media formats
Content delivery standards
Media formats are the technical standards that determine how information is stored, encoded, or transmitted.
The term covers both physical containers—vinyl records, VHS tapes, DVDs, Blu-rays—and digital specifications like MP3, JPEG, or PDF.
Format wars occur when competing standards fight for dominance: Betamax lost to VHS; HD DVD lost to Blu-ray.
As technology evolves, older formats become obsolete, requiring conversion to preserve content.
- AACSound compression format
- FLACLossless audio compression format
- compact discOptical data storage medium
- BetamaxDefunct videocassette format
- VHS tapeMagnetic film cartridge
laserdisc · reel to reel · AVI · EPUB · MP3 · plaintext · print · XML · CSV · file extension · GIF · JSON · TIFF · vinyl · cassette · SVG · cartridge · MKV
- media catalogingcatalog numbers, film classification, cross-references
media formatscontent
What something contains
subject matter · message · substance · information · data
media formatsuser experience
Interaction quality perception