On this day three decades ago, Sony's original blue-and-silver Walkman went on sale in Japan, launching an era of personal, portable music and generations of oblivious subway riders and pedestrians. The first Walkman, called the TPS-L2, cost 33,000 yen (roughly $150) in Japan and didn’t make it to the U.S. until 1980. In case you forgot, the original cassette-playing device had some quaint features, including a pair of headphone jacks that allowed two people to listen simultaneously and a "hotline" switch that activated a microphone to pipe in ambient sound instead of music. For the price of a 1979 Walkman, you can get a... [read full story]
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