The year is 1887 and you’ve gotten home from attending a ball, only to start up your gramophone and dance around to an assortment of tunes.

With the rise of technology in the midst, you’d wonder what the future has in store for the new generations of the world, only to be disappointed to know people are still using the same device.

The only difference being, it was renamed the record player. Although we have the power to play music out of tiny devices that fit into the palms of our hands, we have seemingly reverted back to using these “primal” inventions. 

Thanks to Thomas Edison, we have people claiming they were born in the wrong time, although they refer to times such as the 60s or 70s when the record player became more popular, not the 1800s when it was first invented. 

Though it has gone through many changes, from the phonautograph to the turntable style and now the more modern version, the device has operated the same way for more than a century. 

However, the record player itself is not what we have an issue with, instead, it is the pricey plastic counterpart that accompanies it: the actual vinyl record itself. 

People collect useless things all the time: coins, game cards, Funko Pops, tea sets, and even insects. However, people seem to deny the fact that vinyls are no different in terms of functionality. 

Most vinyl enthusiasts admire their purchases from afar, once they put it on the shelf it never comes down, collecting dust and warping in the sun. 

More than half of the time the plastic wrap protecting the vinyl never comes off and it never gets the chance to sing to the listener. Yet people claim they’re preserving this great purchase for its value.

Not to mention, if any vinyl lovers were looking for the true 1960s experience, wouldn’t this include a sense of awareness for the environment, as many people of that generation had? 

In an article by journalist Jon Donnison on the BBC news site, vinyl sales have lept from 210,000 in 2007 to almost 4.8 million in 2020. This significant boom in sales leaves many to wonder what happened to the phrase “reduce, reuse, recycle” from the 1970s. 

The use of our digital purchase is helping achieve all three of these efforts because, in reality, you only need one appliance to listen to your favorite songs. 

In reality, 99% of the time the vinyls will become warped, scratched, broken, or simply unused. So why is it that everyone is running to stores and opening their laptops to buy their new favorite artist’s track when they could open their phone and plug in some earbuds?

Buying the fifth version of the same album isn’t economically or environmentally conscious in the long run. In simple terms, vinyls are useless and wasteful. They’re clearly a collector’s item rather than a practical way of listening to music 

It may be a hard pill to swallow for some, but if you are hoping to afford more important items, you may want to skip out on the third recolored piece of plastic. 

No one is denying you the right to buy the newest edition of your favorite album the next time it goes on sale, we only ask that you to reconsider its place in the lives of those in the 21st century.