25th Anniversary of the Compact Disc Today

Man, I still remember getting my first CD player and my first CD. It wasn't 25 years ago, the day CDs first rolled off an assembly line in Germany, but it wasn't too long after. I can remember well my teenage awe over the prismatic effect on the flipside, as well as delving into the footnotes about what those little As and Ds (in square boxes) on the back cover meant. When would I be able to find a DDD disc, I wondered.

Today the compact disc turns 25, a milestone for one of technology's biggest success stories. At the time, CDs were seen as a pricey replacement for vinyl, cassettes, and even 8-tracks, but the digital novelty caught on fast. Everything clicked for the CD: They didn't degrade like analog media did, stood up to moderately rough handling (unlike vinyl), and were quite portable, too. 25 years later, CDs are still the source of the vast majority of revenues in the record industry.

At the time, I doubt anyone saw how CDs would impact the computer business. In the 1980s, floppy discs (even old 5.25" floppies) were the norm, but the idea of using CDs for data storage on a computer was staggering: A CD could hold over 400 times the amount of information than a floppy could. The first CD-ROM arrived in 1985, with software shipping on CD in 1987. By the time the CD-R arrived in 1990, consumers were practically drooling for its high-capacity storage capabilities. CD-R remains popular today, practically as a disposable storage medium.

Age 25 may be too soon for a eulogy, but signs are clear that the era of the CD may soon be coming to an end. Internet-based, media-free audio is rapidly on the rise (and CD sales are in free fall), while the once-gigantic capacity of a CD-R has now reached the point where it is useful only for the occasional offloading of pictures and (short) videos to your friends. Even DVD technology, which can store 8GB on a double-layer disc, is looking sketchy at this point, as high-definition alternatives take root.

Still, the CD's got some life left in it yet. In celebration of its birthday, see if you can find the first CD you ever purchased and give it a listen: Unless you've scratched it up, it'll sound exactly the way it did when you bought it. (Whether the music is any good any more is another blog post.)

That may not sound like much of a feat any more, but try the same trick with an audio tape from the '80s and see how it sounds... if you can find the equipment to play it at all!

Happy birthday, CD!