Interesting article:
http://www.businessinside...by-oil-engineer-2014-7

autotune.
 
should be used
 
to correct parts of great performances..
not invent performances.
 
my greatest beef with it, is with the folks who don't know where the line is.
 
 

"Auto-Tune has become ****y shorthand for saying somebody can’t sing," wrote The Verge's Lessley Anderson. "But the diss isn’t fair, because everybody’s using it."



Absolute rubbish! 
 
A singer sings in tune. Hitting the wrong note is an exception, and a rare one at that. 
 
Now, popular entertainers, that's a different story... 

batsbrew
autotune.
 
should be use
 
to correct parts of great performances..
 
 

Not aiming this at you Gonzo, just a rhetorical response based on what you wrote.
 
Why would a great performance need 'correcting', and who is setting the criteria for what is 'correct'?
 
"The singer's first take is often their best, it's full of vitality and emotion," Hildebrand told NPR in 2004. "After the take, their producer will announce 'great but the second phrase was pitchy so let's do it again.' Well, now the singer's worried about pitch and has to focus on the intonation and the vitality and emotion are gone from their performance. What Auto-Tune lets the producer do is fix the first take."
 
In other words 'we can fix a bad performance', because the 'singer' can't actually 'sing'.

 
 
 
 

"Well, now the singer's worried about pitch and has to focus on the intonation and the vitality and emotion are gone from their performance. "
 
In other words, we are dealing with an amateur who can't sing in tune and can't perform under relatively minor stress.
 
What the heck are they doing behind the mic if singing in tune is a source of worries? 
 
It's hard to believe how much we've lowered the bar.
 
 

my opinion, is that a great singer can put out a great honest performance, and maybe hit one or two bum notes, and that is acceptable in my book.
 
autotune, yeah, go ahead and keep those great performances, and fix a couple of clinkers.
 
 
but someone who just can't really put together a great performance, can be cheated into a 'good' performance that is dead on key, with a computer program.
 
that aint rockiin' to me.
 
 

Coming from a rock and heavy metal background, it's always been a given to me that vocals weren't necessarily in tune. Most of my favorite bands back then couldn't really sing their own material too well on stage. 
 
Having to handle the vocal duties myself more often than not, I tried my best to at least sing in tune - and I think I did a relatively fair job. But I never really felt in control of my voice - it was a bit like throwing the dice and hoping for the best. 
 
And I'm fully aware that there's a lot of people like me out there. Vocalists, who aren't necessarily singers. I guess Auto-tune could be of help in such cases. 
 
But what I have a problem with is that nowadays, we have everything upside down and backwards. We've let people who can't sing tell us that it's normal to sing out of tune, nay, impossible to sing in tune and that everybody's using AT. Which is BS. 
 
Because there are people who not only have a great voice but who can actually sing, and perform and convey emotion, and their standard of performance are actually quite high.
 
They have a very tight grasp on their performance so that they are absolutely consistent; they know how to breathe, they have a gift for remembering lyrics, can read a chart, have a stage presence which commands attention; they dance and act, they know how to move on a stage, have worked their diction, maintain a good stamina, can do their stage make up, and on and on and on.
 
Those people exist, and it's a joy to hear and see them. 
 
Of course, that isn't given to just anybody, and it requires dedication and lots of really hard work. But isn't that the point?

I have no problem with Auto-Tune being used as an effect, e.g. that yodley style that I think I first became aware of in Cher's "Believe" in 1998 or so. I mean personally I think it's been overdone, but at least it's creative. I'm not, however, interested in hearing a lead vocal part that's been pitch corrected to 100% accuracy. It's everything that's wrong with today's shrink wrapped pop music.

There are a lot of parallels between Seismic oil exploration and DAW technology.
 
Want a system that can record 200,000 digital channels simultaneously? PM me.

.....yet, hit a couple of flat notes in the songs forum and everyone will let you know that it needs pitch correction. It seems to be expected these days that those couple of flat notes need to be perfected.