Cassettes

One of the types of media to go by the wayside is the audio cassette. It was originally patented by the Philips Corporation (of Holland). They might have shared the patent with another company.

Anyhow, back when it was going strong, I bought these four state-of-the-art versions by four different manufacturers. They are very cool. The Sony has a ceramic housing, and the TDK uses various metal parts in the housing. Maxell seemed to be more into the tape formulation. (If you double-click on the image, you can see it in more detail.)

I think I collected these because I've always been fascinated by packaging.

And, as you can see, Mr. Thurston Moore of Sonic Youth thought they were the hot way to get sound - in October 2006. (The tape shown in that little article is a Maxell, circa about 1977.)

By the way, I scanned the cassettes, rather than shooting them with my digital camera. (They would have probably come out better if I had photographed them!)