Or: The Bath tutorial in RAHE s censorship theory and practice.

On Febr. 12 I submitted to RAHE the posting quoted below in a footnote

It became my sixth consecutive RAHE posting to be rejected thus:

Febr. 13, '04

Thank you for submitting a post to the newsgroup. Unfortunately, I must
decline your post since the question/information/opinion contained in your
article has been posted and discussed at length on
the newsgroup.

-.- David Bath (rec.audio.high-end moderation team)


And now some recent history
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Jan. 17, '04

Subject: weakest Link in the Chain
Bath says:

Sorry, but this thread has been ended, please see the post about it.
Jan. 17, '04

L Mirabel wrote in reply::

Thank you. I have. For what it is worth I agree with your
sentiments.
However it is somewhat discouraging and rather unusual that you
apply your ruling retroactively. Had there been a warning it would save
me (and possibly some others) time and effort.


A cutoff time has to be selected, and any post appearing after the
thread-ending post will seem to have been allowed to circumvent the cutoff.
It is simplest just to stop accepting them once the cutoff message has been
sent.
From: "David E. Bath"

Jan.21, '04

Thank you for submitting a post to the newsgroup. Unfortunately, I must
decline your post since the question/information/opinioncontained in your
article has been posted and discussed at length on the newsgroup.

-.- David Bath (rec.audio.high-end moderation team)


Jan.22, '04

As mentioned in a recent posting by me, no new blind test posts or threads
are being accepted at this point.
Jan.24, '04

L Mirabel wrote in reply
Believe me, I'm not trying to make your demanding job more difficult but
I'm truly perplexed. Also selfishly I'm trying not to write for your waste
paper basket
Here is Nousaine on the 22nd: " That's exactly why we need bias controls.
Level matched and double blind is the best." in a thread called::
"Comments about blind testing" which neighbours " Another DBT posting"
thread)
I realise that the moderators are only human and things slip by.
But once they slipped they are there black-on- white- the cat is out of
the bag.
Eg. I do have a different take from Nousaine on the "Watch King"
interesting posting. How am I to word it?
What is allowed and what isn't?
Hopefully Ludovic Mirabel
Bath answers:
As mentioned in the post about the ending of the DBT thread, I said "So any
post on the subject of DBTs needs to say something new, not just negate the
other side's opinions, beliefs, results, etc." Your post justs repeats your
left-right test again in a thread that is not a DBT debate.
From: "David E. Bath"
26 Jan,'04

Thank you for submitting a post to the newsgroup. Unfortunately, I must
decline your post since the question/information/opinion contained in your
article has been posted and discussed at length on the newsgroup.

-.- David Bath (rec.audio.high-end moderation team)



Jan31, '04

Bath rejects my posting and says:

Please quote the 'Lots of oratory claiming that "science is on my side"' or
delete that part and repost.

Jan.31, '04

L Mirabel wrote:

Glad to comply! Everyone including myself should be

able to verify their statements.
By the way I'm still puzzled by the "newness" rules. How for example am I
to respond to . Mr. Pinkerton's and Nousaine's hundreth repetition : "But
no
one has been able to show diff. between cables under "controlled
conditions" except by giving it a lie by requoting the old Greenhill's
discovery of a
"golden ear"?

In regard to the ones I've approved, they were all in direct response to
requests for info. When someone asks for info on problems with DBTs, feel
free to bring that up.

( Interestingly my posting was an answer to Mr.Abrams challenge to Mkuller
to provide an ABX alternative)

No doubt you'll tell me it is not new. Neither is Nousaine- Pinkerton
constant rewriting of their findings and their 4K challenges. If one is
allowed in then why not a response?

The 4K challenge discussion was due to a request for info on the challenge
by someone wanting to accept it. So it was not a DBT discussion per se.

Rather than bothering you I would propose it as a fair subject for
"discuss' if I had access to it.

After your continued flaunting of the "keep audio discussions off the
rahe-dicuss list" requests, I'm not convinced you can be trusted to comply.
(See note below re

"discuss" L.M.).
David Bath

Complying I gave dates and source for all my references. All three were to
messages in the very same thread in which I posted all to the messages in
that very thread, The earliest of the three appeared one week before. I got
this reply: Apparently one week is not recent enough- it would tax the
readrs' brains unduly


-Jan.31, '04 Bath rejects my resubmitted, amended version:

Two problems:
1. Referencing a quote means listing the Message-Id unless the quote is from
a recent part of the thread. This is so someone can easily find the quote to
verify it. Any other reference is almost useless.

2. Referring to someone's signature is not really valid as a quote
unless it mentions audio as in Pinkerton's or is used by that person
in discussions.
David Bath - RAHE Co-moderator

I gave up at this point. It was obvious that if he won't get me on "newness"
he'll elasticise the rules of reference ad infinitum

I posted the message quoted below 2 weeks later: on Jan 13- as the tenth
(10) contribution to a thread- itself an offshoot of the "Yet another DBT
post" thread running concurrently for weekstodate with 206...messages so
far, several of them from Sullivan, Pinkerton, Chung, Nousaine, etc. each
and everyone of the 206,of course, full of brilliantly new insights into
this 37 years old argument in which they participated for years. To be
honest it was a sort of trial ballon to see how he will shoot it down

I tried to guess which particular part of my arguments was found worthy of
this muzzling censorship effort. Why me? Could it be that instead of going
into the toe-to-toe theoretical arguments about merits and demerits I
continued asking for one thing and one thing only: the evidence that once,
somewhere the "test" supposedly designed for the average audiophile to
distinguish between electronically comparable components did do its job.
Using an unselected, randomised ie average audio interested group.. Just
once. And I never got an answer.

Till I get it I'll stick to my conviction that one "test" for music
reproduction as experienced in the myriads of individual brains is a
phantasm of the engineers who do not quite make the JAES and the RAHE under
Bath policing is their chapel.

Ludovic Mirabel

The text of my Jan 13th. posting:

Jjnunes said:

Frankly, I find the idea of 'veryfying' highly personal subjective
impressions with a scientific test bizzare, absurd and invasive.
I find it sad and amusing that some subjectivists are wanting to
indulge in such an activity, which actually fulfills the definitions of
scientism, in what is a hobby.


I answered: Frankness deserves frankness. I unreservedly and frankly agree
with you; You cannot verify preferences: in wines, books, philosophies,
musical instruments and music reproducing instruments such as amplifiers and
loudspeakers.
Frankly you cannot invalidate them either by any "test" single,
double or triple blind.


And Mike, how do you think of thresholds of audible detection of the
human ear have been established? They are pretty comprehensive and have
been known for a LONG time. The field is audiology, and the
activites in that field compared to what goes on in 'high-end audio' in
terms of sophistication and comprehensiveness are so great as to not
even deserve
a comparison.


Yes, science is great. I know very little about audiology (and
frankly, do not wish to know much more) but I suppose that they are having a
field day out there doing "tests". They are great tests too- for the job..
But in the field that interests me, namely audio component
comparisons, these "tests" when used by a listening panel with the slightest
pretence to randomisation were invariably negative, (cables, preamps, amps,
cdplayers, dacs, 1,75db. volume difference, 2% distortion) No difference,
no difference between anything and anything else roughly comparable
electronically.

So there you a subjectivists perform just like the average listening
panels. The "test" trips them up just as it does
everyone else.
That leaves two choices only: everything in audio truly sounds
the same and rec.audio.high-end is in the snake-oil business or (perish the
thought) the test is great in audiology, psychoacoustics and so on but
useless in component comparison. At least till something, anything positive
is produced. There is still time. The "tests" have been around for 37 years
only.
The degree of "sophistication and comprehensiveness" needed to compile a
dictionary is infinitely greater than that needed to write a sonnet, using
the words found in it. Some might argue that these two fields are at least
as different as apples and oranges.


A note re "discuss" forum, an RAHE offshoot, supposedly designed for
discussion of the moderating issues.

In December of the last year I posted 3 messages there with "blind testing"
as the subject. The first one was to the effect that the only way to control
this boring debate is to ban it completely and forever. At the time
Sullivan, Pinkerton et al. posted and continued to post a message after a
message on the subject. Finally I did too -twice. Mr. Bath made me the first
and the only contributor banned from "discuss". Ever.

This makes certain that when, in effect, he bans me from RAHE I shan't be
able to question it in "discuss". Anyone can discuss any moderating problems
there providing the moderator allows it.