Digital optical technology-what it can do for multi-media

With the advent of mass storage on compact disc one is seeing the first generation of digital multi-media systems. It is hard to explain to someone a multi-media application on CDROM-XA/CD-I without them actually experiencing it. The nearest approximation is to imagine a TV program that encourages one to explore the topic, or just sit back and listen depending on one´s mood. A program can be as complicated as an encyclopedia with pictures and music or as simple a computer game with a video introduction. The whole application program is encoded onto a standard 12 cm compact disc of 650 Mbytes capacity, which can contain natural still pictures, motion video, cartoon animation, graphics, text, music, and speech in any order or combination