In the ten years since the publication of this book there have been momentous changes in the technology of recorded sound. Changes so rapid and so far reaching that some commentators have already anticipated the end of hard media like CDs and the major record companies that produce them. This edition seeks to bring the reader up to date with the new technology, new businesses, and new status of sound recordings in the digital age. In the Preface to the first edition I hoped that technological change would not make some of the machines I described obsolete before the book reached its readers. I do so again, confident that the Internet, MP3, and personal computers will not go the way of DCC or DAT. In this edition I have tried to look a bit farther into the future. These predictions are based on the beliefs that copying of digital content will not be eliminated by legal or technological means, that proprietary interests will bow to the imperative of compatibility, and that large corporations will continue to adapt to technological change. If these conditions hold I expect that this edition will last at least ten more years.

I want to thank Steve Klein and Erik Lizee for reading the manuscript and making useful suggestions and UAB graduate students Thomas Scales and Nilanjana Majumdar for helping in the production of the text.