Death of the Compact Disc

[Laserschwert 475]

I'm much more curious why DVDs never went mainstream for music as well. You could easily store more music in higher quality and have fewer needs for multi-disc releases.

[Marian Schedenig 8,198]

5 hours ago, Bespin said:

I don't understand why companies don't start to sell us USB/Type C packages (CD optional).

 

I like physical media, but selling USB drives just for the files they contain is a really horrible idea, ecologically. And pretty useless, too. I'd rather just buy an empty jewel case with a cover, a booklet, and a download code.

44 minutes ago, Laserschwert said:

I'm much more curious why DVDs never went mainstream for music as well. You could easily store more music in higher quality and have fewer needs for multi-disc releases.

 

Poor usability (few DVD players were really usable without a display, and I think there was never a standard for "blind" navigation on audio "only" discs), plus the format appeared just when people started switching to non-physical media anyway.

[enderdrag64 624]

6 hours ago, Laserschwert said:

I'm much more curious why DVDs never went mainstream for music as well. You could easily store more music in higher quality and have fewer needs for multi-disc releases.

Even just using standard CDs but changing the encoding format to use something like FLAC instead could have been an option . 2x the capacity with no need for new hardware at all, and no added manufacturing cost. The only thing they would have needed to do was change the firmware on CD players

[Jay 37,368]

How to survive the inevitable CD revival - For better or worse, the compact disc could be making a comeback

[Luke Skywalker 1,795]

If CDs become a hipster thing like vinyl is….collecting scores could become unnafordable…

[Andy 4,138]

They'd be wise to bring back the longbox, or slipcovers or something like that.  Blu Ray collectors will pay out the nose for a cardboard slipcover.

[mstrox 6,651]

A buddy posted this last week and I support the movement

 

 

[bollemanneke 3,349]

bring it on. I buy everything I love physically. Refuse to trust streaming. And filling shelves is nice.

[Richard Penna 3,694]

For mainstream, popular stuff, CDs are cool.

 

For scores with limited appeal I still think digital is fine - they need to be releasable without worrying about the risk.

[Bellosh 3,419]

8 minutes ago, bollemanneke said:

And filling shelves is nice.

 

it really is a good feeling.

[mstrox 6,651]

9 minutes ago, Richard Penna said:

For mainstream, popular stuff, CDs are cool.

 

For scores with limited appeal I still think digital is fine - they need to be releasable without worrying about the risk.

While film studios have (limitedly) opted to put archival film score albums out digitally, all of the work for these was done by independent labels who remaster and compile the albums.  Those labels don’t get a cut of digital sales - their work is incentivized by the profitability of limited edition physical releases.  We wouldnt see much on digital if it weren’t for physical release.

 

The only recent score releases I can think of that don’t fall under this umbrella are the Walt Disney Legacy Collection, Solo/Rogue One, and Ghostbusters 1/2

[Richard Penna 3,694]

I'm mostly referring to releases of new scores, and not the archival releases by our labels.

[Tallguy 3,395]

I'm getting ready to move. "Physical" is not currently an advantage. I am, however, already planning on where all of the "important" CDs will go. Star Wars, Star Trek, Close Encounters... Aw heck, they're ALL important.

[Bayesian 1,363]

3 hours ago, Andy said:

They'd be wise to bring back the longbox, or slipcovers or something like that.  Blu Ray collectors will pay out the nose for a cardboard slipcover.

Don't you dare give studios another way for us to buy the same movie for the umpteenth time!

[mstrox 6,651]

I’ve been turning to digital purchases more and more lately, especially for current film releases - but I’m gonna miss seeing my Discogs collection value rising.

 

 

When I die, please don’t let my spouse go to Goodwill

[Bayesian 1,363]

Damn, you must have a lot of discs! Or a lot of valuable ones, at any rate.

 

Here's mine, across 1,228 items:

[Tallguy 3,395]

3 minutes ago, mstrox said:

When I die, please don’t let my spouse go to Goodwill

 

Usually a spouse gets some kind of inheritance rather than being donated to charity.

[Dr. Rick 1,157]

I just made some additions to my collection and it is definitely not at the same level as y'all  LOL

 

Collection Value:* 

Min $2,845.29   Med $4,756.04   Max $8,309.24

 

[Bespin 8,483]

Good idea, I'm currently entering all my CDs in my Discogs profile!

[Andy 4,138]

I know, right?  I want to add mine too, but it would take forever.   Discogs doesn’t have an app with a scanner do they?

[mstrox 6,651]

You can scan your barcodes via the mobile app.  It works maybe 80% of the time.

[Manakin Skywalker 4,896]

I didn't even realize you could do that on Discogs. Just made an account and added most of my collection an hour ago. 👌

 

7 hours ago, Dr. Rick said:

I just made some additions to my collection and it is definitely not at the same level as y'all  LOL

 

Mine's only about $1.6K max (minus all my older vinyls). 

[Bespin 8,483]

I'm afraid the relevant price may be the lowest hehe

[Tallguy 3,395]

Most of my collection doesn't have cases anymore. I consider it "backup media". I would love to have a wall of carefully organized cases but that's not how the dice rolled.

[Bespin 8,483]

Thanks, now I'll make nightmares!

[Positivatee 327]

On 05/07/2022 at 10:25 PM, mstrox said:

You can scan your barcodes via the mobile app.  It works maybe 80% of the time.

 

I might need to appropriate a spare linear barcode scanner from work. 

 

Or... I need drivers to get my CueCat to work on USB in Windows 10. Yes, I still have mine from 2000.

[Turbo 54]

Just ran across this today:

 

3 Trends That Prove CDs are Making a Comeback

https://blog.discogs.com/en/cd-trend-popularity-sales-2022/

[Bespin 8,483]

I started to scan my collection into discogs.

 

First I was a bit suprised to see the most valuable items of it (well, in fact, they don't worth so much!).

[Bespin 8,483]

Well, I’ll keep working for a few more years!

 

Value in US (only including my "visible" collection, I didn't scanned the other half still in boxes, nor the collection I got from my late aunt)

 

Collection Value:*

Min $9,721.85   Med $15,142.49   Max $25,696.15

[BeepBeepRitchie 4]

On 05/07/2022 at 10:13 PM, bollemanneke said:

bring it on. I buy everything I love physically. Refuse to trust streaming. And filling shelves is nice.

100% agreed my friend. I like a collection I can see not just a USB stick!

[bollemanneke 3,349]

Less nice is having a buying policy for classical music that works only 95% of the time. I'm unable to buy Beethoven's first symphony after falling under Marie Kondo's spell.

[Bespin 8,483]

On 10/07/2022 at 10:11 AM, Bespin said:

Well, I’ll keep working for a few more years!

 

Value in US (only including my "visible" collection, I didn't scanned the other half still in boxes, nor the collection I got from my late aunt)
 

 

Added few boxes more today, didn't found the Holy Grail yet!

 

[Jay 37,368]

This animated chart that shows which platform music was primarly sold on over the last 40 years is amazing to watch

 

 

direct link: https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/z670ec/oc_40_years_of_music_formats/

 

Vinyl almost disappeared entirely before making a slow comeback, and currently outsells digital downloads, which at one point dominated the chart!

 

Another thing I observed is that La-La Land Records launched in 2002, which you'll see on the chart is the year that Compact Discs had their biggest stranglehold on the industry, only cassettes visible at the time, and shrunk to its smallest size.  Immediately after they opened their doors, digital downloads, then streaming took over.

 

And they've only increased their single-disc prices from $20 to $22 over this 20 year of industry change and inflation.  Crazy.

 

[A24 4,338]

The big artists of today are releasing their albums on cassette again. 

[Nick1Ø66 4,718]

I admit, I'm pretty much 100% streaming now. For a while there were a few artists I stuck with and bought their CD's, but that's pretty much stopped as well. I ripped my entire CD collection to lossless, just to archive it, and haven't looked back. I don't even own a CD player, other than a stand-alone drive on the very rare instance I need to rip something.  And the only time I'll even go to the stuff I've ripped myself is if it's not available to stream.

 

[Jay 37,368]

The RIAA has a cool updated chart that you can view and interact with with normal dollars:

 

 

Or adjusted for inflation dollars:

 

 

Here is is: https://www.riaa.com/u-s-sales-database/

[King Mark 3,631]

I only trust physical media and digital files stored on my own computer . Not even putting anything on the cloud because who knows if one day they might be able to tell if I've got bootlegs, fan edits or music I didn't purchase and block it or worse.

 

With streaming they might even remove Williams tracks or albums because someone found something "racist" or "phobic" about it  (for example it's only a matter of time before activists start a campaign to get the Harry Potter movies and soundtracks banned from streaming platforms).

 

But seriously if they can remove previously released music (SW Special Editions) because of rights expiration or whenever they feel like it , streaming is never to be trusted, ever.

[Disco Stu 15,495]

Good visualization for keeping the "vinyl revival" in perspective.

[Jay 37,368]

33 minutes ago, Disco Stu said:

Good visualization for keeping the "vinyl revival" in perspective.

 

Yea you can do fun things at the site like have it show you only vinyl, cassette, and CD:

 

[enderdrag64 624]

Music seems to have found a happy medium where you can choose to have either a subscription service, or purchase your music outright; same thing with videogames (think things like Xbox Game Pass)

 

I'm very pleased as long as this continues to be the case. I really don't like the existence of streaming exclusives in the realm of tv shows and movies

[King Mark 3,631]

41 minutes ago, enderdrag64 said:

Music seems to have found a happy medium where you can choose to have either a subscription service, or purchase your music outright; same thing with videogames (think things like Xbox Game Pass)

 

yes that's a good sign that they will not force everyone into music subscriptions.The Vinyl trend is GOOD , not because I would ever listen to skipping and popping vinyl records, but at least it maintains physical media alive.

[Disco Stu 15,495]

Just vinyl albums, adjusted for inflation.  I feel like a trendsetter, I started buying vinyl records in 2005.  I remember it was me and one other guy on the floor of my dorm freshman year that had record players in our rooms.  I tired of the format by the time the revival really started (I mostly stopped buying records around 2014)

 

 

[Jay 37,368]

It's also fun to look at JUST the non-physical media.  Ringtones were the top selling method from 2005-2007!

 

 

It's also funny that the music industry only started legally selling music digitally in 2004!!  I downloaded my first mp3 in 1997!

[Disco Stu 15,495]

I'm one of a very small number of people it seems whose most preferred method is purchasing digital music files.

[HunterTech 994]

1 hour ago, King Mark said:

I only trust physical media and digital files stored on my own computer . Not even putting anything on the cloud because who knows if one day they might be able to tell if I've got bootlegs, fan edits or music I didn't purchase and block it or worse.

 

With streaming they might even remove Williams tracks or albums because someone found something "racist" or "phobic" about it  (for example it's only a matter of time before activists start a campaign to get the Harry Potter movies and soundtracks banned from streaming platforms).

 

But seriously if they can remove previously released music (SW Special Editions) because of rights expiration or whenever they feel like it , streaming is never to be trusted, ever.

 

That would be one hell of a privacy violation to occur in that particular instance, since the only time companies give a shit about the stuff you upload onto the cloud is if the material is illegal in genuinely harmful ways (think CP and whatever terrorists might sneakily put there as tools). I sure as hell haven't gotten anything from the services that wasn't just shared links being blocked or deleted (which I wouldn't think you'd use it for).

 

I can tell you don't actually talk to anyone from the current generation, because a lot of them will fully acknowledge too many other people worked on the HP franchise for it to be something to just demand be removed, given shit like royalties for the actors and crew are a thing. It's a franchise they'd have less issues with if the main rights holder were either different or just gone, since it's ultimately too big and profitable to just get rid of like that. Hell, I never have heard anyone actually discuss all the discourse in person, so really, how aware do you think much of the general public is for large scale pushback to be feasible even?

 

That last point is valid though, so nothing much to add there.

[Stark 316]

I keep roughly 2 copies of all the music I own, which is almost entirely digital except for a few dozen deluxe CDs which I immediately ripped and a handful of vinyls I mainly own for the gimmick.

[enderdrag64 624]

52 minutes ago, King Mark said:

yes that's a good sign that they will not force everyone into music subscriptions.The Vinyl trend is GOOD , not because I would ever listen to skipping and popping vinyl records, but at least it maintains physical media alive.

Physical media is good, but honestly vinyl exclusives are even worse than steaming exclusives. At least streaming exclusives can *generally* be ripped in lossless, and don't sound like shit

[King Mark 3,631]

4 hours ago, HunterTech said:

I can tell you don't actually talk to anyone from the current generation, because a lot of them will fully acknowledge too many other people worked on the HP franchise for it to be something to just demand be removed, given shit like royalties for the actors and crew are a thing. It's a franchise they'd have less issues with if the main rights holder were either different or just gone, since it's ultimately too big and profitable to just get rid of like that. Hell, I never have heard anyone actually discuss all the discourse in person, so really, how aware do you think much of the general public is for large scale pushback to be feasible even?

 

 

 Yeah that was a bit of an exaggeration and it likely won't happen but they are doing their best to derail current Harry Potter projects like the videogame Hogwarts Legacy, with social media platforms and major gaming websites trying to shame you into not playing or buying the game.  And some episodes of old TV shows on Netflix have been removed here because someone made claims they were "racist" so my reasoning in general is not totally implausible.

[HunterTech 994]

Episode removals are always stupid, because it likely doesn't take that much effort to simply make a quick disclaimer. It's fairly representative of how companies usually approach modernity, where they'd rather the aggressively easy solution than one that would actually satisfy all parties (since I imagine it'd do very little to alleviate those out of the loop that think some of the more "recent" concepts are a bit much to take all at once). Rather than tactfully deal with it, they'd prefer it just go away so that they don't have to hear about it again.

 

As for the game, well we are talking about it, aren't we? It seems WB and Disney have come to really adopt the "no such thing as bad publicity" mentality, where they just go ahead with projects regardless of what the feedback is. It'll be a bit before we could even see it attempt to take a significant hit on a product (cause the casual market is who decides at the end of the day).

[King Mark 3,631]

Also the fear of uploading a bootleg on the cloud is exaggerated I admit, but we did have a period in the history of this message board where the RIAA was actively suing downloaders for their life savings and everyone was a bit paranoid.