17th August 1982: First commercial compact disc produced in the German town of Langenhagen

Having initially created separate prototype digital audio discs, engineers at electronics giants Philips and Sony came together in 1979 to develop a standardised format. Interestingly, this happened while they sat on opposite sides of the VHS-Betamax war over home video formats. In 1980 the engineers agreed on and published their ‘Red Book’ standard which is still used, with some minor amendments, as the basis for all compact discs. Having agreed on this, marketing could then begin. The first public demonstration was given in 1981 on Tomorrow's World, a BBC television program about new science and technology, in which presenter Kieran Prendiville scratched a CD to demonstrate the supposedly indestructible nature of the new format. However, when playing the Bee Gees’ album Living Eyes he inserted a different disc to the one he scratched. A year later the first CD was produced to be sold commercially, although a number of months went by before the disc was available to purchase in stores. Chilean pianist Claudio Arrau’s recording of Chopin waltzes was pressed at Philips’ Polydor Pressing Operations plant, with the pianist himself starting the machine. Philips apparently believed that classical music fans were generally more affluent and therefore more likely to pay the hefty price tag for CDs and their players. The first ‘pop’ music compact disc to be produced was the The Visitors – the last album recorded by the Swedish musical super-group ABBA.