I have a few thousand LP's.
For you younger folks that would be "vinyl." For you older folks,
"records." The correct term is LP for Long Playing records. Vinyl LP
records came out in the mid 1950's and were replaced with CD's in the
mid 1980's. That means that all of the music recorded in the classical
era of rock and country was originally released on vinyl records.
The advantage of CD's was that
they were cheaper to make and could be sold at a premium price, so the
profit was much higher. A side benefit was that the manufacturing
process was more consistent, so on the average, the sound quality was
better. They were also easier to handle and store than LP's and CD
players could be made smaller and shake resistant so they could be
installed in automobiles. The down side for us visual artist types was
that the cover art of a 5 inch CD was less than a fourth the size of a
12 inch LP.
So now I have thousands of
vinyl records, all of which I have owned for over 30 years, that I am
trying to decide if I should digitize. When people call for a quote to
digitize all of their old slides or negatives, I ask them why they want
to do that. If it is to preserve them, I usually talk them out of it
because they already have a permanent original. If it is for easy
access, great. Digital is much easier to share, print, or use in a
publication.
It is the same decision I need
to make with my old records. The original vinyl records are valuable
artifacts, but if I want an easier way to access, share, or listen to
music, having the whole collection cataloged on a hard drive would be
amazing. Having all that music on a USB drive to play in my car would
also be very cool.
