About Me
Late in 1998, I ran across an internet site which sells A.A. and Al-Anon
speaker tapes. I ordered several cassette tapes and I was very disappointed
with what I received. Some of the tapes were mis-labeled, some were blank, and
they were all over-priced.
The company finally straightened out my order, but the incident caused me to
do some research into the speaker tape business. During this process, I
purchased tapes and CD's from four different companies. My research lead to the
following discoveries:
- There are at least a dozen internet sites selling A.A. tapes and most of
these also sell Al-Anon tapes.
- Most of these companies simply copy other companies' tapes. This became
apparent when several tapes purchased from Company A contained spoken
advertisements for Company B, etc.
- These tapes are all in the Public Domain and are not copyrighted.
- The material cost for bulk cassettes is less than 50 cents. Even when
including the cost of vinyl albums and labels the entire per-tape material cost
is below a dollar.
- The average price of A.A. and Al-Anon cassette tapes on the internet is
$4.00 not including shipping. I found a low of $3.00 per tape and a high of
$5.00.
- Many companies have shipping charges well above their actual shipping cost.
- Audio quality on average is very poor. This is primarily a reflection upon
the original recording method.
- Companies which sell CD's and claim that the audio quality has been vastly
improved are misleading their clients. In almost every case the CD is of no
better audio quality than the cassette tape because of limitations regarding
the quality of the original recording.
- CD's are sold for an average of $9. The material cost of a CD, jewel case,
jewel case label, and CD label is below $1.50.
- I searched for a web page which provided A.A. or Al-Anon tapes in RealAudio
but I couldn't find one. Much later I found out that there is another page like
mine out there:
A.A. Speaker
Tapes. Bob Y. runs this great site which has many RealAudio recordings. He
rotates them every two weeks.
Despite all of the problems, I felt that the messages on the tapes were
extremely important, and could be a valuable part of anyone's recovery. The
messages give hope, laughter, and meaning to the listener. These discoveries
prompted me to start a web page at the beginning of 1999. I recorded a few A.A.
and Al-Anon tapes in RealAudio format and placed them on the page. My main goal
was to save people a few bucks and introduce these tapes to people who had
never heard them. To my surprise, I found that people valued this web page for
many reasons beyond the monetary.
People from many different walks of life wrote and told me of their great
appreciation for the site. Visually-impaired. Home-bound. Travelling all the
time. Afraid to go to that "first meeting". Not sure what A.A. or
Al-Anon are all about. Those who record the audio from the internet and give it
to friends, family, or even those in prison.
My goal is simple. To provide as much A.A. and Al-Anon audio content as
possible. And to provide this content in the manner in which it was originally
given: free of charge.
God Bless,
Kelly
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