The Death of Cassette Tapes in the Audiobook Industry

Hachette Books mourned the loss of an old friend this week: the cassette tape. The company released its last audiobook on cassette, Sail by James Patterson and Howard Roughan, in June 2008. This weekend they held an office party, a funeral, in honor of the medium that has served them well for so many years.

While cassette tapes have been in widespread usage since 1979 and the music industry has long abandoned their use in favor of the digital medium, they only accounted for 9% of the sales of audiobooks in 2006.