Here's a topic that's on my mind for several reasons, but mostly because they did a big news story last night on it locally.
Do you think the end of the CD is near, and if so, how long will it will take? KEEP IN MIND I'm not talking about the TOTAL extinction of the form, I mean, they still sell vinyl albums. The question is simply when will CD's become hard to find in your average store.
I used to make a pretty good living from home selling CD's via the internet. I closed that business last year because of the drop in sales I saw. It was in part due to increased competition, partly due to the record labels dropping their list price but increasing or at the very least leaving the same their wholesale prices, and because of digital downloading.
I know many 20 year olds and a lot of teenagers too, they for the most part NEVER buy CD's anymore. They all have ipods and their attitude is "Why pay $15 for a cd with two songs I like when I can download 15 songs I like for the same amount".
I am thoroughly convinced that CD's will be done in about 10 years. When those teenagers and 20 somethings are in their 30's and 40's and make up the bulk of the record buying public.
They are so comfortable with technology, that the concept of the CD is going to be completely old school to them.
Bon Jovi was in the report, and he agreed with my view, he said he has two kids, 14 and 11, and they love music but never buy CD's, they download everything.
But a record industry exec disagreed, he says people will always want the physical product.
I think that's true of us folks, who grew up with it, but it's really silly to think these kids are gonna have an attachment to something they never really knew in the first place.
Good subject. I think that age will have alot to do with who is buying/downloading music. I work in the computer industry and don't own an IPOD, MP3 player, or download music for continual personal use. I like the CDs. My kids don't download music, in fact, they don't even have their own computers, not because we can't afford them, but because we have 2 in the house already that will feel is sufficient for our use. My kids prefer CDs. I think it will be on a personal preference. I agree that CDs are not as popular but I think it will be closer to 20 years or more before the end happens for them. Thats just my take.
See, my take on it is that we are too early in the downloading technology to see some of the later effects... Think about your old Nintendos (the 8 bit ones guys). This home system was tops in technology & revived the all but dead gaming industry. Those cartridges could save games & were very reliable....but have you tried to play your Nintendo lately....Mine is 18 years old, & takes about 20 tries to get ANY of the games to work. The batteries saving the games in cartridges like Zelda & Sim City have long since died & in order to beat the games I have to play all the way through , cuz I can't save any more...
Same thing with some of my Magnetic Floppy Discs for my PC....they don't work so well with today's technology, and thier immages degrade over time...
Same thing with VHS, Cassettes, & any other Magnetic medium....they worked great at the time, & no one could see anything replacing them...til they started degrading and losing picture & sound quality ( many times through no fault of the user).
CDs have been around almost 20 years in some form or another, And if you take care of them (like NOT using them as coasters or frisbees) they'll work long after your Stereo stops working. Just about any music cd will work in just about any stereo, old & new.....I haven't seen anything that really degrades a cd...making them to continue to work.
Now there is the digital revolution...& already I see problems here....1rst off there are SO many different formats, Mp3, wav, Itunes, Napster, Connect, Each of these playable in some players & not others. my iPod will play all of my mp3's & itunes , but can't recognize songs downloaded legally from Napster or Connect. So If I've got songs from all 3 of those sites, I have to have 3 different player to make them work, Plus with some itunes, you can only put them on a certain # of machines or burn them to a limited # of discs. after that, you have to buy a new copy....regardless of who puts out or distributes the cd, there is a 99.9% chance it will work in any cd player I choose & I can play it in any # of players or Computers I want.
Another Problem w/ digital downloads is that you don't really have a physical copy of the song. Suppose you wipe your hard drive because of a virus,( which as you know are VERY common) Um...bye bye song, you gotta buy it again....Unless the actual CD gets stolen (which does happen) you have that song for life.
The last thing is the life of the digital player...what happens when the battery to the mother board dies (like my Nintendo cartridge...there was a reason I brought it up), or what happens a couple of years down the line when you write & re-write over the hard disk in the iPod....the tech isn't as reliable as CD's Yet, & like a Wonder Drug that comes out before long term testing is completed, who knows how long OLD iPods will last & be able to deliver good music.... Plus Unless I have a car that comes with a built in adapter, I haven't found a good way to play my iPod music through the car stereo, except taking the digital music, burn it to a cd, and put it in the car...& if that's the case....then we'll always need CD's anyway
There is so much more I could say, But I don't have time...I just think at this time digital music is too young & unreliable to be thinking of getting rid of Studio discs any time soon.
All good points Mo, but the truth is if you don't back up your PAID FOR mp3 files you're nuts!
You can get almost 250 songs onto a CD in mp3 format, so there's no excuse for not backing them up, and that eliminates the problem of potential loss, which I beleive is the only REAL danger of switching to the format.
another good point you made was the various forms of file, MP3, WAV, etc.
That bothers me too. They're worried about illegal copying, so they're constantly changing that format. That's what I view as the biggest potential problem.
BUT, I have a lot of faith in the computer geeks out there, and there will always be a way to convert a file from one type into another I beleive.
