The Last VCRs Ever Will Be Made This Month

[Nutso]

http://www.popularmechanics.com/technol ... -last-vcr/

Even after they're obsolete, technologies can take a long time to fully die out. It was only in 2011, after all, that the last typewriter factory shutdown. And now, at long last, it appears the videocassette recorder is suffering the same fate: Funai Electric, the last company known to make VCRs, is ceasing production.

Funai has a long history with the VHS format and VCRs. In 1980, it launched the CVC Player, the first ever compact cassette recorder, which attempted to compete with the more popular VHS and Betamax formats. Funai's website notes that the CVC "attracted a great deal of interest when Japanese television broadcasters used these for a program on climbing Mt. Everest," but they were no match for the more popular formats. In 1983 Funai started making VCRs of their own, applying technology used in the CVC, and haven't stopped until the end of this month.

[Jim]

I was not aware that they were still being made. Who is still buying new VCRs?

[Teaos]

Security companies.

[Tinadrin Chelnor]

I was not aware that they were still being made. Who is still buying new VCRs?

My mother just recently got one, as she picks up a fair few VHS's in charity shops.

[McAvoy]

They are used for recording video for physical copies. Why they haven't been surpassed for CDs by this point, I have no idea but probably motivated by cost and maybe stubbornness.

[Graham Kennedy]

I found a 2014 Gallup poll that indicated that more than half of American homes still had a VCR in them!

[Teaos]

Not surprising, people don't throw stuff away. You have 20 years of the tapes, you need a player to watch them.

[Mikey]

Indeed, I have a VHS player for the old Disney movies that I had, which have now become the province of my kids.

[McAvoy]

I did hang onto my VHS tapes for a long time too but if you go to flea markets they have them for $1 each. So movies like Disney, you could easily upgrade for $20.

That and DVDs take up less space.

[Mikey]

Just never got around to it... They are a temporary fancy at best, and anything I want to have permanently is now owned digitally. Even less space required than DVD's.

[RK_Striker_JK_5]

I've still got a VCR, but don't really use it. Almost all of my movies and whatnot have been replaced by DVDs.

[McAvoy]

Parents had one until last year. They don't throw anything away but I do. Whem I told them they,had no use for it because they no longer had any tapes to play they allowed me to throw it away.