Science Youtuber Steve Mould explains why vinyl records are better than digital media. Not because they have better audio quality (I'm not getting into that argument, because I don't care much about sound quality) -- it's because LP grooves can be used in unusual ways. For instance, the spiral of an LP ends in a circular track called a "locked groove" or "runout groove" and some records include a recorded snippet that endlessly runs, just for fun. For instance, The Beatles famously added a loop of gibberish at the end of side two of Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band.

Mould also demonstrates "interwoven tracks," which were used on horse race game recordes, with a random horse winning each time the stylus was set on the record. Mould's old toys with tiny records inside are very cool, too. Read the rest