Receivers

In the dawn of HiFi, the most popular audio product was the receiver—essentially a radio tuner and power amplifier with a level control. The receiver was how we all listened to music. Over time, the receiver's minimal feature set was added on to with various upgrades like tape and phono inputs, then later equalizers and other bells and whistles. Before long they became the Swiss Army Knives of audio. Today, a receiver is about as far away from its origins as one could imagine. Some of the more feature-laden receivers don't even have radio tuners any more. They are more home theater processors sporting up to 12 channels of power amplification, digital signal processing, streaming audio and even television tuners. What's funny is how the name "receiver" has stayed with the product category over all this time. Sometimes products become so widespread their names no longer reflect their function. When this happens we refer to them as an eponym, like Kleenex, or Xerox. I vote to upgrade the venerable receiver to eponymous status. After all these years, it certainly deserves it.