Who invented the CD?

Mention the inventor of digital compact disc (CD), and people will immediately think of the names of two companies: Philips in the Netherlands and Sony in Japan. Because since the advent of CDs in the 1980s, the names of these two companies have been deeply branded in people's memory by overwhelming publicity. Recently, however, it is reported that CD was invented by an American physicist in the 1960s. And the scientist didn't get a penny from the huge profits of selling CDs. This new statement has undoubtedly aroused widespread concern. Is there really such a thing in the world now? There are a lot of materials, such as Wikipedia, an online free encyclopedia founded on 200 1 1 65438+5. Many participants from all over the world edit and create thousands of new entries every day. Wikipedia records that Philip and Sony have the right to invent CDs. The related entry reads: 1980 * * Philip and Sony jointly developed a digital compact disc (CD), and mass production began in Langenhagen, West Germany two years later. Later, Microsoft and Apple joined this camp, and turned the CD-ROM into a CD-ROM in 1987, which caused a worldwide computer revolution. Not long ago, a Russian website told a little-known story: 193 1 year, a boy was born in Bremerton, in the midwest of Washington, USA. He is James Russell, who invented the model plane (remote control boat) at the age of six. 65438-0953 Russell graduated from ReedCollege, Oregon (ranked sixth among the top ten most difficult universities in the United States) with a bachelor's degree in physics. As a physics enthusiast, he found a job in a laboratory of General Electric Company in the United States and became one of the earliest researchers engaged in the application and development of color display screens and input keyboards. There, he participated in a series of experimental projects and designed and manufactured the world's first electron beam welding equipment. 1965, Pacific Northwest Laboratory was established in Richlund. Russell became a senior researcher in the laboratory. Since then, he seems to have realized the direction he should concentrate on in the future-how to preserve the sound quality. He is a lover of classical music. Like many music lovers of that era, he often felt extremely depressed because the sound quality of old plastic records deteriorated with the storage time. To this end, he vowed to perfect it, and he even wanted to replace the old-fashioned needle playing with the spikes on the cactus. On a Saturday day, Russell suddenly had an idea: using digital recording and recovery system to completely change the method of sound recording and playback. Because of this, in the process of recording and playing, all components will not have physical contact, and will not cause any physical damage, which will affect the sound quality. Thus, an idea with the color of technological revolution was born in Russell's mind. At that time, Russell already knew something about the digital recording form based on magnetic tape and computer punched cards. He believes that the best "memory" should be carried out by light beams. At this time, his mind was full of "0 and 1" and "darkness and light". He thinks that if these codes are arranged closely enough, they can be used not only to save notes, but also to save encyclopedias. Although Russell didn't realize his idea at once in the institute, he completed the scheme of converting analog signals into digital signals, which laid the foundation for him to realize his idea. About two years later, Russell invented the first optical digital recording and recovery system. In this way, the first digital compact disc (CD) came out. Russell applied for his invention patent at 1970. In 1970, the inventor continues to improve his invention, and he hopes it can be applied to any form of data storage. Like many new inventions that determine their own times, the appearance of CD did not immediately attract investors' interest. But in 197 1 year, Eli Jay Kaubs, a venture capitalist, founded the optical record company and urged Russell to join his company. This company intends to develop VCD. Because there was an idea at that time: record TV programs on small and exquisite plastic carriers and send them out through the postal system so that people can enjoy their favorite TV programs at any time. 1974, at the exhibition held in Chicago, the company showed an optical digital TV set with recording and playback functions. This is the first device that can convert color images into numbers, but investors are indifferent to it, and the whole world has not changed. Another year passed, and in the summer of 1975, representatives of Philips in the Netherlands visited Russell's laboratory, and did not give too high evaluation to Russell's research. According to Russell's memory, these representatives said to him at that time: "This is very good for preserving materials, but we can't use it to solve audio-visual problems." It should be said that a few years before visiting Russell Laboratories, Philips has been producing its own analog optical portable CD. The Dutch are convinced that simulation is the only possible solution. "Because Philip invested 60 million dollars to develop the CD, no one can tell Philip that they are wrong." Russell commented like this. However, just two months after Philip's representative visited the inventor's laboratory, Philip quietly produced a CD exactly like Russell's invention. Since then, in addition to Philip, Sony and other companies in Japan have used Russell's technological inventions crazily, but never mentioned Russell's name. This makes people doubt that Russell's thoughts inspired others. Russell doesn't want to monopolize the optical disc process and take it for himself. He even said calmly, "It's hard to say whether what others produce depends on my invention. You know, people in two or more different places may have the same idea at the same time, which is nothing special. It is entirely possible that our work is carried out in parallel ... "In 1992, Warner Bros. Entertainment and other disc manufacturers filed a lawsuit against the optical record company. Finally, the optical record company paid 30 million dollars to destroy the patent right, and the court finally awarded the exclusive right of optical disc technology to the optical record company. However, the inventor Russell didn't get any money, because all his 20 CD patents belonged to his employer-optical record company. However, this encounter did not stop the inventor. He is still studying the optical system of data storage. He is considering a new competitor of hard disk storage capacity-optical random access memory (ORAM). In this system, there are no rotating discs or even moving parts, and the data is read entirely by light. 199 1 year, Russell and his partner, Paul Nye, established Ioptics Company, which specializes in ORAM. Despite the investment of millions of dollars from Microsoft, it seems that the time is not yet ripe and the system has not yet found a market. In the past long years, the inventor who has applied for more than 50 patents still leads an unremarkable life and is still engaged in the research he is obsessed with. Recently, the only event in the global report that reminded Russell of his existence and made him feel beautiful was that at the age of 53, he won the VollumAward Award of the International Society of Optical Engineering in 2000 for his outstanding contribution to science and technology. References: