The Walkman was not an engineering breakthrough, magnetic cassette players had existed for a long time. However, it did something that was brand new to the consumer market, and people loved it. While the Walkman's popularity could largely be attributed to its innovation, its release also happened to coincide with the fitness aerobic craze of the 1980s. The larger number of people who were outside jogging and stretching, used the Walkman to make their workouts more entertaining.All technology eventually dies, and the Walkman is no exception. Compact discs soon began to roll out to consumers and the cassette player became obsolete. But while the Walkman was no longer selling off store shelves, it did lead the way to newer and better portable music players. CD and mp3 players soon began selling, they were better than cassette players, but they drew their influence from the Walkman.
Sources:
http://content.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1907884,00.html
https://www.theverge.com/2014/7/1/5861062/sony-walkman-at-35
It is amazing to see the beginning of modern, portable technology. For this new form factor, selling 200 million pieces, that must have been a hit. I hope to see one of these if one still exists in working conditions to see how it influenced the modern iPods and other music players that are available.
ReplyDeleteThe Walkman was clearly revolutionary, bringing mobility to personal music collections via cassette tapes. However, it was not the first product to demonstrate the mobile potential of music. That would be the transistor radio, which was commercially released in 1954 and is still widely used in cars today. The transistor radio would go on to be eventually overtaken in popularity by the Walkman and the Boombox as well.
ReplyDeleteThe popularity of the Walkman showed that many consumers wanted a very compact piece of technology that they could use everyday with ease. This attitude later influenced many music players such as the famous iPod made by Apple. The phrase 1000 songs in your pocket lured in many consumers and it was a hit.
ReplyDeleteSource: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IPod