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Audio News for February 28, 2017

Home Electronics Spying on You? –  The convenience of your Amazon Echo and Google Home could come at a cost, according to some security experts. The “wake word” is either “Alexa” for the Echo or “Hey, Google” for Google Home, but in order to recognize those words, the two devices are, by definition, listening to everything you say, even when you think your are out of earshot. That’s just a bit scary. And it’s not just those two companies who can access your devices. Somehow outside your home can access your machine and potentially use these items to spy on you. One security expert says “Make sure you have a firewall, and certainly use antivirus and malware software on your computers.” Google Home Adds Voice Shopping – You can now order everyday items just by asking Google Home. You’ll have to set up a default address and payment method, of course. Just to the Google Home app More Settings and select Payment under the Google Account Setting section. Agree to the terms, enter your card information and billing address under Payment Method. Follow the on-screen prompts and select your delivery address.  Over 50 retailers already participate and thru April 30 […]

Editorial for August 2016

Editorial for August 2016

For this August our free drawing is five complete Rossini operas on Blu-ray from Opus Arte: The Italian in Algiers, Il Signor Bruschino, The Silken Ladder, Moses in Egypt and Cyrus in Babylon. Claudio Scimone and Ewa Poldes are among the performers. The Italian in Algiers is considered one of the funniest operas ever written. Here is a link to the Amazon site where the box set is offered. All you need to do is click on the Register To Win banner on the Home Page and fill out our simple form. The winner of our July drawing for the lavish DGG package entitled The Mono Era 1948-57, consisting of 51 CDs, is Alan Craig of Grand Junction, CO. Congrats! (And note that the mono DGGs are considered superior to the later stereo CDs.) EDITORIAL AUDIOPHILE AUDITION began as a local program in San Francisco and then in 1985 as a weekly national radio series hosted by John Sunier, and aired for 13½ years on up to 200 public radio and commercial stations. In September 1998 its web site for program listings was expanded to this free Internet publication. August 2016 is our 209th issue! All disc reviews are added thru the month as […]

Home Page for October 2014

Home Page for October 2014

Our October drawing is for six collector edition sets of the complete Harmonia mundi 8-SACD set of the Complete Beethoven String Quartets performed by the world-famous Tokyo String Quartet. This quartet existed from 1969 to 2013 and has 40 landmark recordings in their discography. Their version of this cycle of the Beethoven String Quartets (Nos. 1-16 + the Grosse Fuge) is elegantly packaged as a set of eight multichannel hybrid SACDs which will go to six AUDIOPHILE AUDITION readers who this month register using our simple form.  Here is our review of the set. (Those who don’t completely fill out the form will not be eligible for the drawing, including those who registered in previous months.) The six lucky winners will be listed on our Editorial Page next month, where this month you’ll find more details on the drawing and the winners of last month’s drawing.