I wonder how many times this cycle will repeat itself- Record Companies
fail to understand, and attempt to stifle, new technology and formats:
From "A history of vinyl" from the BBC website:
"The record industry had spent the first twenty years of the century
convincing the public that they needed a source of music in the home
but they didn't foresee the possibility that it may be free.
Unfortunately, The Radio Corporation of America (RCA) had by the early
1920s started mass-producing commercial radios which, while
acoustically inferior, offered a far wider range of news, drama and
music. The Record Companies retaliated by drawing up contracts for
their major artists, forbidding them to work for this rival medium.
This move to limit radio's output was doomed to failure as new vacuum
tube amplification rapidly improved reception and sound quality. Record
sales plummeted."
