The first Compact Disc rolled off the production line 25 years ago to the day. It became the standard for storing audio. And now, in 2007, we clamber through the ruins of what the CD created, thanks to the Internet, and corporate greed.
Abba's "The Visitors" was the first production CD to be made on the new optical storage medium. Sony and Philips had started work on the technology six years previous. Yes, that's right, Sony did once make a storage format that became popular!
It would be a massive understatement to say that CDs are a popular format. In 2004, annual CD sales hit 30 billion. That figure includes data CD-ROMs and recordable CDs too; not just audio discs.
But the CDs heyday has come and gone, sales falling in the new millennium as users turn to new ways of obtaining music. And over that time, some terrible things have happened to the once glorious storage format.
As record companies desperately try to dictate to users what they can do with something they buy, the CD has been molested until it's no longer... well... a CD in the true sense.
Copy protection in many CDs adds errors or subversive hidden data tracks to prevent or control how the discs can be used in computers. The side effects include forcing the error-correction on CD players to work harder, and the discs failing to play altogether in car stereo. The only upside is that such discs usually aren't allowed to carry the CD digital-audio logo, but how many people actually look for that?
The CD isn't the only popular optical storage format on the block now, though. The DVD came to be in the 90s. The release of the PS2 with its internal DVD player, along with DVD players making their way to supermarket shelves, saw their uptake rocket around the year 2000.
DVDs had copy protection too, of course, although it was designed in at the start. Shame it was crap... ask a guy called DVD Jon about it.
Skipping over DVD's history a bit, we come to Blu-Ray, HD-DVD, and few other formats either in development, or in existence. But what have we done with the idea of ubiquitous, easy to access storage?
To play a high definition optical disc, you'll need to upgrade most of your hardware, be it on your computer or in your home theatre. Then you'll only be able to do certain things with that disc. If you try to bend the rules... well you can't.
There's really no point elaborating on the state of DRM in modern storage formats. You all know the score. So I'll just say the following: Is this really progress?
