Posted on 03/09/2009 10:08:13 AM PDT by ShadowAce
Compact discs weren't always impromptu drink coasters. Once, in the not-so-distant past, they played music, contained pictures, and let people play video games with tacked-on FMV sequences. And today, the venerable CD turned 30.
Happy birthday! 1979-2009.Thirty years. Pretty amazing that it's been that long since those crazy Dutchmen at Philips spun the technology off of laser discs as part of an optical digital audio disc demo in Eindhoven.
Of course, the CD didn't immediately take off right then and there. It needed a little help from Sony, which worked with Philips to get the format standardized. The standard they named Red Book, which included everything from playing time (initially 60 minutes), to the disc diameter to sampling frequency. Put simply, the collaboration worked out, and Red Book was a success. In the book The Compact Disc Story, Philips reps lauded the task force they established with Sony. The CD that team created was "invented collectively by a large group of people working as a team," Philips said. If only Apple and Microsoft could say the same, no? Oh, the things they could build.
Gushing and my bloviating aside, it wouldn't be until October 1, 1982 that Billy Joel's 52nd Street became the first CD album released. It was conveniently released in Japan alongside Sony's brand new CDP-101 Compact Disc player. The album (and more importantly the medium it was pressed upon) changed history, as more compact disc players were introduced into the market beginning in 1983. The music CD would reach its zenith with The Beatles "1" (30 million in sales), before beginning its eventual and inevitable fall to the Mp3 in the mid-2000's (in 2008, for example, CD sales dropped 20%).
Related to that point on Mp3s is copy protection. Or, to be more accurate, the CD's complete and utter lack of copy protection of any kind.
When the Red Book was finalized, the standard made nary a mention of copy protection. Other than an anti-copy clause in the subcode, there was nothing. In fact, if a company tried to market a copy-protected CD (no ripping, copying, etc), as many did in 2002, Philips said the discs would not bear the official Compact Disc Digital Audio logo. It's great that Philips did this, because as is the case with many "protected" forms of media today, these non-standardized CDs were anti-consumer; they often did not work in a variety of CD-ROM drives or standalone players. And yet Lars Ulrich was silent. Baffling, but true, and definitely an interesting parallel to today's debate about digital rights management and piracy.
As was noted by Blam today in an email to me about this anniversary, Red Book's active attempts to keep copy protection from the spec was incredibly forward thinking at the time. You definitely didn't see it in the infamous anti-consumer Extended Copy Protection (XCP) debacle at Sony Music BMG. Remember that ol' chestnut? Ironic that the creator of the original standard would be somehow involved in one of the most egregious CD-related abuses of consumer trust, no?
But back on point. The CD is 30. It changed tech and gadgetry pretty substantially. Even as it enters the twilight of its existence, we geeks have a lot to be thankful for, and there's still plenty to learn from that copy of What's the Story Morning Glory you have under your coffee mug right now. [Wikipedia]
It's OK. So did I.
CDs are nice in their way, but they are 1 of the most overrated items of all time. They are alot of trouble, including needing sophisticated electronics and software to compensate for endless skipping in car rides (shades of what would happen to records), which wasn’t really offered on a regular basis until c.2000.
This along with teflon-coated cookware is 1 of the things I want to write up on my personal blog, whenever I start that!
There are still companies in the US and Japan making battery powered portable turntables for adults (there are no childrens records being pressed to my knowledge anymore, it’s about the only genre that isn’t on new vinyl).
I think the majority of adults and teens with battery powered turntables use them to audition used records at thrift stores, garage sales, and record conventions (both for quality of the record, is it scratchy, and to hear what the music sounds like).
I still have my vinyl... but the old turntable is acting up, even after some replacement parts. LPs just don't sound that great when the playing speed adjusts itself from 30 - 37 RPMs, and the calibration wheel has a mind of its own. ;-) So it goes.
“Even when production cost for CDs dropped below that of LPs and cassettes, the price for the shiny discs remained higher in the stores than the other formats.”
YES!
I hated the $15 tags for CDs when they finally really came out in the ‘80s - then, 10 years later, still $15! They were so popular that relative to income, they should’ve cheapened.
My only caution on that complaint is the inflation rate; perhaps the absolute $ staying the same was good while other things went up?
I wonder how much each of the 4 channels even sounds from one another.
It was the swansong of baby boomer music buying, as the next (but smaller demographic) generation came of age and bought music (new and reissue).
Around 2000 sales figures were declining as the markets tapped out and again they proclaimed “victim” status and said that “clearly” the loss in sales was because of illegal copying. It was a factor to be sure (and something I never participated in) but not the significant cause of a dropoff in the sales figures (changing times, smaller audience, more diversions for entertainment).
How many of the 10,000 songs that some people downloaded do they still listen to on any more than “one time” basis?
I won't justify the downloads. For materials outside of the public domain they are illegal. But the music industry tried in the 1980s to prohibit libraries from loaning out CDs (as the Hollywood had also tried to prohibit home video rental) and in the 1990s the music industry tried to stamp out used CD sales.
Some voices in the industry don't even like the listening booths. You might put that CD back on the shelf (open no less). The companies don't want those releases on a returnable basis. But a customer who listens to 3 CDs in a store and makes a confident decision in buying the one the (s)he actually LIKES is more likely to buy another album when the money is available. If you are burned on a purchased, it's hard to justify the gamble on another album (unheard).
Radio formats have locked down exposure to new talent (or anything that isn't owned lock stock and barrel by one of the major corporations). The industry shut down downloading as much as it offered self-guided exposure to unsigned bands as because it violated copyright. They saw it as a threat.
They saw Myspace as a threat too until they learned to co-opt it. MTV failed to see the value of myspace and passed on it when they had the chance to buy it. Now they are busy trying to strive for relevance buying magazine publishing, record labels, and websites.
Start going to yard sales and estate sales. You could get them by the crate for $5.
78s are a fun to collect. You can usually find crates full of them at flea markets and such. They might be marked $1+/disc, but can be talked down quickly. If you've ever picked up a bunch of these you'll know why - very heavy. My kids though I was nuts over Christmas when I set up a mono system and threw on Bing's White Christmas....C
I still remember watching “NBC News Overnight” with Linda Ellerbee (and so it goes...) back in 1983 when the segment came on about a new format for music. It was a “tiny” disc that was read by a laser, only on one side, played from the inside out, spun at 4 times as an LP and you couldn’t touch the thing. I still remember the Sony guy holding up a CD and saying that they were virtually indestructable. “You can microwave a pizza on one of these and it will still play perfectly.”
8-tracks were still being sold, but cassettes were rapidly taking over.
I couldn’t afford a CD player until 1988. The first CD I bought was Herb Alpert’s Greatest Hits.
I still have about 1,500 vinyl discs—mostly 12” singles from the mid-late ‘80s (being a DJ in that blessed era). I should sell them. Any takers?
Oh...I also have a portable victrola (works, but in rough shape) and a couple of dozen 78’s I could let go of.
I just recently trashed hundreds of cassette tapes.
Most of my 500 CDs are down in storage but I have about 60 gigabytes of MP3s in my iTunes.
I still have some vinyl and my bestest friend owns some Beatles on vinyl.
I WANT that David Soul tape!!!
/s
omg, I had Van Halen’s first album on 8-track. The first concert I saw was
Van Halen and I was too young to be there. (My parents were clueless) I got to see Diamond Dave’s butt-cheeks in those crazy peek-a-boo pants. ...good times...
We have all the vinyl we had when we got married over thirty years ago. I still have the old ‘67 Benjamin Miracord ELAC hydraulic cue direct gear drive turntable that works magnificently. It’s coupled to an early 1980’s SONY stack system sufficiently powerful enough to mock a small Earthquake.
I’m hard of hearing anymore, but I can crank the valve on this sucker and enjoy it still.
Yeah, probably why I’m hard of hearing. Heard that one before.
I have a Technics turntable... did some cleaning a while back and put on a new belt but didn't want to attempt "major" surgery. However, it still doesn't want to hold a constant speed. Might bite the bullet and try some more drastic measures.
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