PseudoSpeak

The prefix pseudo- (from Greek ψευδής, pseudes, "lying, false") is used to mark something that superficially appears to be (or behaves like) one thing, but actually is another. Subject to context, pseudo may connote coincidence, imitation, intentional deception, or a combination thereof. Wikipedia.

Back at the dawn of creation before ever there was digital or MP3 there was "Hi-Fi" and this meant High Fidelity audio reproduction. Before even those days it was valve (vacuum tube) wireless sets with a tone control that offered "bright" or "mellow" sound. And that was the era I was born into. As I have said elsewhere I cherished a valve amplifier for its superior sound and later learnt that its balanced dual pentode output stage cancelled out 3rd harmonic distortion which would be particularly objectionable to the ears. Sad that I no longer have that amp. It would never have made it through community.

My birth echoed the dawn of the transistor and so I came to build a transistor amplifier. My grandfather donated a large speaker for which I built a cabinet and the amplifier sat on top in its solid oak case and brushed chrome front-panel (part of a door kick-plate) and home-made brushed aluminium knobs (aluminium round stock finished off in a drill-press). I christened it "pseudo-speak" which I thought was cute even if not quite the correct etymology. The system was unashamedly mono - I had only one speaker and anyway could not afford stereo.  At other times I played with "pseudo-stereo" in which I took a mono source and send higher frequencies to one speaker and lower to the other. It works surprisingly well, especially if you have not known better.

I remember one older visiting family friend asking if it really was "hi-fi" (which title I claimed), and have wondered ever since whether she knew what she was talking about. She might have done, but she didn't seem to me the sort of person that would.

After all, the majority of folk have no idea what stereophonic (or indeed stereoscopic) means, witness the fact that they place the two speakers that came with their set next to each other, explaining that it looks tidier that way. One wonders why God bothered to give such people two ears or two eyes - such a waste!