Re: You are all thieves
The 8 track (Lear Jet Audio) had high tape wear , no FF and no rewind because it was a an always slipping endless loop. Though 1/4" rather than 1/8" CC and twice the speed, it wasn't better quality than decent CC using home recorded tapes because of high speed duplication and the track width may have been slightly less than CC as the head is physically moved each time the metal foil is detected. Home recording gear did exist. Also the program had to be split in four.
Experimental wire recording existed maybe 1899. US and UK used Wire Recording till after WWII. The Germans started tape use in the 1940s. Ampex was one of the first post WWII copies.
1: RCA 1/4" tape cartridge 1958
2: Compact Cassette 1962. Originally for dictation.
3: Lear Jet 8 Track 1/4" endless loop demos in 1964. A refinement of earlier loop cartridges. Also called Stereo 8. Only widespread ever in USA and because of a deal with a car maker. Some small sales in UK 1968 to 1970, approximately. A dead format.
Radio studios/DJs used an endless loop cartridge that seems to have predated the consumer 8 track
4: Micro Cassette 1969. At half the speed of Compact Cassette and usually mono (someone mad MIGHT have done a stereo version) it was only ever for dictation. Now dead due to Flash memory.
5: Sony Elcaset 1976 1/4" tape, superior design to CC and RCA cartridge. Technically good, but too large for portable market (there was one portable that looks like a competitor to Uher or other reel to reel portable recorders used by journalists.) About 10 years too late, so a failure. Dead format.
6: CD. About 1982 to 1984 introduction. Still best solution for physical music
7: Sony Minidisc. A great idea killed by DRM, inability to copy off your own recordings digitally (journalists etc) 1992. Now a dead format. Also Sony was too late adopting MP3 as alternative to ATRAC.
7: MP3 Players using Flash, battery backed RAM or HDD: Available solid state and HDD from 1997, though prototypes using other codecs may have existed from 1982. MP3 as a codec only existed from 1984.
SACD / DVD Audio / HDCD Audio etc: Variously 1995 to 1999 introductions. All dead. Aimed at Audiophiles, a fickle market.
8: iPod. A very late MP3 entrant (2001) successful due to iTunes.
There was also a very large stereo / two track version of the Lear Jet cartridge also using 1/4" tape that was only rented to restaurants and hotels. Certainly in use in 1970s.
Cassette players and tapes are still made and sold.