Remember that crazy little thing called 8-track?

An adult digs up their old record collection out of the attic and their kid asks what they are. The parent nostalgically names all the singers of their day whose works have been pressed into vinyl discs. Then the kid says, "No, I mean, what are those?" pointing to the records held fondly in your arms.

Technology marches on initially fuelled by the novelty of the notion that a format of media could actually become obsolete.

Most young people do indeed know what a vinyl record is (from more recent media depictions if nothing else), even if they never listened to or owned one themselves and don't know whether a "seven inch" or 45 rpm was an album or a single, or, in fact, what 45 rpm or 33 1/3 rpm even referred to. Modern DJs still use them, for instance, and their appearance in pop culture is almost ubiquitous. They've also been undergoing a resurgence of popularity among audiophiles, hipsters, indie music fans and even teenagers since 2007 (Sony is even pressing records again), thanks to their retro appeal, even outselling CDs for the first time in over 30 years in 2019. Consequently, while they still haven't overtaken streaming in terms of revenue, their renewed semi-popularity started to be acknowledged in mainstream media at the end of the 2010's.

The same can also be said for 8-track tapes, of course (arguably more understandable, since many people know of 8-track but don't know what the actual cartridge looks like). Popular from the mid-1960s to the early 1980s the main advantage of the 8-track tape cartridge was that it did not have to be "flipped over" to play other tracks.

It likely already applies at least to some degree for both cassette tapes and videocassettes, as both are no longer being made en-mass and generally only appeal to niche markets. Wikipedia reports that whereas 442 million cassette tapes were sold in the U.S. in 1990, by 2016, the number was just 129,000. The last major Hollywood film to be released on VHS in the United States, Cars, was in 2006.

“You might be considered a redneck if you just bought an 8-track player to put in your car.” Jeff Foxworthy

In September 1965, the Ford Motor Company introduced eight-track tape players as an option on three of its 1966 models (the sporty Mustang, luxurious Thunderbird, and high-end Lincoln) installing them in around 65,000 vehicles. By the 1967 model year, all of Ford's vehicles offered this tape player upgrade option.

In “Chasing the Wendigo” Justin’s 1964 1/2 Mustang came with an AM push button radio and a studio-sonic sound system so he added an after-market 8-track tape deck. He would lose himself in Creedence Clearwater Revival's sound, a mixture of grimy hard rock, blues, folk, and Gulf Coast styles, known as "swamp rock". He cruised down highways and byways singing lustily to the gritty, raspy voice with a strong twinge of a bayou-area accent of John Fogerty.

Their sound started out remarkable, but in time the sound quality declined and songs would bleed over into the next. 8-tracks were composed of a sturdy exterior, but their inner technology was very faulty as they broke easily and the tape often became tangled. The never-ending looping technology bothered many listeners as the eight-tracks could not rewind, and usually the complete material of an album would not fit on the tape.

Karaoke anyone: Karaoke is made up of two Japanese words:”kara”, which means “empty” in English and “oke”, which is the short form for “orchestra”, so the word “karaoke” in English means “empty orchestra”. Invented in the city of Kobe, Japan and introduced to the public in the 1970s, they were basically made up of cassette tape players and 8-track cartridges.

In this age of legal streaming and downloading of music, movies, video games, and other software, sooner or later the whole notion of going into a store and buying a physical object with stored data will be part of the history books (well, the history e-books if paper books also become obsolete due to e-readers).

The fact that something is not in active use anymore doesn't mean people will have no idea what it is. Papyrus hasn't been widely used for centuries, and people still know what it looks like and what it was used for.

“Once a new technology rolls over you, if you’re not part of the steamroller, you’re part of the road.” – Stewart Brand