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Walkman is a Sony brand tradename originally used for portable audio cassette players in the late 1970s. In the 2010s, it was used to market Sony's portable audio and video players as well as a line of former Sony Ericsson mobile phones. The original Walkman actually introduced a change in music listening habits by allowing people to carry recorded music with them and listen to music through lightweight headphones. Owners of the Walkman were able to take back their "lost" time, commuting for example, and turn it into a pleasurable experience, or add a soundtrack to their urban surroundings. It was the privatization and personalization offered by the Walkman that lead to its success. The prototype was built in 1978 by audio-division engineer Nobutoshi Kihara for Sony co-founder Masaru Ibuka. Ibuka wanted to be able to listen to operas during his frequent trans-Pacific plane trips, and presented the idea to Kihara. The original idea for a portable stereo is credited to Brazilian-German inventor Andreas Pavel. The first Walkman was marketed in 1979 in Japan, using the name Walkman. From 1980, it was known as the Soundabout in many other countries including the US, Freestyle in Sweden and was called the Stowaway in the UK. Advertising, despite all the foreign languages, still attracted thousands of buyers in the US specifically.〔Du Gay〕 Sony President and co-founder Akio Morita hated the name "Walkman" and asked that it be changed, but relented after being told by junior executives that a promotion campaign had already begun using the brand name and that it would be too expensive to change.〔 The names "Walkman", "Pressman", "Watchman", "Scoopman", "Discman", and "Talkman" are trademarks of Sony, and have been applied to a wide range of portable entertainment devices manufactured by the company. The name "Walkman" was based on its precursor, the Pressman tape recorder. An initial prototype of the Walkman was in fact made by replacing the recording circuit and speaker from the Pressman with a stereo amplifier.〔Du Gay, 55〕 Sony continues to use the "Walkman" brand name for most of their portable audio devices, after the "Discman" name for CD players was dropped in the late 1990s. == Marketing == (詳細はThe introductory United States advertising campaign for the Sony Walkman was created in the New York office of the international advertising agency, McCann-Erickson, who had won the Sony business the prior year. A major component of the Walkman advertising campaign was personalization of the device. Prior to the Walkman, the common device for portable music was the portable radio, which could only offer listeners standard music broadcasts. Having the ability to customize a playlist was a new and exciting revolution in music technology. Potential buyers had the opportunity to choose their perfect match in terms of mobile listening technology. The ability to play your own music and listen privately was a huge selling point of the Walkman, especially amongst teens, who greatly contributed to its success.〔 Despite "all this technological diversity, there must be one which is the perfect choice for you".〔Du Gay, 31〕 This method of marketing to an extremely expansive user-base while maintaining the idea that the product was made for each individual "() the best of all possible worlds—mass marketing and personal differentiation".〔 Sony accomplished the genius feat of mass individualized and targeted advertisement, enabling the Walkman to be recognized as an influential piece of technology. Today, Walkman still maintains its role in popular culture, albeit a diminished one due to the large number of competitors in mobile audio devices today. Through Sony's effort to "() certain meanings and practices which have become emblematic of--which seem to stand for or to represent--a distinctive 'way of life': the culture of late-modern, post-industrial societies",〔Du Gay, 18〕 the Walkman remains, largely due to effective advertisement, a symbol of the freedom and portability that Sony sought to convey among the younger demographic. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Walkman」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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