Years ago, Mickey Knight, Diacoustic Lab, purveyor of styli, lacquer blanks, and Gear created this list of laws applicable to Audio Engineers. The list was then distributed at an AES convention in the 1970s when many of the persons on this list were the goto guys in their respective games
Grundman's Law - Bernie Grundman, Mastering Engineer & Educator
Under the most carefully controlled conditions of pressure, temperature, humidity and other variables, the system will perform as it damn well pleases
Knight's Law - Mickey Knight, creator of this list
A pat on the back is only a few centimeters from a kick in the pants
Hidley's Law - Tom Hidley, Studio designer, Westlake Audio
Nothing is impossible for a man who doesn't have to do the work
Duncan's Law - Kent Duncan, Kendun Recorders. Recording and Mastering Facility
When in doubt, mumble
Evan's Law
Every man has a scheme that will not work. See also O'Donnell's Law
Hulko's Law - Lee Hulko, mastering engineer, Sterling Sound, one of the original owners
A theory is better than its explanation
Storyk's Law - John Storyk, Studio Designer
The amount of work done varies inversely with the amount of time spent in the office
Woram's Law - John Woram, Engineer and Author. Propounded by Sci-Fi writer, Arthur C. Clarke, 1962
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic
Nordahl's Law - Tore Nordahl, Studer & Neve. Now a consultant
Everything goes wrong at once
Emmerman's Law - Mack Emmerman, Criteria Studios, Miami FL
In a crisis that forces a choice to be made among alternative courses of action, people tend to choose the worst possible course
Tarsia's Law - Joe Tarsia, Sigma Sound, Philadelphia
The obvious answer is always overlooked
Tarsia's 2nd Law - Mike Tarsia, Sigma Sound, Philadelphia (2009)
When booking recording studios, pick any 2 out of 3: Fast | Cheap | Good
You can get your product fast and cheap... but it isn't going to sound good
You can get it cheap and good... but it won't be done fast
You can get it good and fast... but it won't be cheap
Also applies to many other time/cost/quality decisions
Previn's variant of Tarsia's 2nd Law - Andre Previn, Classical and film composer. Submitted by Tim Whittaker (2014)
Do you want it good, or do you want it Thursday?
Snoddy's Law - Glenn Snoddy, recording engineer. Discoverer of Fuzz as an effect. Fuzztone Origin
It works better if you plug it in
Harrison's Law - Dave Harrison, Harrison consoles, inventor of inline console topology
There is always an easy answer to every problem - neat, plausible and wrong
Meadow's Law - Glenn Meadows, Masterfonics
It won't work
Westlake's Law - Westlake Audio, purveyor of Gear and studio systems. Likely attributable to Tom Hidley, who was the owner of the company
The first 90 percent of the project takes 90 percent of the time, and the last 10 percent takes the other 90 percent
Harned's Law - Jeep Harned, founder of MCI
Once you open a can of worms, the only way to recan them is to use a bigger can
Schnee's Law - Bill Schnee, Engineer and Producer
Anything that begins well will end badly. (note: the converse of this law is not true)
Stone's Law - Chris Stone, founder and owner of the Record Plant. aka Farber's Fourth Law
Necessity is the mother of strange bedfellows
Golden's Law - John Golden, mastering engineer: Artisan Sound Recorders, Kendun, K-Disc, and John Golden Mastering (2009)
A man with one watch knows what time it is. A man with two watches is never sure. aka Segall's Law
Perry's Law - Ken Perry, Mastering Engineer (2009)
If the facts do not conform to the theory, they must be disposed of
Garay's Law - Val Garay, Engineer and Producer
An object will fall so as to do the most damage
Kelsey's Law
Make three correct guesses consecutively and you will establish yourself as an expert
Lightner's Law - Bill Lightner, mastering engineer @ K-Disc (2009)
If it happens, it must be possible
Steele's Law
Social innovations tend to the level of minimum well being
Guy's Law
The probability of a given event occurring is inversely proportional to its desirability
Moyssiadis' Law - Dave Moyssiadis, mastering and recording engineer
As soon as you mention something, if it's good, it goes away; if it's bad, it happens
Capps' Law - Capps makes disc recording styli
If it can find a way to wear out faster, it will
Lippell's Law
If a research project is not worth doing, it is not worth doing well
Neumann's Law - Georg Neumann, microphone God
Whoever has the gold makes the rules (see also: Temmer's Law)
Calbi's Law - Greg Calbi, mastering engineer: The Cutting Room @ Record Plant NYC, Sterling Sound, Masterdisc. (2009)
Nothing is as easy as it looks
Marino's Law - George Marino, mastering engineer: The Cutting Room @ Record Plant NYC, Sterling Sound
Everything takes longer than you think it will
Todrank's Law - Bob Todrank, purveyor of Gear
There are two types of people: those who divide people into two types, and those who do not
Brosious' Law - Ham Brosious, then with Audiotechniques, Gear Purveyor. Now with Digibid, Gear Purveyor of the new Millennia n.b. Ebay ended up eating Digibid's lunch. They are now toast
The components you have will expand to fill the available space
Ingoldsby's Law - Brian Inglodsby, MCA
You cannot determine beforehand which side of the bread to butter
Merten's Law
The more time you spend in reporting on what you are doing, the less time you have to do anything. Stability is achieved when you spend all your time reporting on the nothing you are doing
Sax's Law - Doug Sax, The Mastering Lab
All laws are basically false
Zentz's Law - Alan Zentz, Mastering Engineer and studio owner
Inside every large problem is a small problem struggling to get out
Ludwig's Law - Bob Ludwig, Mastering Engineer
The other line moves faster
Dozier's Law - LaMont Dozier, Producer & Songwriter
Negative expectations yield negative results. Positive expectations yield negative results
Rettinger's Law - Michael Rettinger, Acoustician
Nothing is ever a complete failure. It can always serve as a bad example
Ricker's Law - Stan Ricker, Mastering Engineer, half-speed mastering God
Experiments should be reproducible. They should all fail the same way
Boden's Law
If an experiment works, you must be using the wrong experiment
Hansch's Law - Jo Hansch, mastering engineer: Festival Records-Australia, Kendun, Artisan Sound Recorders, K-Disc, Dinkum
Work expands to fill the time available for its completion
Eberle's Laws
Once a job is fouled up, anything done to improve it makes it worse
No matter what results are expected, someone is always willing to take it
No matter what occurs, someone believes it happened according to his pet theory
No matter what the result, someone is always eager to misinterpret it
See also: O'Donnell's Law
Appears to be part of Murphy's Laws
Fulginiti's Law - Greg Fulginiti, mastering engineer, Sterling Sound, Artisan Sound Recorders, Masterdisk
In a heirarchical organization, the higher the level, the greater the confusion
Reese's Law - Mike Reese, mastering engineer: The Mastering Lab
There are two sides to every argument, unless a person is personally involved, in which case there is only one
Leek's Law
An experiment may be considered a success if no more than half your data must be discarded to obtain correspondence with your theory
Cato's Law
The merchandise you need the quickest will be shipped the slowest way
Gray's Law - Kevin Gray, mastering engineer
In any collection of data, the figures that are obviously correct beyond all need of checking contain the errors
Corrollary 1: No one you ask for help will see the error either
Corrollary 2: Any nagging intruder who stops by with unsought advice will spot it immediately
Simpson's Law
There is a quantity which, when multiplied by, divided by, added to or subtracted from the answer you get, gives you the answer you should have gotten
Berrra's Law / Mark's Law - Yogi Berra
In theory, there's no difference between theory and practice, but in practice, there is
Anderson's Law - Jim Anderson, AES Past President
Nothing takes 5 minutes
Karl's Law - Karl Johnson, Audio Engineer
When time is of the essence, all fixes have failed, and the show must go on, then: one man's buzz is another man's line noise
Hufker's Law - Eugene Hufker, Contributed (2009) by his son, Barry, Hufker Recording St. Louis, MO
If at first you don't succeed, you're using the wrong hammer
Stamler's First Law - Paul Stamler
80% of the problems in audio are caused by a bad connection someplace
Stuart's Law - John Stuart, recorder of more folksingers than you can shake a stick at
The worse they are, the more verses they know
Temmer's Law - Stephen Temmer, Gotham Audio, importer of Neumann Microphones
If I don't make or sell it, it isn't any good
Chinn's Law of Overkill - Rick Chinn, Uneeda Audio (and purveyor of this list)
If it's worth doing, then it's worth overkilling
Wilcox' Law - Peter Wilcox, Wannabe dobro player (by his own admission)
In any endeavor, two thirds of the work is done by one-third of the participants
Blasingame's First Law - Joe Blasingame, Blasingame Audio Productions St. Louis, MO
When operating in the vacuum of a studio, time moves faster than anywhere else in the Universe
Blasingame's Second Law
No matter how fast and effective an audio engineer works, to the paying client it's like molasses
Mortensen's First Law - Dan Mortensen, Dansound
When using recorded music as a test source, the moment when you are finally ready to begin the test always coincides with the end of the song/CD
Simpson's Law - Keith Simpson (2010)
When you reach for the knob, the _____ player stops playing
(a corollary to Mortensen's first law)
Mortensen's Second Law - Dan Mortensen, Dansound
Someone, out of your field of vision, always unknowingly chooses to drop or knock over an object, creating a very loud abrupt BANG!!! at the exact moment you plug or unplug a connector. Good luck figuring out what the hell it was
Chinn's variant to Mortensen's Second Law - Rick Chinn, Uneeda Audio
When you're repairing someone's amp, and they're watching, they invariably blow a stream of smoke over the patient, which makes you wonder if some part just let out its magic smoke. This was more common in the 70s than now, since smoking has been banned in most public places (YAY)
Jaeger's Law - Rene Jaeger, Analog Design Engineer Loud Technologies
The evaluation sample is always in the 99th percentile of the performance range
Welti's Law - Todd Welti, (2009) Staff Scientist Harman International
If you've worked through the problem forwards and backwards, checked your math, consulted your intellectual superiors, and made invocations to the Gods, and still your hardware setup is giving the wrong result, you will find that it's a bad cable
von Recklinghausen's Law - Daniel von Recklinghausen (1925-2011) Technical Director, H.H. Scott and many other companies. Source: obituary, JAES, September 2011
If it measures good and sounds bad, it is bad. If it Measures bad and sounds good, you've measured the wrong thing
Molberg's Law - Keith Molberg, M. Mus. Professor of Recording Arts @ Briercrest College and Seminary - Submitted by Brendan Clace (2011)
If it sounds good, it is good
Boden's Law of ProTools - Mike Boden, (2011) Recording Engineer
Everything's easy, all the time
Pfaeffle's Law - Tom Pfaeffle, Late owner of The Tank Studios (RIP) (who was murdered in a bizarre incident) Submitted by Art Arzaga Jr. (2011)
Digital audio does not exist unless it has been backed up 3 separate times on 3 separate drives
Olmstead's Law - Frederick Law Olmstead, (1822-1903) Journalist and Landscape Designer (did Central Park in NYC)
After all is said and done, a hell of a lot more is said than done!
Trimble's Law - Tom Trimble, Director of Student Unions, University of Toledo. Submitted by Jeff Moss (2011)
Anytime there is a button somewhere, some idiot will try to mess with it
Gaston's Law - Leslie Gaston, (2010) Assistant Professor of Recording Arts, University of Colorado
If you can't figure out why you're not hearing anything, it's because one (and only ONE) button needs to be pushed. The angrier you become, the more obvious the button
Chinn's Corollary to Gaston's Law
In any DAW or digital mixing surface, the button you can't find is on the menu you just visited (and going backwards in the UI is impossible)
Murphy's Monitor Law - Ralph Kaiser (2012) TD, University of Guadalajara
The monitor levels decrease as soon as the show starts
Rubel's Law of Production - Mark Rubel, Instructor & Co-Director (2014) The Blackbird Academy
Great music poorly recorded will always be great; crappy music wonderfully recorded will always be crap
Murphy's Law of Inanimate Reproduction - Tim Franquist (2014) Independent Live Sound Engineer
If you take something apart and put it back together enough times, you will now have enough parts leftover to make another one, but neither one will work
Poole's Law (for monitor mix engineers) - Mikey Poole (2014) Independent Live Sound Engineer
A positive movement of an eyebrow supersedes any movement of a fader or pot
Hawley's Law of Differences - Scott Hawley, PhD (2014) Teacher of acoustics and electronics for audio engineering students. Belmont University, Nashville
Given any two arbitrarily similar sounds, there will always be at least one audio engineer who will claim to be able to hear the difference
O'Donnell's Law of Independent Behaviour - Casey O'Donnell (2014) House Engineer at Hard Rock Live, Orlando
Everyone is entitled to their own wrong way of doing things
Phillips Law of Reverse Mixing - Mark Phillips Professor of Music, Ohio University
Often the best fix for not being able to hear someone is to turn down something (or many somethings)... rather than turning up what you don't hear
Hogan's Law of Time - Teri Hogan President & CEO Sound Services, Inc. Past contributor to Live Sound International
However much time you have is how long it will take