40 years after the first VHS video cassette recorder rolled off the production line, the last known company making the devices is ceasing production. According to Japanese newspaper Nikkei , Funai Electric, a Japanese consumer electronics company, will give up on the format by the end of the July after 30 years of production.
[...] While the Funai brand might not be well-known in the west, the company sold VCRs under the more familiar Sanyo brand in China and North America.
[...] At its peak, Funai Electric sold as many as 15 million VCRs per year, but last year only sold 750,000 units.
[...] Betamax players, which were the chief competitor of VCRs back in the 1980s, were discontinued back in 2002. However, tapes were made up until November 2015, when Sony finally announced that Betamax tapes would stop being produced in Japan. While losing the home-recording war, Betamax kind of lives on: Betamax was the basis for Betacam, which is still used in broadcasting.
Do any Soylentils still have a VCR? If so, how long has it been since you last used it? What did you watch?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 22 2016, @12:41AM
Two or three years ago I bought a used VCR for $5 and watched some pre-recorded tapes that someone had given to me in a big trash bag. The selection from the trash bag included early versions of the early Star Wars movies.
(Score: 4, Funny) by Tork on Friday July 22 2016, @12:47AM
Slashdolt Logic: "25 year old jokes about sharks and lasers are +5, Funny." 💩
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 22 2016, @01:02AM
I had two trash bags tacked to the side of my VCR for years but my wife threw them away so the experiment was over.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Friday July 22 2016, @02:17AM
Those might actually have some value. It's difficult to find an unmolested copy of the original Star Wars movies.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 22 2016, @12:49AM
I went internet instead when TV went digital because I liked analog snow and broadcast ATSC artifacts are hideous.
The last VHS tape I watched was "Dr. Who and the Daleks" which I had finally gotten around to renting because of the then-recent revival of Doctor Who. I threw out my VCR after seeing "Dr. Who" was a non-canon travesty of a movie.
(Score: 2) by edIII on Friday July 22 2016, @12:51AM
I *long* ago transferred everything I had on VHS tapes to digital and no longer require a working unit. Anybody that has a need for such things can probably find cheap converters now that will decently back up that VHS tape to blank DVD. I myself hacked a ReplayTV to use its encoder and transferred every tape to disk. It was all family stuff, vacations, old Disney movies, and what not. Not tons of porn on VHS that needed to be saved for posterity... ;)
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
(Score: 2) by JNCF on Friday July 22 2016, @01:14AM
But can you turn a DVD into a credit card? [youtube.com]
(Score: 2) by edIII on Friday July 22 2016, @01:54AM
Ok, John Connor :)
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 22 2016, @08:57AM
You can recode almost any magstripe card with a magstripe writer.
I kept a video parlor card in my wallet for years, with its magstripe having my VISA account number encoded in it.
The idea being that I did not want to carry my VISA card with me, but if I needed it at an ATM, I could use it to withdraw from my account.
I figured that if I were ever held up, the bandits would not know it was actually usable as a VISA card, and probably would not haul my ass over to an ATM, to be compelled to withdraw funds in exchange for not being cut up. At the time, I was working in an area I flat did not want to have much on me at all. Being I was using public transportation at the time, I had no need to carry anything on me that would give anyone any ideas or give away where I lived. They would get my lunch money and that would be about it.
No fraud intended or committed. I used it on my own money. The card was just the way of entering the account number.
(Score: 2) by art guerrilla on Friday July 22 2016, @10:41AM
i like that, very clever, very neat, very simple...
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 22 2016, @01:02AM
Have one of those combo dvd/vhs player, but it's been boxed up for a few years now. I will pass it down to whoever proves to be most filial. Bastards.
(Score: 2) by SomeGuy on Friday July 22 2016, @01:50AM
I actually still have my VCR hooked up to my old CRT TV along with the OTA Digital TV converter box. At one point a long time ago I had planned to put together some fancy Linux based media center, but slowly that went down hill as there was just less and less watchable content on TV. Never even added a DVD player - I use my good old PC for that (running Windows 95 :P and it gave me high quality video long before HDTV).
There was some show I recorded not too long ago because it was on too late, but now that I think of it I never did get around to watching that :P
Perhaps a good time to pick up one of the last off the assembly line here. Although thankfully Goodwill loves to sell used ones. They don't yet have some hangup about containing toxic materials (CRT TVs/monitors) or containing personal data (old, even vintage computers - Do not give anything with an MFM/RLL hard drive to those chipper-shredder loving bastards).
Perhaps I should dig out one of my old tapes and pop it in sometime just for shits. Original Transformers, Dr. Who, Star Trek TOS, Babylon 5, MST3k, perhaps a random movie from back when they actually showed movies on TV. Or not.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 22 2016, @02:05AM
I picked up a Daewoo DVD/VHS player at a local Goodwill for a pittance six years ago or so. The last thing I watched with it was The Big Lebowski. I donated it back to Goodwill a couple months ago while downsizing for a cross country move.
A few days later I realized I had left The Dude in the VHS player when I donated it... A terrible loss to say the least.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 22 2016, @02:11AM
Also a newish player (probably from the Japanese company that just stopped making them) bought 2-3 years ago just so I could play them.
They're all commercial tapes, nothing homemade. There are a bunch that are related to various recreational sports, that are out of print. Some are worth watching multiple times, in other words it's not just beginner instruction.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by damnbunni on Friday July 22 2016, @02:26AM
About a month ago. I watched 'The Adventures of the American Rabbit'.
... look, I liked it when I was a kid, okay? It's a nostalgia thing.
(Score: 3, Informative) by JNCF on Friday July 22 2016, @08:37AM
The American Rabbit V.S. The Mighty Buzzard [youtube.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 22 2016, @08:13AM
My friend said it was the most energetic concert he's ever been to. Lead Singer Dexter is... 51 years old now, and seemed to enjoy himself. I wonder how his PhD is progressing.
One of the songs dated itself by mentioning the VCR.
https://youtu.be/dQ_kwxmaJ3U?t=72 [youtu.be]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 22 2016, @09:44AM
I have a VCR, but probably have not watched anything in 7 or more years. It's not plugged in, but it quetly sits in the TV thing, so i let it.
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Friday July 22 2016, @04:04PM
I still have tapes to digitize, and bought a VCR when I ran across a fifteen dollar gizmo that's supposed to do the job. Haven't gotten it to work yet. It's a shame, because I have a tape of my kids when they were preteens.
Carbon, The only element in the known universe to ever gain sentience
(Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Friday July 22 2016, @05:12PM
Used it last week to view a tape found in my late father's effects.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 23 2016, @03:19AM
Just want to say; I recently bought the original model of off-the-shelf VHS Players ever widely sold in a america off craigslist for something like $20. When it's worth 100x that for the hipsters in 10 years, I will relish *this* moment.
mu-ah-ah-ah-ah!
(Score: 2) by Squidious on Saturday July 23 2016, @12:32PM
Last movies watched were the original Star Wars trilogy when my daughter had a party with her friends just for that purpose.
Plus we still have lots of family vids that yet need converting to digital.
The terrorists have won, game, set, match. They've scared the people into electing authoritarian regimes.