Sam Grobart has written a very humorous piece for the New York Times titled Daddy, What Were Compact Discs which illustrates how technology has changed how we listen to music and watch TV over the last fifty odd years. I had to chuckle over the formats Grobart mentions because I too used to have not just LPs, VHS tapes and DVDs but laser discs, cassette tapes, standard CDs and gold CDs. And today, I have a handful of CDs and DVDs; however, most of the television shows and movies I watch, and music I listen too is digital –streaming to my HDTV or playing on my one of my iPods so of course there is no physical format for those movies, TV shows or albums.
And the article does indeed make the point that today music and video formats are in the process of transitioning from physical CDs and DVDs to the digital format, which unlike former formats cannot be held in your hand. Thus in the future young kids won’t understand what physical formats for audio, video and reading are unless you explain it to them because all the videos they watch, the music they listen and the books they read will be digital!
And of course I’m sure public libraries will still have physical books on their shelves so most kids will see paper books when the visit their local public library and will understand what they are – but compact discs and VHS tapes – those will indeed be a mystery!
Here’s a link to the New York Times article:
Linda R.
Tech & Book Talk at SSCL 