Compact Disc: The Zombie Format?

As technology grows, for better and worse, all kinds of items get left behind, like diskettes being replaced by flash drives, et al and magnetic tape formats (8-track, VHS, Beta, audio cassettes) being replaced by optical media. Despite its lower definition by today's standards (16 bits of sound versus the 20 to 24 bits, not to mention kHz that DVD, Blu-ray and some streaming can do), the compact disc has somehow survived and is still being made. Even when chain stores drop them, you can still get them and the music industry (the only supporter as the computer business has moved onto the other formats) is the sole supporter. Why?

Because they are all over the place, convenient, play on almost any 5-inch digital player (this even includes the small tray in the long-dead 12-inch analog LaserDisc format, which eventually break in digital sound for film and video despite not starting out with any digital audio at all) and they sold so well, plenty are still out there in collections, used stores, thrift stores, basements and many are still highly collectible. True, many have gone bad (scratched, left in hot cars, cracked, smashed, dirtied beyond use, oxidation that eats away the information, etc.) and a huge chunk (especially older ones) have dated sonics that make them hard to listen to. But it all goes to show just how successful the original optical disc format was.

It had many variants for video and computers that were of limited use, and a smash second success as CD-ROM. As the vinyl record revival looks like it is here to stay, it shows that people still want physical media despite the many out there who (sometimes for weird, even political reasons) want to kill it. The music business never did sell the idea of an all-audio DVD or Blu-ray, though there were attempts, especially when they had two replacements for the CD (the still-produced, amazing Super Audio CD format and decent, if menu-challenged DVD-Audio (with a capital 'A' formats) that battled it out in vein as Napster came out of nowhere. So the CD is still alive and well, even if some of the ones you've burned over the years are already starting to go.

Does that make it a zombie format, one that is alive when people think it is or should be dead? No yet. People are still buying them and using them, but it is an amusing footnote to all the rush for the next thing that the format that helped bring us all into the current age of tech remains viable long after its technical fidelity peaked. We'll see how much longer it holds out.

This originally appeared as the homepage essay for the mid to late 2018.