Compact discs, or CDs, appeared on the recording media scene and rapidly became the standard, demand for them growing in leaps and bounds. But their position as market leader was a passing thing. As digital recording media they are still used but in ever smaller numbers, as the graphic shows. Part of the decline in production is the result of production going overseas. But a shift in how we record and store digital information is the primary cause for the decline of CDs.
Today’s market size is the value of U.S. manufacturer shipments of CDs in 2009. These values refer to blank CDs, to the storage media and not products later sold and distributed on that compact disc media.
Geographic reference: United States
Year: 2009
Market size: $4.27 billion
Source: “Table 1139. Recording Media—Manufacturers Shipments and Value: 2000 to 2009,” Statistical Abstract of the United States: 2011, January 20, 2011, page 716, available online here.
Original source: U.S. Census Bureau
Amazing chart — once more showing that we excel in farming production out to others, a recent subject of discussion in our circle.
Very true.
However, a significant shift in technology is also at play here. CDs used in the music industry are disappearing. With movies and transfers of data, flash drives and direct downloads are eating away at the CD space. And have you purchase software online lately. If you want it on CD you have to pay extra… which, of course, we always do but the point is that software is not longer regularly distributed on CD.
I realize this is not news to you. Just thought I’d add to a comment chain that is… real!
In actuality, aging out of the hand-held scene and never having been a consumer of music, I did *not* know. But, of course, I’d noted the software phenomenon with genuine irritation.