cassette questions

[terryfox3]

I was pokeing around on ebay and i found a cassette that was made in 2005 by the band depeche mode.I thought all cassette production had ceased except for blanks.What im wondering is where in the world is cassette still holding on.Indonesia and singapore are places i see them advertised from.I also read that ebay germany is a very tough place to buy a cassette deck at with many more buyers and sellers.I also saw a thing on cnn where some radical imam was sending out cassette of his sermons.Is pakistan iran etc a place where cassette still hanging on?So where are prerecorded cassettes still hanging on?Also cro2 cassette blanks are still produced where?

[Scorpion8]

Last I heard, the Far East is still big on them. I don't know about Europe.

[BrocLuno]

For those places where there is no "digital world", and they live in an analog society, cassette has to be the smallest & lightest medium - CDs need a digital interface. I remember stories of Russia and the booming trading business in cassettes of western music. They can be copied and passed along without any government spy-bots tagging your trades and busting you big time. I suspect their police are a little more threatening than the RIAA, but I can't be sure :)

[ampegdan]

I've heard cassettes are still big in Mexico too, but have not confirmed this.
I used to drive through a Mexican neighborhood to work and a couple of the stores advertised them along with CD's. You can still get Maxell XLII's at Walgreen's, and allegedly TDK SA's are available somewhere, but I haven't seen them in a long time.

[SaSi]

Europe is also not a good place for cassettes. German and UK stores stopped selling cassette decks two years ago with the last stores in the UK carrying cassette decks this Christmas.

I live in Greece and cassette sales in media stores and record shops are simply non existent in the mainstream. Whever still has a radio-cassette in their cars, it's because the units are factory installed and have proprietary form factors. These people consider changing cars. . .

The other day I visited my old time favourite store where I used to buy TDK SA90 in boxes of 10 back in 1979-85 and although the store is still there, it is flooded with every brand and color and box size of CD, DVD and memory cards (!!). I went there to try and get a tape reel when I received my first R2R and they did have 2 RMGI 5"/1200 ft. reels. I got one of them for 18 euro (~$26). Unfortunatelly I didn't check out if they still carried cassettes. They may still have some of the old nice TDK MA. I only have two of those - could not afford more than that when I bought them...

[Mark W.]

IN 2004 you could still get a Cassette deck as Std equipment in a Dodge Dakota pickup I assume in other Dodge and Chrysler products

[terryfox3]

what im thinking is that in the so called first world where we have the money to constantly upgrade the cassette has died.It the so called second and third world its still going strong.There are just no sales figures like in n america or europe.Id bet there's tons around at least up unitl the last few years.The thing that keeps me from trying a cassette from the far east is that im afraid its a bootleg or just a cd copy unlike the old days when you got a analog copy.

[ampegdan]

The bootleg thing was always the rub with cassettes because it was so easy to do. I found a machine at a thrift not long ago that would make five copies of a tape at a time. Couldn't think of a reason in the world to buy it. I've picked up several over the years that turned out to be boots, but my fave was a Muddy Waters compilation I bought in a flea market in New Orleans, which really got me turned on to the early blues. I still play it regularly.
I thought the last new factory cassette I bought was Sheryl Crow's "Globe Sessions" in '98, but I actually keep picking up blues compilations on cassette in truck stops up and down I-70. Little reels live on.