Dear Walkmans

via The New York Times:

Sony is sending its cassette tape Walkman into retirement in Japan as demand for a music player that was ground-breaking in its day dwindles to a tiny niche in the era of digital technology.

Sony stopped Japanese production of the portable music player in April and sales will end once the last batch disappears from stores, company spokeswoman Hiroko Nakamura said Monday.

Sony has sold 220 million cassette Walkman players globally since the product's July 1979 debut that changed lifestyles by popularizing music on the go. More than 30 years later, the cassette Walkman has been rendered an anachronism by MP3 players and iPods. Demand for cassette players in Japan is now largely limited to elderly users. But Sony will continue production of the cassette Walkman in China to accommodate users abroad, including in the U.S., Europe and some Asian countries, Nakamura said.

It is a sad day in music technology. As we enter the day and age where EVERYTHING is on the internet, the media we used to inject our music on is becoming thing of the past. As with the traditional vinyl record, 8-track player, VHS and Betamax, every media format has its dying day. For you, oh great Sony Walkman, with your cassette tapes, that day is upon us. Built in 1979 to a throng of no one (people were still convinced 8-tracks could catch on), you enabled people to take their favorite recordings with them wherever they went. They could use your format-able cassette tapes to record whatever they wanted, from long riffs by jam bands to four hour-long radio blocks with their favorite rappers. Walkman, hip-hop, and music today, would be nowhere without you. You single-handedly began what we call filesharing today.

In the 80s you were synonymous with youth culture, as beat-dwellers were lost in their headphones everywhere you could be taken. My mother said you were the reason my generation would go deaf, though ironically I heard everything you blasted in my ears. Your convenience was unparalleled. Whereas record players and 8-tracks needed an absurd amount of space, all you needed were two double A batteries and a pair of headphones to turn a routine walk to the gym into a personal concert. I can't tell you the last time I've used one of you, but I'm sure in some dusty basement, you're there, just waiting to play 'The Chronic' or 'Illmatic' for some unwitting soul who would never know your magic otherwise. Yes, we dropped you in lieu of CD's and newer versions of your namesake, but your original form will be remembered the most. Walkman, you will be sorely missed as we move into an era where removable media is forgotten and iPods thrust their sound waves into our eardrums. As a child of the 80s (90s really), I'm sad to see you go by the wayside, but happy to have known you, even if half of my cassettes got recorded over by accident...