The joy of replacing your bulky CD Walkman, with its never working anti-skip technology and generally annoying shape, with a sleek and in comparison tiny MP3 player is a memorable part of growing up for a whole bunch of people.
It’s time to say goodbye to trusty MP3s though, as The Fraunhofer Institute, the German Company who were pivotal in the original development of the technology, have announced the end to the licensing and patents for the software.
The crucial thing to remember about MP3s is that it was the first technology to compress sound into such a small file with no loss of sound quality. It was the capability of doing this that led to the release of the first iPod in 2001, and we all know they sold pretty well. Basically, the MP3 transformed the way we all listen to music forever.
The death of the MP3 is making room for the newer, wider used technology of the Advanced Audio Codec family, abbreviated to AAC. Its technology like this that supports the more popular way to listen to music these days, on services such as Apple Music and Spotify.
It’s true to say that this announcement may not affect the way we are listening to music monumentally, MP3s will still be able to be used as normal, the statement marks more of a shift in the future of digital music, making way for new technologies to be developed.
However, it is worth paying our last respects to the format that assisted with the ability to easily attain and download music for people all over the world.