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]
One of the most significant causes in the decline in CD sales that took place a few years ago was that by 2000, Boomers and Xers had finally finished replacing all their LPs onto CD. For many collections and music listeners, this process took years and accounted for a large number of CDs sold.
“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.”
Too cool. My main table is a Thornes 125MkII into vacuum tube powered gear. Long live tubes!!!!!
My wife's old collection of records includes the original "Meet The Beatles" album, in 'High Fidelity'. The album jacket advertises that the recording is also available in stereo.
I know that stereo is nice, but there's still something nostalgic about listening to it the "old" way.
I used SoundForge to convert tapes to mp3.
It took a few days to get it done.
Have you ever put a CD in the microwave oven? Looks cool, but I doubt it will ever play again.
....hiss.....click....hiss
Actually, everything turned out pretty well. I used a decent cassette player when I made the mp3’s.
Ah, vinyl, with your pops, crackles, static, skipping everytime someone moves, warping, non-portability and enormous bulky playback equipment, I knew as soon as I saw this headline it wouldn’t take very long for some wisened luddite to bring you up.
I threw out all my video tapes this weekend and packed up the VCR. I haven’t used it since we got the DVR 3 or so years ago.
I also bought a Popcorn Hour Network Media Tank. It plays everything digitally. I download whatever I want, transfer it to the PCH over the wireless and watch it at my leisure. I also have an extensive DVD collection that I’ve slowly been burning. All that will end up on the PCH too and the DVDs will get packed away.
Within 10 years EVERYTHING will be digital delivery.
CDs were great, but their utility is fast approaching zero. Flash drives can hold up to 80 times more(64gb) and transfer it faster. I suspect only automobile CD players are the only real continuing use for CDs these days.
“You can microwave a pizza on one of these and it will still play perfectly”
What a load of @!$@@. Just like records, CDs SCRATCH. Who’da thunk? Wow! Can’t believe an exposed playing surface could ever be damaged!
I remember right as CDs made it big-time late ‘80s “the Big Chill” CD was a big player in the theater I worked in (along with Ghostbusters, etc) as background music. I worked there about a year and the CD was skipping over parts about 5x during play. That was just the beginning of seeing the lies about CDs.
No longer that great a place, given now you are virtually forced to use PayPal (eBay’s child).
“Ah, vinyl, with your pops, crackles, static, skipping everytime someone moves”
Sounds like someone’s talking about CDs.
Does anyone remember the first music CD you bought? Mine was Famous Blue Raincoat, by Jennifer Warnes
I remember that the very first CD I ever heard was at Radio Shack, and the disc was Slade: Keep Your Hands Off My Power Supply
The Wall, bought the same days as my first CD player. Followed closely by Dark Side of the Moon, Songs From the Wood and the Grand Wazoo. After that I forget.
Enormous bulky, eh? No problem for those with enough room -- my 50 lb. Marantz receiver and Teac reel-to-reel fit just fine in my house. As far as the snap, crackle, and pop of uncared for vinyl is concerned, uncared for CDs suffer the same maladies.
I should have expected there to be an avid CD-hater out there.
Please share your wisdom. Expound on all the "lies about CDs". I'd love to read about how horrible they are, especially in comparison to what they replaced: Reel-to-reel, Vinyl, Cassette and 8-Track tape.
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