VHS
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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Video Home System, better known by its abbreviation VHS, is a video tape recording standard developed during the 1970s. It was released to the public during the latter half of the decade. During the late part of the 1970s and the early 1980s it formed one-half of the VHS vs Betamax war, which it would eventually go on to win. VHS' properties include longer playing time, faster rewinding and fast-forwarding, and a less complex tape transport mechanism. The open standard used for VHS technology allowed mass production without licensing costs. VHS would eventually come out as the winning video tape format, surpassing other home tape formats by the 1990s.
In later years, optical disc formats began to offer better quality than video tape, and took over in film studios, then retailers, and finally video rental stores. By 2006, most major film studios stopped releasing new movie titles in VHS format, opting for others such as DVD and Blu-ray.
On December 23 2008, the last major United States supplier of pre-recorded VHS tapes, Distribution Video Audio Inc. of Palm Harbor, Florida, shipped its final truckload.
