The Future, Before the Suits Killed it off

Anybody remember RCA CED video discs from 1980? No? That's because they were marketed under the name "SelectaVision." Does that ring a bell? Hello, is this thing on?

Maybe this video will blow off some of the cobwebs in your mind. It was sent on a CED videodisc for dealers at your local TV store to watch and, hopefully, get excited about a format whose days were already limited:

It's from the dawn of the home video revolution, when TV's stopped being a piece of furniture in your grandma's house and started looking like those things they used in TV studios and with computers: monitors. The knobs were on the way out, buttons were on the way in.

The big leap was with the VCR. I don't need to explain what happened with those. Unless you were born after 1999. Get outta here kid, ya bodder me.

Then the RCA disc. They killed it later that year. Seems sales were sluggish at best. The biggest issue was the technology itself: not only could it not record from the TV like the VCR, the video on a CED was read using a stylus. Yes, that's right: a NEEDLE. Did the disc skip or jump? Of course it did! Slam the side of the player while watching your fave disc and see what happens! Strangely, that didn't happen when playing back a VHS tape, so if I'm going to play $800 for a device that allows me to watch what I want, it's going to be the one that records as well as plays.

I hope you enjoy this relic. The pitchman, a hallmark of advertising of the time, was hired no doubt to speak with "authority" thanks to his dulcet tones.

PS: The big TV sets for Grandma were still marketed. They'll make their appearance later in the video if you make it that long.