My Dad was a consumer audio technology enthusiast at the time so we always had the latest (CD then minidisc). There was a weird doldrums period between the release of the CD and Napster (iPod even) for creating and sharing music and mixtapes. It seemed that we would be stuck in a perpetual 5-10 year new technology release cycle. Cassette tape remained the best way to share music as CD burners were not readily available and hardly anyone used minidisc.

Not to forget: copying anything to minidisc was slow(!)

In the end, the final nail in the coffin of more mechanical storage of audio was rights protection and management, which is what killed R-DAT.

Analog copying, those were the days. Specifically, the days of not being able to use my computer or my minidisc player for a solid hour, lest stray noises from apps or excess CPU usage goof up the audio going from one to the other. And then there was the separate joy of twiddling the little wired remote to title the newly written tracks...

NetMD solved this, allowing for digital copying and titling via USB, but it came along so late (2001) as to make no meaningful difference - especially in the face of the iPod, which had its advent in the same year.