Consumer electronics: New uses for existing products signal the merging of consumer electronics technologies ¿ Video and audio, audio and computers, and computers and video

In reviewing developments in 1985, it is pointed out that few years in the recent past lacked an attempt by manufacturers to open up at least one new product category-8 mm videocassettes, compact disk audio, stereo television broadcasting, laser disk video-attempts that were more or less successful. But in 1985 manufacturers introduced nothing radically `new´. Instead, they came up with novel ways to exploit or alter the existing technologies. They discovered that a 2-hour 8-mm videocassette could double as a 24-hour high-fidelity audio tape. And compact disks, introduced to audiophiles several years ago, turned out to be an excellent medium for computer data storage. Conventional color television sets were made in different shapes and larger sizes, and CD players were made smaller.