The end of the CD

KeithR · Feb 5, 2018

I mentioned in the past year this was a big risk and now it has begun:

https://amp.businessinsider.com/best-buy-pulling-cds-from-stores-reaction-2018-2

NorthStar · Feb 6, 2018

Are they going to stack LPs?

Hi-FiGuy · Feb 6, 2018

This is no surprise. I have noticed in all avenues the inventory dwindling greatly in the last year and what they do have is the hit of the week and nothing but Greatest Hits.
Cant remember the last time I bought a silver disc, even at $5.00 or less I walk away.
Between Netflix and VUDU and Cable we pretty much got it covered.
Last time I was at Costco they had one small box of Disney Blu-Ray and that was it.
Was in Target tonight and went back to the DVD's/Cd's and its almost all gone and they had racks of toys pertaining to the currents movies out in their place.
Think about how much even the smartphone plays into this, you can manage your library from it, hit play on it and watch it on your TV,all from sitting on your duffer on the couch. Who has got time to look through the discs, pick a movie, open the case, turn on the player, put the disc in, wait for it to load, select the settings AND THEN push play. I am working up a sweat thinking about it, I need a beer.

Hi-FiGuy · Feb 6, 2018

NorthStar said:
Are they going to stack LPs?

They all have vinyl now.
Its just run of the mill stuff, nothing that gets your attention.
I saw the new Justin Timberlake album at Target on vinyl.
They are a little late to the party id you ask me.

NorthStar · Feb 6, 2018

I saw vinyl too @ my local London DRUGS, from $25 to $50 average a [strike]pill[/strike] pop. It reminds me of the 60s and 70s when LPs were $4 to $6. Vinyl forever? Of course yes, it's uniquely intimate, can't bring with you to listen on the go, it's only for special private romances, and the hip society.
It's funny how we decide and nobody else dictate the way of our privacy in music listening @ home in romantic mood.
Headphones and iPods and iTunes; where's the romance in that.

CDs are going the way of the 3D, in the darkness behind tinted sunglasses.

CDs are not selling anymore in stores like Best Buy and Costco and Walmart; I don't see kids there.
CDs are in second hand specialized music stores, among the zillion of LPs. That's where kids of all ages get their physical highs.

spiritofmusic · Feb 6, 2018

I think you all know how I feel about this.
Anyhow, minimal cd sales in the US is an anomaly, cds still sell healthily in Europe, and elsewhere.
No shortage of cd boxsets and special editions in genres like prog and fusion.

Tango · Feb 6, 2018

NorthStar said:
Headphones and iPods and iTunes; where's the romance in that.

It is there when she put her head on your shoulder sharing one earphone to you listening together.
Call me romantic

.

Tang

bonzo75 · Feb 6, 2018

I would never go out with a girl who listened to music with one earphone.

NorthStar · Feb 6, 2018

They have Best Buy and Target stores in Europe?

We are all romantic.

Would you go out with a woman who listen to music through earphones using both ears?

BMCG · Feb 6, 2018

spiritofmusic said:
I think you all know how I feel about this.
Anyhow, minimal cd sales in the US is an anomaly, cds still sell healthily in Europe, and elsewhere.
No shortage of cd boxsets and special editions in genres like prog and fusion.

and for the preservation of physical media we will always have the curious sales experience/channels/path to market that is Japan.

audioguy · Feb 6, 2018

Amazon will probably get a short term up tick in revenue from those who still want CD's. Services like Tidal will also get a benefit from this. To my ears, Tidal provides more than enough "accuracy" to satisfy me. I had quit buying shiny discs once I subscribed to Tidal. And for background music (which is what most folks listen to) iTunes, Amazon or any of the other compressed music formats will be just perfect

Eventually the same will happen to movies/BluRays. It will be a bit longer because the quality of the compression (at least for the audio side) it far from perfect. Technology moves on ..... and so must we.

spiritofmusic · Feb 6, 2018

Audioguy, I beg to differ

audioguy · Feb 6, 2018

spiritofmusic said:
Audioguy, I beg to differ

With which part? That the audio is good enough for me on Tidal or that Amazon will benefit or .....?

I'm probably a bit older than most on this forum, hence my ears don't work as well. I did some A/B blind testing on Tidal vs CD (as did one of my younger friends on his $150,000 system/room) and while neither of us could consistently tell the difference, what differences we thought we heard took nothing away from our enjoyment of the music. Furthermore, even with the death of the shiny disc, I can still download lots of stuff and give up NOTHING.

spiritofmusic · Feb 6, 2018

Audioguy, I just beg to differ with the whole concept
I get the whole streaming thing, having had great exposure regularly to the SGM over 2 years
No argument from me how good it can sound
But to use this as an argument that CDs are redundant, I don’t agree
And this change is only acute in the US market, CDs still sell, and actually are thriving, in Europe
If it was purely down to ease/convenience, lps would be dead too

audioguy · Feb 6, 2018

You may be right. But that CD sales are down (at least in the US) is not a surprise at all.

But we do look at this differently. I think it is all about convenience. Digital was all about convenience. The "perfect sound forever" nonsense was a selling point but once folks got used to the ability of skipping songs with their remote or sticking 6 CDs in their car CD player (i.e. convenience), CD growth took off.

Then this on-line book selling company (Amazon) started selling CDs and I didn't even need to leave my home to get my music (more convenience)

Streaming is yet another convenience.

The masses determine market direction, and we are NOT the masses. I believe that over time, most all physical media will disappear. Will vinyl hang around? Probably for some time. Do I think there may be some companies who still sell physical media? Yes, at least for a while.

I would much prefer that unless streaming services could provide full bandwidth audio and video, that the BluRay never disappear. But I am not the masses because the masses don't care. And most companies sell to the masses.

For those of us who only want "What's Best" in music or movies (not the hardware to play it on), IMHO, the ability to purchase physical media will continue to decline.

I did a quick bit of "research". Vinyl sales worldwide were about 3 million units. CD sales of about 550 million units but most importantly, streaming has now surpassed those numbers. It is only a matter of time!!

But that's just me.

spiritofmusic · Feb 6, 2018

Oh, I see that, and am sanguine.
I’m also bloody minded.
I hated digital for three decades until I found my cdp of choice.
Defended analog over digital in the dog days of the late 80s and early 90s.
Put up with all the so called advances, from 16 Bit to 18 to Bitstream to SACD/DVD-A.
And after all that frustration, they NOW want me to give up on it?...
“I’m mad as Hell and I’m not going to take this anymore!”

morricab · Feb 6, 2018

spiritofmusic said:
Audioguy, I just beg to differ with the whole concept
I get the whole streaming thing, having had great exposure regularly to the SGM over 2 years
No argument from me how good it can sound
But to use this as an argument that CDs are redundant, I don’t agree
And this change is only acute in the US market, CDs still sell, and actually are thriving, in Europe
If it was purely down to ease/convenience, lps would be dead too

Well, in many ways cds ARE redundant. The difference with analog is that there is no way to "stream" analog. So, if you really WANT analog then you either have to buy LPs or tapes. Digital makes having no medium possible and that is a real difference from analog, which is permanently married to a medium to deliver it.

Now, one can (rightly, IMO) argue that a good cd transport (like from CEC or Mark Levinson) will outperform any computer server that exists and that delivery by USB is so inherently flawed that a good transport/DAC interface or a very good integrated cd player will still get better sound from digital than server based "transports".

morricab · Feb 6, 2018

audioguy said:
You may be right. But that CD sales are down (at least in the US) is not a surprise at all.

But we do look at this differently. I think it is all about convenience. Digital was all about convenience. The "perfect sound forever" nonsense was a selling point but once folks got used to the ability of skipping songs with their remote or sticking 6 CDs in their car CD player (i.e. convenience), CD growth took off.

Then this on-line book selling company (Amazon) started selling CDs and I didn't even need to leave my home to get my music (more convenience)

Streaming is yet another convenience.

The masses determine market direction, and we are NOT the masses. I believe that over time, most all physical media will disappear. Will vinyl hang around? Probably for some time. Do I think there may be some companies who still sell physical media? Yes, at least for a while.

I would much prefer that unless streaming services could provide full bandwidth audio and video, that the BluRay never disappear. But I am not the masses because the masses don't care. And most companies sell to the masses.

For those of us who only want "What's Best" in music or movies (not the hardware to play it on), IMHO, the ability to purchase physical media will continue to decline.

I did a quick bit of "research". Vinyl sales worldwide were about 3 million units. CD sales of about 550 million units but most importantly, streaming has now surpassed those numbers. It is only a matter of time!!

But that's just me.

According to Forbes vinyl sales are estimated at more than 40 million units sold, not 3 million.

"Vinyl records are projected to sell 40 million units in 2017, with sales nearing the $1 billion benchmark for the first time this millennium. This impressive milestone has been untouched since the peak of the industry in the 1980s. While explosive by today’s standards, according to Deloitte, in its heyday (‘81), total vinyl album sales surpassed 1 billion units in just that year alone."

morricab · Feb 6, 2018

audioguy said:
You may be right. But that CD sales are down (at least in the US) is not a surprise at all.

But we do look at this differently. I think it is all about convenience. Digital was all about convenience. The "perfect sound forever" nonsense was a selling point but once folks got used to the ability of skipping songs with their remote or sticking 6 CDs in their car CD player (i.e. convenience), CD growth took off.

Then this on-line book selling company (Amazon) started selling CDs and I didn't even need to leave my home to get my music (more convenience)

Streaming is yet another convenience.

The masses determine market direction, and we are NOT the masses. I believe that over time, most all physical media will disappear. Will vinyl hang around? Probably for some time. Do I think there may be some companies who still sell physical media? Yes, at least for a while.

I would much prefer that unless streaming services could provide full bandwidth audio and video, that the BluRay never disappear. But I am not the masses because the masses don't care. And most companies sell to the masses.

For those of us who only want "What's Best" in music or movies (not the hardware to play it on), IMHO, the ability to purchase physical media will continue to decline.

I did a quick bit of "research". Vinyl sales worldwide were about 3 million units. CD sales of about 550 million units but most importantly, streaming has now surpassed those numbers. It is only a matter of time!!

But that's just me.

14.3 million sold in the US alone.

asiufy · Feb 6, 2018

audioguy said:
With which part? That the audio is good enough for me on Tidal or that Amazon will benefit or .....?

I'm probably a bit older than most on this forum, hence my ears don't work as well. I did some A/B blind testing on Tidal vs CD (as did one of my younger friends on his $150,000 system/room) and while neither of us could consistently tell the difference, what differences we thought we heard took nothing away from our enjoyment of the music. Furthermore, even with the death of the shiny disc, I can still download lots of stuff and give up NOTHING.

audioguy,

You're not alone, and it has nothing to do with your age or your ears. Before streaming, folks like you bought CDs because that was all you could get. Once streaming/downloads hit the big time, the music industry didn't come up with enough incentive for people to keep buying CDs, and instead decided to just dump the prices through the big box stores, hoping people would keep buying the stuff simply because it's cheap (or cheaper). We can all see how that went... Record stores want nothing to do with CDs anymore, and the big boxes are turning their backs.

If the music industry had offered a compelling case for CDs back then, with a better overall product (packaging, content, etc.), perhaps a partnership with a download/streaming service, and focused on their most dedicated channel (record stores), CDs might've had a chance.

As it is, folks like yourself, who just want the music, have no reason to buy CDs at all.

alex

The end of the CD

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