This Day, That Year

Item from Jan 26, 1990, in China Daily: A China-made assembly line for video cassette recorders is now in trial production in Nanjing Radio Factory of Jiangsu province. The line is capable of making 150,000 VCRs a year ... The factory is one of the nine factories designated by the Chinese government for VCR production ... Although China has a vast potential VCR market, the domestic industry is limited by a lack of technology and funds.

VCRs were once very popular because television was a major form of home entertainment for Chinese families and many users recorded programs for view at their leisure.

But with new technology like Internet Protocol television, in which viewers can select a vast store of live and recorded programs and movies, many Chinese have forgotten what a VCR and its accompanying VHS cassette tapes even look like.