Vice: Does Anyone in the World Still Buy CDs?

Oh yeah, I get that. And I'm older, I'm thinking about how to dispose of all my crap so my daughter doesn't have to. I buy far fewer albums than I did before in total. By a whopping margin. But when there is music I really want to live with, I want a physical copy.

 

The article is stupid because it's wrong. Plenty of people are buying cd's. It may not be as much as it once was or as much as downloads but it's very common.

Hard drives crash and even with a backup, it's a huge pain. A physical disk will last you the rest of your life. I like a shelf full of cd's. A computer full of files isn't as much fun.

 

I graduated with a journalism degree in 1999. One of my professors won a Pulitzer for Vietnam War reporting. The absolute crumbling of journalistic standards in the past two decades is shocking. Without getting into anything specific, the disregard for neutrality and the purposeful polarization around hot button topics is going to have some very disturbing consequence eventually. I am now at sea when I look for an impartial piece. They do not exist.

 

But then Vice is a bit s**t, isn't it? Some of their travelogue pieces are still pretty good, but since Gavin McInnes was canned/quit it's essentially become Gawker or Mic.com with more swearing.

 

I know it well, been in the journalism biz for most of my adult live, and been involved in the internet side of it since launch a net biz in '95. I've lived through the whole transition and live day to day with the various pressures. TMZ is really THE model, the most successful "news" media enterprise of the last 20 years. (And btw, Vice does pay, though I dunno what it's scale iss, but it reportedly does half a billion a year in revenue and it spends).

 

I buy cds and I make mix cds.

 

What's odd to me and makes little sense, is all the non-audiophiles I see in the local chain of music/movie/game stores picking through the vinyl record section. There are thousands of used/new CDs in these stores and maybe a hundred vinyl record titles. LOL. And no, it's not for the sound quality. These folks do not have thousands into a proper turntable rig.

Anyhow, the anti-CD and pro-download members posting here should keep in mind that many of us have carefully selected CDs/SACDs which contain the best mastering work for a given title. When the audiophile computer front end is as well vetted and affordable as I expect in a couple years, then I can easily get on board. Plus, I'll have a physical back-up.

 

Got my journalism degree in 1990 and agree completely.

 

Still buying CDs. Lots of them. Have no plans to stop any time soon. Or in the distant future. Ever, really.

In the 1970s they could have written an article about how odd it is for anyone to buy LPs when there's so much free music on the radio.

 

I've been buying more CDs than ever lately. If it's a choice between spending $10 for a used LP of questionable provenance vs. $5 for a brand new CD on Amazon, I'll take the CD almost every time.

Buying used CDs is now the cheapest way to build your music collection (assuming you can find them) and there were plenty of great albums, and hundreds of great compilations, released in the 90s and 2000s on CD.

 

The best comment of them all is "Everything is useless when you think about it"

 

I will only do downloads as a last resort (like the previous issue of All Things Must Pass), or if a download of the album in high res is free (like with some of the SDEs). I have possibly four or five I obtained that way. Even then I roll my own DVD-As from the downloaded file. Paying for a download is like buying air. I own about 3500 CDs and buy at least one a week, in some stretches, one a day (more than 10 this week). If I decide to sell them, I can actually get money for them. Try that with downloads. In general, no physical product means no sale.

I understand that those under 35 feel differently, but a lot of them also listen in crappy fidelity on crappy equipment via a streaming service. Under those conditions, I probably wouldn't think music was worth paying for either, and that's a big part of what's killed the music business.

 

I still buy new releases/reissues from my favorite artists, but:
I burn the CD into lossless and play it on digital devices, so the CD gets used only once.

 

You go ahead without me and get that Tweetstorm goin'. I'm fine with being a laughingstock but only on my own terms.

D.D.

 

As the yrs go by here we'll be seeing much more of this type of contempt for people (older/younger) that BELIEVE in stuff or have values or KNOW anything about anything. Seriously, this is part of the growing disdain for people who are not streamlined & part of that herd.
I realize that my fellow adults created this atmosphere when they turned out to be a cultureless, history-ignorant herd as equally addicted to iphones as their kids are.
These people are allowing a device absolutely dictate what they're capable of enjoying & understanding. Think about that!

 

I stopped reading at "us good people". I got this far in the thread though. That's been entertaining.

 

But then again, who are you to judge, right ?

D.D.

 

stopped buying CD's years ago. vinyl & download code is enough for me.

cd's are just landfill. there is no point to them in 2016. a plastic jewel case and tiny bit of card sleeve contributes nothing to my listening experience. I stream AIFF / AAC files to my system and that's enough for me in the digital realm.

 

This a great era for buying second-hand CDs.

The peak for buying vinyl was early- to mid-1990s. No one wanted LPs, and before eBay and internet access, no one knew what anything was, let along what it was worth.

The savvy buyer does not follow trends.

 

I just bought Zep BBC on CD - awesome - didn't feeling like spending the unnecessary cash to by the vinyl.

 

I don't see the point of buying an album on vinyl if it wasn't originally mastered for vinyl, i.e. prior to the 90s (approximately). Even then, I would rather search out a used copy -- where you know that it was mastered from analog tapes -- than buy some crapshoot new reissue for $20+. For anything recorded (or, in the case of Zep/BBC, compiled and mastered) in the digital era, CD (or 24-bit download) seems like the obvious format choice.

 

Beats the hell out of the "download complete" message, doesn't it.

 

(1) People, in general, should not talk like this.

(2) People who are (presumably) getting paid to write should not write like this.

(3) It does not surprise me that someone who would talk and write like this would write an "article" such as this one.

 

I need more Bran in my diet, I become apocalyptic at the drop of a hat these days

 

I feel like I am in a twilight zone episode, the last buyer of CD's on earth.

just me, 1 of my cousins, and allegedly folks on this forum, who may not really exist as I have never met them.