Without the CD, there would be no (same size, looks alike) DVD. And without that, the average house wouldn’t have such a wealth of vintage tube on tap to watch whenever we want.
This BBC news story celebrates the compact disc’s 25th birthday by providing such wonderful facts as the very first commercial music CD. (Do you know what it was? Answer below.)
Also in the story is the interesting observation that the audio CD thrived thanks to its single, open standard -- none of that destructive VHS/Beta rivalry or NTSC/PAL incompatibility. Any CD you buy anywhere in the world should play anywhere in the world. Unfortunately, the same can’t be said of video DVDs, with the world’s different TV engineering standards and the distributors’ control-freak region coding. Now the Blu-ray/HD-DVD battle is slowing the purchase of high-def video players, scaring consumers wary of betting on the wrong horse, Beta-style.
The CD will always be historic for starting us down the digital entertainment path, offering a clarity, ease of use and storehouse of info that DVDs (and now high-def discs) have only expanded upon. Learn more about the original development of the compact disc here.
Sure, the CD may go the way of vinyl records and VHS tapes someday -- perhaps someday soon. MP3s and other hard-drive/flash-stored entertainment are already challenging the disc’s preeminence. With video on demand becoming familiar in digital cable, users don’t have to store anything, just electronically click to see/hear a title or a genre/format transmitted from the system's head-end whenever they want.
Oh, that initial CD? “The Visitors” by ABBA.