Whois & Analysis for amoeba.com

Amoeba Music is an independent music chain with stores in Berkeley, San Francisco, and Hollywood, Los Angeles, California.

Founded by former employees of nearby Rasputin Records, it opened on Telegraph Avenue in Berkeley in 1990.

The stores are unusually large given their independent status.

The San Francisco store, which opened in 1997 in the Haight-Ashbury district, is especially notable for its size.

Occupying a 24,000 square foot (2,200 m²) former bowling alley, the store regularly stocks upwards of 100,000 CDs, vinyl records, and audio cassettes, both new and used.

A gramophone record (phonograph record in the US), commonly known as a vinyl record or simply vinyl or record, is an analog sound storage medium in the form of a flat polyvinyl chloride (previously shellac) disc with an inscribed, modulated spiral groove.

The groove usually starts near the periphery and ends near the center of the disc.

Compact disc (CD) is a digital optical disc data storage format released in 1982 and co-developed by Philips and Sony.

The format was originally developed to store and play only sound recordings but was later adapted for storage of data (CD-ROM).

Several other formats were further derived from these, including write-once audio and data storage (CD-R), rewritable media (CD-RW), Video Compact Disc (VCD), Super Video Compact Disc (SVCD), Photo CD, PictureCD, CD-i, and Enhanced Music CD.

The first commercially available Audio CD player, the Sony CDP-101, was released October 1982 in Japan.

A record shop or record store is a retail outlet that sells recorded music.

In the late 19th century and the early 20th century, record shops only sold gramophone records, but over the 20th century, record shops sold the new formats that were developed, such as eight track tapes, compact cassettes and compact discs (CDs).

Today in the 21st century, record stores sell CDs, vinyl records and in some cases, DVDs of movies, TV shows, cartoons and concerts.

Some record stores also sell music-related items such as posters of bands or singers and even clothing and items such as bags and coffee mugs.

A guitar amplifier (or guitar amp) is an electronic amplifier that strengthens the weak electrical signal from a pickup on an electric guitar, bass guitar, or acoustic guitar so that it can produce sound through one or more loudspeakers, which are typically housed in a wooden cabinet.

A guitar amplifier may be a standalone wood or metal cabinet that contains only the power amplifier (and preamplifier) circuits, requiring the use of a separate speaker cabinet–or it may be a "combo" amplifier, which contains both the amplifier and one or more speakers in a wooden cabinet.

There is a wide range of sizes and power ratings for guitar amplifiers, from small, lightweight "practice amplifiers" with a single 8" speaker to heavy combo amps with four 10" speakers and a powerful amplifier, which are loud enough to use in a nightclub or bar performance.