How do you know all this, especially the word ‘sputtered’!?
Bono has a competitor. A strong one.
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Ah. good explanation! I assumed (incorrectly) that the info on a CD was stored in a pigment layer like in a writable CD. Did not realize that “real” CD’s were essentially micromolded. Cool stuff.
So in this case they (allegedly) have sold the means to produce a metal master, which could then be used to mold the polycarbonate discs, which would then still have to have the metallic layer deposited…
I’m suspicious that glass masters are possibly pricey enough to produce that this is an artistic stunt of nice looking (but content-less) glass discs rather than an artistic statement by sale of actual maters, but what do I know.
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It’s honestly a trifle unbelievable: “Oh, I’ll just stamp millions of 100nm deep pits into chunks of plastic(packed tightly enough that the spiral read path is a touch over 5km), then metallize them under vacuum, on an industrial scale for maybe ten cents apiece” is the reliable, mature, relatively inexpensive, option; while photosensitive dye layers written with a somewhat higher powered variant on the laser read optics are the ones that were developed some years later and were deeply finicky for some time.
I have no idea what a real glass master costs, though I doubt it’s cheap; but if they are handing those out(rather than just unmetallized but otherwise ordinary disks) I assume that it’s a pretty limited run and/or for well heeled fans.
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Apropos the Hatster, I read a great story yesterday about him asking Captain Beefheart if he’d like to collaborate on some music. The Don’s one-line reply was, ‘Dear Bongo, No’.
Most of it, the reason is prettty prosaic. I’ve always been interested in contemporary material culture and how things worked, so I did some background reading. People give me strange looks when I make the claim; but it’s just background knowledge.
Sputtering started with that; but got a little bit more in-depth during my (ill fated, alas, processes requiring moderately high vacuum are not hobbyist friendly) attempt to do a selective deposition of cadmium selenide on a glass substrate. Vexing; but involved doing some additional background reading.
Also, because I applaud the efforts of my fungal colleagues, I persued the story of the CD-eating fungus with considerable enthusiasm.
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