I hesitated to ask for help for so long, that everything has become beyond my control. Way beyond. I guess I’m a victim of my own pride.
Well, at any rate I took the advice of a few virtual (but very real to me) friends to put myself out there and ask for help during a very dire financial struggle.
So I posted on my Facebook “SmiteMatter” page, status update, a plea for your help. I included our Pay Pal account, email identifier in the hope of maybe receiving a little financial help from people.
The Pay Pal account I posted is shared by me and my wife Christina but in her name and email. “Paltrynoise[at]gmail.com
First! It IS NOT A SCAM. THIS IS VERY REAL!

I’m usually a open book. I rarely hold much back. Some things I just elude to without offering great detail. I do want to keep some things private. That’s pretty hard to do when asking publicly for help.
I hope you’ll understand if I leave out certain details that I find embarrassing enough to keep private.
If you must know, I will discuss it privately one on one. Just email me. My contact information is everywhere including the sidebar of this blog.

Our situation like many is dire. My wife and I both are unemployed. Not by any fault of our own. We have and do look for work under every stone. It’s just not there. Not for us anyway. People say, oh this place or that “Mac Job” place is always hiring. Well, we looked, asked, applied, followed up, and tried again. They were not hiring us. Why? Don’t know, but it’s extremely frustrating.
We lost our home 6 years ago due to some shady dealings between lifelong family friends who made sweet love to my rectum and cheated us out of our deal to buy the house.
I have medical needs each month that I simply cannot live without and still function. This is something I wish to keep the details of private. Nothing terribly unusual but expensive, and necessary. For what its worth, I am completely sober and have been since March 18, 2010. I don’t do any drugs. None. I don’t even smoke pot. I don’t drink alcohol either. I smoke cigarettes and that’s it. I don’t even buy cigarettes, I roll my own at a fraction of the cost to manufactured cigarettes and vaporizers. I spend a mere $24 every couple months for tobacco and tubes that equate to about 2 cartons. Yes smoking at all is stupid, but right now my preference to go to vaporizers is financially out if reach. I intend to go back to vaporizers when things stabilize so I can finally quit.
I’ve taken my sobriety very seriously and have never once cheated. That’s a choice I’ve made for my own reasons. I mention this because I was told a particularly rude person has lied to many people suggesting what I say here is untrue. It is a fact beyond reproach that the person is simply spreading lies, inventing rumor that only shows their lack of class. To what end? I have no idea. What kind of person does that, kicking someone when they are down? I feel very sorry for that person, and I hope he gets help for his issues.

That’s really the largest part of the expenses we are short on, and without. A job is on the horizon for me, but being a government run program (Care Giver) it takes a stupid amount of time and red tape to get through before I see a pay check.

In short, my wife, son, and I, are facing extremely scary scenarios. So bad that despite our best efforts cannot avoid without help financial from others. So desperate and immediate that I am swallowing my pride asking anyone and everyone who can to please help with any amount they can comfortably offer. Here we are. I humbly ask (and not without some shame) for your help donating any amount to our Pay Pal so we can just survive. A dollar, or two, or more or whatever. Even a friendly message, or sharing this plea with anyone you can think of. It all helps. Even just buying my music helps down the road. A track or the album, whatever. Anything you’re comfortable with.

I guess my WordPress account is too basic as there is no Pay Pal “Widget” to put an easy “Donate” button up. So I can only ask to please
donate to our Pay Pal under my wife Christina’s name: Paltrynoise[at]gmail.com, my wife! son Jacob, and I truly, with deep sincerity thank you for anything you can help with.

With humility and gratitude: David A Israel AKA SmiteMatter

For the past couple months I’ve been wondering about what bit rates Inter-App Audio supports.
Obviously nobody answered my question prior to the launch of iOS7. Since its launch, I’ve emailed several iOS music app developers asking this very question. Not one has replied with an answer. Strange? Maybe.
Whatever.
Its a question I think needs to be answered. Today I’ve started asking that question more aggressively by posting it on all of my social media pages and now here. Additionally I’ve sent more emails asking more developers, and some of the same ones I asked already.

We all know that Audiobus, and AudioCopy are always 16bits no matter what your output (iDAW) app is capable of or set to.
It’s not a problem, especially for those like me who create electronic music. However, it’s still a legitimate question.
It may really be a big deal to other people, and or even a deal breaker for some new folks who insist upon the highest bit rates and depths available.
Now, I am no technical wizard. I do not proclaim to fully understand every implication of what bit rates mean to everybody.
I do want to at least know what I am getting with IAA.
I use Auria for the majority of my music productions. It defaults at 32bits audio processing. It can be set to 64bits audio processing. I can’t really imagine any need for 64bits myself. Perhaps you can? It really seems overkill at 64, and holy cow, it must put a huge burden on CPUs not too mention larger project files. All of that aside, I just want to know. What bit depth does IAA support? 16, 24, 32, or what? For some reason nobody has chosen to answer this question. I know I am not the only person interested in the answer. So if you know the answer, please comment on this post. If you also want to know the answer, please leave a comment as well.
It should be a fairly simple thing to answer. Right? So who knows?

WELL! I just got the answer. Inter-App Audio works at 32 Bit floating point. Thank you Rim Buntinas of WaveMachine Labs!

So there you have it. Unless I completely misunderstand the answer, it appears then if you use IAA to stream audio up-to 32bits, the host (if capable) app maintains the very same bit depth. No more being pegged at 16bits.
If that even matters?
Now keep in mind its all really just aesthetics. No human ear on earth can hear bit depth. In order for one to even try they’d have to find the (inaudible) noise floor from an absolutely silent part of the track, crank it up to levels that if music were playing, it would shatter your ear drums and destroy your speakers, just to try and hear what would sound like tape hiss. It’s there, but at frequencies beyond human capabilities. Its a myth that anybody can hear it. It’s not a debate, there’s no golden ear, the science is proven, and the facts are the facts. The human ear and brain simply cannot process such extreme sonic realms, no matter how trained, or how good the equipment is.
It’s not even the point.
That said, 32 bit floating point is still good, or even technically better, but as a person using it, its doesn’t really matter if you know all the technical details. Its nice to know though. What it does mean to you is that there is more room for additional processing of audio without clipping. In other words you can be more relaxed with leveling and whatnot. You get a greater dynamic range to work with. That’s a good thing. It has nothing to do with what you playback and hear.
The most noticeable difference is 32bit will create about %50 larger project files.
More than anything its about what your computer is doing with the audio code, and not so much what you are hearing.

Want to know more about 32 bit floating point audio? Check out this Wikipedia entry or google “32 bit floating point audio explained”. You’ll find all sorts of information on the subject. Most of it is stuff you don’t really need to know. It won’t change how you hear anything. I’m kinda nerdy like that though so its something I’ve been researching.
For the record, I still have a huge amount to learn with the technology aspect to combine with my comfortable understanding of human hearing.

I hope you found my questions, information and answers of some use. I’d still love to hear and learn from your answers what this all means to you and iOS music in your world.

Ever have a period during your life when everything just fell apart? Despite your best efforts everything just grew out if control? Ever find yourself searching for things to sell so you could pay rent? Whether you have or not, if you have any shred of human compassion you will understand it’s no picnic. I for one have a unfortunate close understanding of it myself. Asking for help is extremely difficult. Nobody wants to be a charity case. Pride can easily get in the way.
My friend and fellow blogger Ryan Hemeon of iOSMars is in this very desperate situation. He doesn’t want to ask for help, but he needs it. I am in a very similar situation myself,so I can understand his feelings on all of it. However this is not about me. It’s about compassion and doing the right thing to help a person out. Now before you go on about how everyone is having a tough time these days, or simply dismiss the whole thing, just try to think about what you’d like someone to do for you if you were in the same situation. This isn’t a scenario of a guy being a little short, it’s beyond simple minor financial difficulties. We are talking close to homelessness here. He works hard to provide excellent video reviews of countless iOS Music Applications to assist potential customers in their decision whether or not to buy. Countless promo codes for apps have been given away to people for free.

Don’t know about iOSMars? Check out his website http://iOSMars.com

Now begging for change is not the premise here either. You will get something in return for your donation. The whole of the iOS Music community has come together to create a 3 volume set of compilations. Music from artists around the world. I have contributed a track (but being in the same situation as Ryan, cannot donate any money) to the Vol. 3 “Life On Mars” benefit compilation. There is a wide variety of artists that include Derek Buddemeyer, The Oxford Ambient Collective, Jesper Jones, Maria Calfa-De Paul, Caustic Sunshine, Pants Of Death, and so many more on the collection.
So it’s no small thing to say you get something in return for your good deed. That’s pretty damn fair.

I know, nobody likes to pay for music anymore. There is some general feeling among many consumers that art just happens in spare time. Well, anyone who has a creative bone in their body knows that’s simply not so. It takes much time, effort, and dedication. Whether you like the results or not, it’s art, and it’s worth your dollar. Writing and making video reviews takes much effort and time to understand and then convey accurate assessments of the subject. All things considered, it’s work. Work with very little compensation, but done for the love of music and the reward of helping others choose what to buy or not. In this case you will also be helping a good person out. So why not?

Whatever you decide, I thank you, and Ryan thanks you for consideration and or donation to help iOSMars continue.

The 3 volume compilations can be found
http://iosmars.bandcamp.com/album/life-on-mars-vol3-a-compilation-of-ios-music

A cup of coffee can run about $3 these days. Drink it up, and piss it away. Buy a song from a artist for a buck or so (or an album for some more bucks) and you get piece of something special, forever yours to enjoy.

PS. Sorry about the links. My WordPress mobile app is broken and despite doing exactly what I’ve always done to provide links, WordPress decided to not show them to you. So I have to put those web addresses instead.