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Volume 16, Spring 2004 |
Arts & Leisure
Rewinding the Popularity of Cassettes
Copy Chief
Most people are too infatuated with CDs, MP3s and other alphabet soup media to take notice of where cassettes have gone. Cassettes - you know - that non-digital, rectangular, plastic-driven format that used tape? The format that replaced the eight-track - remember? If your memory needs refreshing, do not turn to a nearby record store to find any answers.
One major chain store, FYE, delegates only the back-wall to the format that once spanned each wall, floor to ceiling.
One major chain store, FYE, delegates only the back-wall to the format that once spanned each wall, floor to ceiling. Some independent stores refuse to stock cassettes, and those that sell used music do not sell them either. In Toms River, N.J., Smiley's Tunes and Toys has gone decidedly un-tune and pumped up the toy aspect, foregoing cassette-tape shelf space. The store slashed prices on cassettes to $5.99 or less.
Compact discs outsell cassettes by the millions, according to the Recording Industry Association of America. In 1993 consumers bought 339.5 million cassettes, while in 2002, the number dropped to only 31.1 million. Compare that to the sale of CDs. Now hurt by downloaded music, 2000 was a record year (pardon the pun) for CDs, selling 942.5 million units. Cassette sales for that year were 76.0 million.
"There's really no use for cassettes anymore," said music lover Gregory C. Snipe, of Manchester , N.J.
"There's really no use for cassettes anymore," said music lover Gregory C. Snipe, of Manchester, N.J. "With the current options available, cassettes do not have one pro, but have a whole list of cons."
Snipe lists deteriorating sound quality and flimsy design as two big negatives to the format.
"If the sound quality's not there, what's the point?" he asks. Yet in his car, the only way to listen to music other than on the radio is through a cassette player. In order to listen to music on his format of choice, Snipe says he has a cassette tape-to-CD adapter he uses to listen to his CDs, which number about 100. "I don't even know where my cassettes are," Snipe says.
In his thesis, "The Rise of the Compact Disc at the Expense of the Cassette," Josh Holdreith examines the rate of decline in cassettes purchases. He based his study on data from the RIAA. Holdreith found that the ratio between CDs and cassettes bought was about 1: -0.5. That his results show a negative cassette ratio denotes that whenever a CD is bought a cassette will not be bought. His findings underline how one medium is being substituted for another, and that a format is becoming obsolete. In this case, obsolesce belongs to the cassettes.
"Their [CD] sales have increased very rapidly in the past decade, so cassette sales have dropped rapidly because the two are substitutes," Holdreith said. "This means that the rise of the compact disc was definitely a major factor in the decline of the cassette."
According to the St. James Encyclopedia of Pop Culture (2002), cassettes are still widely used, mainly in cars.
The decline in cassette sales from year to year was 18 percent back in 1994. Now, sales of the format dropped 40.8 percent, according to the RIAA. However, according to the St. James Encyclopedia of Pop Culture (2002), cassettes are still widely used, mainly in cars. Although 2003 models come with a CD player standard (many manufacturers charge extra to put a cassette player instead), there is a massive fleet of cars on the road that are not new, and therefore are equipped with cassette players. The encyclopedia also says that the cassette tape remains the dominant form of sound recording worldwide.
Ironically, when Phillips introduced cassettes in 1962, the format's sound quality was decidedly sub par to records. Manufacturers instead pushed cassettes as a technology that was in the same vein as transistor radios: it didn't have a high sound quality going for it, but it was more portable than an LP. In the cassette tapes' heyday, the 1980s, boomboxes and Sony Walkmans were popular. Yet as early as 1991, CDs signaled a shift in format. While superior in sound quality, CDs were also portable.
According to Now & Then Records, an independent music store in Hazlet , N.J. , consumers remain attached to the cassette format, unwilling to let it go.
What did cassettes have going for them after that? According to Now & Then Records, an independent music store in Hazlet , N.J. , consumers remain attached to the cassette format, unwilling to let it go. The store specializes in so-called dead formats, stocking its shelves high with records, cassettes, even eight-tracks. Employees there insist that these formats, cassettes in particular, are not dead. Look into most people's homes and you will find a stereo that still has a cassette tape deck, maybe two. People still have the equipment, and until the last cassette player is destroyed, the store will keep selling the format in order to cater to that specialized costumer.
So it does seem that cassettes have gone the way of the eight-track, but as of this writing, they are hanging on stubbornly by a thread.
Many are quick to call cassettes "history," and the signs are all there that tapes are just that; bins of the stuff line flea market and garage sale tables. So it does seem that cassettes have gone the way of the eight-track, but as of this writing, they are hanging on stubbornly by a thread , or perhaps by magnetic tape. The "record" industry has pronounced it dead, and consumers are starting to agree. So, take out that big box of cassette tapes from your basement or bottom drawer and get nostalgic. Behind the white noise of the deteriorating magnetic tape are some fond memories.
Catherine E. Galioto, a junior journalism/professional writing major at The College of New Jersey, is the unbound Copy Chief; so if you find any mistakes, please blame her. She is also a freelance writer with several accolades who appears regularly in more than seven publications. Outside of that, things get much harder to define.