he giggles.
I watched the original and saw nothing that could be considered copyright infringement. It’s criticism and fair use all the way.
I do like Mark’s troubleshooting approach and the use of a (not inexpensive) FLIR camera to spot the bad component is clever. I tried to get my work to buy one of those for years, but it was always “not in the budget”. They did finally break down and buy one, and it gets used all the time. They really are very useful tools, for everything from heat analysis of PCBs to finding overheated breakers in panels.
He did kind of ridicule the Evans’s webpage, but he deserved it for using all that overblown language to describe what is really a pretty simple design. And it could have been done with a lot fewer PCBs…that product is a manufacturing nightmare, but I suppose if you’re only making 10 a year, it really doesn’t matter.
and I watched guardians of the galaxy 3 last night in 4K just sitting there in my recommended videos in youtube. They certainly seem to have their priorities skewed
I’m glad you highlighted this.There has been a bit of a pattern recently in terms of companies threatening Youtubers, and it needs to stop.
As for phono stages, I would suggest that state of the art is Parks Audio Waxwing at $500 ish. I find it hard to believe you can do better, and it revolutionised my vinyl listening.
“expensivity through obscurity”, the sibling of “security via obscurity”, that some over-priced piece of tat can’t be shown “with it’s covers off” because then you can see what has been slapped in their and then concealed under exotic hardwood, leather and gold trim.
The good news for Mark is that this is unlikely to affect his business. He was mentioned in a recent BBC news article and ‘demand “got so out of hand” Mr Maher has closed the contact section of his website’
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/clyjvn658n6o