VHS

The Video Home System (VHS) is a standard for consumer-level use of analog recording on videotape cassettes. It was developed by Victor Company of Japan (JVC) in the 1970s.

From the 1950s magnetic tape video recording became a major contributor to the television industry, via the first commercialized video tape recorders (VTRs). At that time, the devices were used only in expensive professional environments such as television studios and medical imaging (fluoroscopy). In the 1970s videotape entered home use, creating the home video industry and changing the economics of the television and movie businesses. The television industry viewed VCRs as having the power to disrupt their business, while television users viewed the VCR as the means to take control of their hobby.

In the 1980s and 1990s, at the peak of VHS's popularity, there were videotape format wars in the home video industry. Two of the formats, VHS and Betamax, received the most media exposure. VHS eventually won the war, succeeding as the dominant home video format throughout the tape media period.

LP record

The LP (long play), or 33 ¹⁄₃ rpm microgroove vinyl record, is a format for phonograph (gramophone) records, an analog sound storage medium. Introduced by Columbia Records in 1948, it was soon adopted as a new standard by the entire record industry. Apart from relatively minor refinements and the important later addition of stereophonic sound capability, it has remained the standard format for vinyl albums.

Format advantages

At the time the LP was introduced, nearly all phonograph records for home use were made of an abrasive (and therefore noisy) shellac compound, employed a much larger groove, and played at approximately 78 revolutions per minute (rpm), limiting the playing time of a 12-inch diameter record to less than five minutes per side. The new product was a 12- or 10-inch (30 or 25 cm) fine-grooved disc made of vinyl and played with a smaller-tipped "microgroove" stylus at a speed of 33 ¹⁄₃ rpm. Each side of a 12-inch LP could play for more than 20 minutes. Only the microgroove standard was truly new, as both vinyl and the 33 ¹⁄₃ rpm speed had been used for special purposes for many years, as well as in one unsuccessful earlier attempt to introduce a long-playing record for home use.