Compact cassette

The compact cassette is an enclosed magnetic-tape format introduced by Philips in 1963. Its two reels move a narrow tape past a recording head for audio playback or recording.

Magnetic tape sound recording: A method of storing sound as magnetic patterns on moving tape. The cassette is a compact implementation of this recording method.
Philips: A Dutch multinational electronics company founded in 1891. Philips developed and introduced the compact cassette.
Portable cassette player: A battery-powered device designed to play compact cassettes while carried or worn. Portable players made cassette listening mobile and personal.
Microcassette: A miniature cassette format developed for voice recording and other compact applications. It was smaller than the compact cassette but generally less suited to high-fidelity music.
Cassette culture: A set of social practices built around making, exchanging, and listening to cassette recordings. Low-cost copying turned the cassette into a medium for personal and informal circulation.
Cassette deck: An audio component that records or plays compact cassettes using a motorized tape transport. Its transport moves cassette tape across the heads at a controlled speed.
Lou Ottens: A Dutch engineer who led the Philips team that developed the compact cassette. Ottens directed the engineering effort behind the format.
Sony Walkman: Sony's line of portable personal audio players, first released in 1979. The Walkman made private, portable cassette listening a mass-market habit.
Elcaset: A large-format audio cassette system introduced by Sony in the 1970s. Elcaset pursued better sound quality with a format much larger than Philips's cassette.
Home recording studio: A recording space assembled for music production outside a commercial studio. Affordable cassette multitrack equipment let musicians record at home.

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