Walkman

The Walkman personal stereo is a transistorized miniature portable cassette tape player invented by Akio Morita, Masaru Ibuka[?] and Kozo Ohsone[?] in 1979, and manufactured by Sony Corporation.

Offering the ability for people to carry their own choice of music with them, the Walkman stereo was one of the most successful new consumer product introductions of the 1980s. Hit pop songs were written about it ("Wired for Sound" by Cliff Richard), hundreds of clones flooded the marketplace, and they quickly became ubquitous amongst urban pedestrians and commuters.

The words "Walkman", "Pressman", "Watchman", and "Discman" are trademarks of Sony, and have been applied to a wide range of portable entertainment devices manufactured by the company. The cassette-based Walkman products are now approaching technological obsolesence as the format fades, gradually being replaced by MiniDisc and solid-state MP3 players as their cost comes down.