re: Jay Z's New Streaming Service's Keynote: Biggest Douche or Surreal Skit Show?

Most services (such as Spotify) use 320kbps. TIDAL HiFi streams at 1411kbps. They also offer a service at the same quality as Spotify at $9.99.

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Blind testing shows that people can't discern between 256 kbps and lossless audio.

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That's largely dependent on the audio being listened to and the hardware being used. To the trained ear, there's a difference, but you're right that most people won't hear the difference. There's less being knocked off of the track itself, though, and to the audiophile with high end headphones, there's a difference. You're hearing the track as it was intended to be heard with a fuller range of highs, lows, and whatever else may be lost in Vorbis schemes.

To be clear, I'm not claiming to be a trained ear or audiophile, but I do believe that we shouldn't just settle on a low bitrate and not ever progress just because people don't think they need it. A lot of people claimed they didn't see any difference between HD and standard definition television, and they didn't need it. If we can get FLAC/ALAC streaming as the norm, it's a plus.