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THE new year looks set to be an unhappy one for the music industry. First,
the price of CD recording machines is plummeting, along with the cost of the
discs, so consumers will have a cheap, easy way to make home recordings. The
second blow is that the record companies’ attempts to impose a levy to
compensate for losses due to home recording have been undermined by a new piece
of software.

Philips, which makes at least half the CD recorders sold, estimates that a
total of 2 million recorders were sold in 1997 and 5 million will sell this
year. The first CD-recorders used CD-R, write-once blanks, and cost
£1000.

New recorders, for use with a PC or hifi, cost under £400 and can use
either CD-R blanks or erasable CD-ReWritable discs. CD-RWs rely on phase change
technology, in which a coating of rare earth material switches between amorphous
and crystalline states when struck by a laser beam. This changes its
reflectivity, allowing it to be read by another laser.

A further big breakthrough is the price of the discs. CD-R discs are now
available at just £1 for use with computers, and £5 for music
recordings. CD-RW discs are still expensive at £20, but the price will
fall with mass production.

In an effort to protect its income, the music industry has insisted that the
blank discs for music recording and those for storing computer data be made
slightly different, so that a levy can be imposed on blank music CDs. In many
countries, the music blanks now carry an extra levy to compensate for potential
lost revenue.

Both the music and computer discs have a groove in the surface to guide the
laser during recording. The groove undulates slightly to provide the recorder
with timing information. Music blanks undulate slightly differently from blanks
that are used on computers.

The situation with levies is something of a shambles: many countries have yet
to decide whether to impose them. Even in the free trade area of the European
Union, the amounts charged vary between countries.

But now computer software company Adaptec has undermined the whole concept of
split pricing and consumer levies by releasing software called Easy-CD, which
lets a PC recorder make audio recordings on computer blanks. The discs will play
back on an ordinary CD player.

Until last month, CD-RW recorders would only allow the disc to be reused
after all the stored information had been erased. But Philips’ new models allow
users to erase any file or recording they choose, much as on a floppy disc.

The music industry is unlikely to arouse much sympathy with consumers. The
cost of pressing discs has dropped to around 30 pence, while the retail price of
CDs is around £15.