KARAOKE EQUIPMENT
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KARAOKE - PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE:

What does the future hold for Karaoke, technologically and socially?

 

The worldwide market for Karaoke discs continues to grow, with the range of options on how people receive their Karaoke growing with it. As a result of this continually growing market, the price of discs has been falling sharply sine the year 2000 to today. For example, Sunfly CDG discs which used to cost £25, now sell for £12.97 on our site. Music Factory discs which used to cost £20, now cost £9.99. Prices for the professional Karaoke discs have never been lower. The number one format in the United States and the UK remains the Karaoke CD+G disc, whilst the Karaoke DVD has now become the format of choice in Asia and mainland Europe. With the CDGs and DVDs coming down in price, the attraction of the Video CD (VCD) is beginning to wane. Sunfly, for example, have now ceased production of VCDs, and have transferred their energy to DVD. DVD offers the advantage of a larger disc capacity, giving it the edge all around on sound, vision and features. The only thing which has kept the DVD back has been the higher pricing, but this is now beginning to become less of an issue.

 

Technological advances continue to add to the consumer choice available. Computerised downloading is becoming more and more common, and the advent of discs created from PC files has spawned new formats such as MP3G and divX. Time will tell whether these new formats will have the staying power to catch up with the CDG or the DVD disc in the nations hearts and minds.

 

The enthusiasm for Karaoke continues to permeate every public place where people gather, and public singing has become as endemic as drinking, at a large number of the nation's bars and taverns.

 

It was said that in the past, with the popularization of records, radio, and TV, people had tended to become passive receivers of entertainment. The advent of Karaoke continues to help correct this phenomenon and makes a great social contribution to the modern world of musical entertainment.