Sony Walkman cassette version canned after 30 years

RIP Sony Walkman, we hardly knew ye. Actually, that’s a lie – the cassette playing Sony Walkman is one of the world’s best known gadgets, a consumer tech legend that pretty much everybody owned at one time, or has at least heard of. And now it’s gone, with Sony announcing that the last tape-based Walkman rolled off the assembly line on 22 October.

The Sony Walkman was launched on 1 July 1979 – yep, over 31 years ago – to a mixed reception, but by the early 80s this portable cassette player had established itself as THE gadget to own.

It was, essentially, the first portable music device that allowed you to listen to whatever you wanted. Extended car journeys, in which you’d been previously subjected to your dad’s Eagles greatest hits collection, could now be accompanied by the sounds of the latest Salt N Pepa album, squirted straight into your ears by a pair of lightweight sponge-covered headphones.

Sony has shifted over 200 million cassette Walkmans in total, but the device’s death knell was sounded long ago. The introduction of Sony’s own CD-spinning Discman made the Walkmen seem positively outdated – although the Discman’s bulky size meant there was still very much a market for the Walkman.

But it was the introduction of portable MP3 players, in particular the Apple iPod in 2001, that really spelled the end for this venerable tape-wrangler – why on earth would you carry around a creaky old cassette player when you could fit thousands of great-sounding digital songs on a tiny, lightweight device – with no tangled tape to worry about?

So, bye bye Sony Walkman – you were a loyal gadget companion for many years, but the world has moved on. We’ll pour out some beer on the sidewalk for you as we listen to some suitably sad tunes (but probably on our iPod touch).

Sony (via CrunchGear)

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