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A number of people these days are no longer using CDs as their
music
format, instead using online music downloading services, such as
Itunes and Music match, and then downloading that music onto
their
Ipod, Zune, or whatever.
I am not particularly fond of this sort of thing, because many
online
music stores use a non-standard format-and if the company that
runs
that service also makes MP3 players, you're often "stuck" with only
using their products (or your computer) to play the stuff you
downloaded from their site. Also, in my opinion, MP3 players get
"messed up" more often than CD players break down- I've had CD
players last for over 10 years!!! Also, if you're not very tech-savvy,
a
lot of problems with MP3 players will make you want to tear your
hair out! And when you live with people who can easily solve most
software-related MP3 player snafus, these problems almost always
happen when the only person who can fix it isn't home.
CDs are still alive and well as a music format, but they're never
going to be as popular as they once were due to the proliferation
of
Ipods- and with online music stores, the process of simply buying a
CD, ripping it and putting it on your Ipod has fallen into disuse.
Nonetheless, CDs and CD players are still being sold, and I doubt
they'll really go away any time soon. They've been around for a
long
time, but maybe it's time a new "disk format" for music came
around.
In my opinion, the best way to do this with today's technology
would
be to simply have a small flash memory card with several MP3 files
pre-installed, and then the card could be sold alongside CDs, and
an
appropriate player also be made. The card ideally would have
"album
art" on it and/or a list of the songs on the card. You've seen CD
players with Ipod docks- Now, imagine a slot on your boom box for
a
small card similar to one you would use in a digital camera. You
insert the card into your stereo and then press "play" just like a
CD.
This would fare better in portable applications than CDs would,
because they would not be as prone to damage and the players
wont
take as much power as a disk that turns round while at the same
time powering a laser. Portable players of this media would most
likely be pretty reasonable size, smaller than a DS lite but bigger
than the Ipod shuffle. A small black-and-white LCD display to
show
how much power is left in the batteries, the track number etc.
should be adequate-or if you really want to cut corners, a power-
on
light and a "replace the batteries" light-no screen is really
necessary
because you're not selecting playlists or changing ambiguous
settings-
basically nothing any more complicated than your average CD
player.
This would be great for those who don't have a large amount of
free
space on their computer-or people like me who aren't fond of on-
demand downloading. Of course, you can still BUY CDS and stereos
that play them, and I personally think they're good enough, but
some
people may disagree due to the fact that they are easily damaged-
more so than a memory card-type media would.
Wikipedia: Minidisk
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minidisk
[jutta, Dec 07 2008]
Wikipedia: Memory Stick
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memory_Stick
Intended for music players, among other things. [jutta, Dec 07 2008]
Music on a USB memory device
http://news.bbc.co....ainment/6065656.stm
UK band Keane released a single that was sold on a USB memory device back in 2006. I think that the Fratellis followed a year later. [Jinbish, Dec 09 2008]
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Annotation:
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(-) Switching to yet another storage format doesn't address the standardization-, usability-, and reliability problems you're complaining about. (It may get better, it may get worse, just another spin of the wheel.) I'd rather just stay digital - I can't help but feel that shuffling little pieces of hardware about with information fixed on them is cumbersome and a waste of storage.
(Your mileage obviously varies, and that's fine.) |
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You're aware of the post-CD media attempts by e.g. Sony? |
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Oh didn't know about those minidisk things, srry. |
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Anyways, the idea wasnt just to have an MP3 player accept
memory cards, but they would actually sell the cards with
the music already ON THE CARD-like a CD. |
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PERSONALLY my "milage" with CDs is fine, but again, your
milage may vary. I just think that using some kind of disk
or card instead of just downloading crap is a better idea,
coz they seem more reliable and more "plug-and-play" in
the end, but CDs have been out for over 10 years, and
some people may think it's time for a change |
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I could swear that I've seen usb sticks sold with music on them... |
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{I remember the MiniDisk advert with a song by the band 'Reef': "If you know where I'm at, I might get a kick from that...} |
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MiniDisks are awesome - yes, there's a level of physical storage and maintenance that you don't have to do with digital files - but I quite like the simple link between object and content. Has anyone tried to organise their iTunes from inside the iPod? Or does everyone else end up listening to all the bands beginning with "A" all the time - I wouldn't mind, but "Prince Charming" is getting on my nerves (ridicule is nothing to be scared of). |
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Keeping a 'library' requires having the means to interface that library in a suitable way - and as cool as it is to have a solid-state 100Gb disk with all the music from all time stored on it, it's useless if all I get to listen to by the time I get to work is bloody Aswad. Currently, the only way to interface my library is by turning on my computer, waiting for it to boot up, choosing my 'tunes' application creating a playlist, and then synching that up with my portable media device - all of which is fine - playlists are cool - but I could have been out of the house 15 minutes earlier if I'd been limited to making a selection from one of my object d'audio. |
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In other words, if my 'media' is in a physical form, I can stop at the shelf where it lives on my way out in the morning, and think to myself "Hmm, I fancy a bit of Zodiac Mindwarp today" |
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Ideally, the form would be something like cheap little chewing-gum like slivers of plastic that you can stack, flick through, write on, write-protect and generally interface with manually. The player would ingest one of these slivers, reading it without making any electrical connections, allowing the slivers to remain waterproof, scratchproof and generally all-over-everything-proof. |
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// In other words, if my 'media' is in a physical form, I can stop at the shelf where it lives on my way out in the morning, and think to myself "Hmm, I fancy a bit of Zodiac Mindwarp today" |
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That doesn't appear all that different from me scrolling through the list of bands or records on my iPod, picking out one of them, and pushing two buttons that cause the device to play all the titles in the selected group. Except I can do it without being anywhere near my shelf. |
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It depends on the ratio between how many bands you have on your iPod, and how many of those bands you might want to listen to. |
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I had one of those old lcd scroll-wheel ipods, which decided in the end to only work on one half of the scroll-wheel, making the whole thing a bit of an effort - so perhaps I just had a poor experience. |
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Since the shelf is decidedly low-tech, short of a catastrophic shelving failure, while much less portable, it's likely to be more robust than any consumer electronics. (Let's overlook for the moment that I still need to rely on consumer electronics to play my MD or CD collection - but that's still a separate thing to storage, and the library type functions that come with that storage) |
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I'm not saying it should have an absurdly large amount of
music on one big card, but selling many small card holding
about 2 hours worth of music. the cards have album art
stickers on them, and they are small enough to carry a few
in your pocket. They are not really susceptible to
scratching, and memory cards in general tend to be
somewhat robust in terms of being carried around loose.
you simply insert the card and press play. You can fast-
forward, skip tracks, etc. anything you could do with CDs.
There are also blank ones that you can put your own music
on, with blank labels that can be written on. |
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Maybe the record companies should just start distributing
their music on an existing memory card format-such as SD
cards-and music players could then simply have a slot for
an SD card-which some players do, but it's uncommon. |
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The reason I thought of this to begin with is that online
music stores place various restrictions on how you can use
your own files. For example, some won't allow you to
"copy" it to more than one computer. Also, if the company
that operates the online store makes MP3 players, they
generally make the music ONLY work on THEIR players!
Some won't even support burning the music to a CD! Yes, I
know you can get past this if you're so inclined-and it IS
legal to make copies of things *FOR YOUR OWN USE* but
knowing how to do it is the problem-and even if you do
know how to do it, I highly doubt it's as straightforward as
just "ripping" a CD or DVD |
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THAT is why I prefer to use some type of disk for music and
videos- you can (usually) rip them to any format you want
with the appropriate computer software, play them on a
far, far wider range of players reguardless of the company
that makes the player, let friends borrow it, bring it on
trip,(which of course you can do with an ipod as well but
you have to fuss with the computer to put new music on
it) use as a frisbee (: OK I was joking on that last one :)
and so on. |
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