20 min listen
Music History Monday: The Sony Walkman: A Triumph and a Tragedy!
Music History Monday: The Sony Walkman: A Triumph and a Tragedy!
ratings:
Length:
18 minutes
Released:
Jul 1, 2024
Format:
Podcast episode
Description
We mark the introduction on July 1, 1979 – 45 years ago today – of the Sony Walkman. The Walkman was the first entirely portable, high-fidelity (or at least fairly high-fidelity) audio cassette player, a revolutionary device that allowed a user to listen to entire albums anywhere, anytime. Introduced initially in Japan, the higher-ups at Sony expected to sell 5000 units a month for the first six months after its release. Instead, they sold 30,000 units in the first month alone and then – then – sales exploded. All told, Sony has sold over 400 million Walkmen (“Walkmans”?) in cassette, CD, mini-disc, and digital file versions, and Sony remained the market leader among portable music players until the introduction of Apple’s iPod on October 23, 2001. For Sony the Walkman was a commercial triumph. For consumers, it was a technological game-changer. But for humanity, taken as widely as we please, it can (and will!) be argued that the “portable music player” – or PMP – has been an unmitigated disaster, a tragedy that has served to increasingly isolate human beings from one another in a manner unique in our history. Headphones and Earbuds Growing up, my maternal grandparents lived in a pre-War apartment […]
The post Music History Monday: The Sony Walkman: A Triumph and a Tragedy! first appeared on Robert Greenberg.
The post Music History Monday: The Sony Walkman: A Triumph and a Tragedy! first appeared on Robert Greenberg.
Released:
Jul 1, 2024
Format:
Podcast episode
Titles in the series (100)
Music History Monday: Courage: On February 21, 2012 – ten years ago today – five members of the Russian feminist punk rock group Pussy Riot staged an unauthorized performance on the soleas of the Cathedral of Christ the Savior in Moscow. by Music History Monday