Vintage Technology's

Walkman

The Walkman was invented for the co-chairman of Sony, Akio Morita, who wanted to be able to listen to his favorite operas on plane trips. It was initially marketed as the Sound about in North America, but the “Walkman” name was used for the product up until the present day.

Discman

Two years after the mass production of the Compact Disc, Sony released its portable player for it. While they were popular with audiophiles, who appreciated the quality of recording, earlier Discmans would skip and didn’t allow for the popular “mix tapes” until it became possible for computers to “burn” CD’s.

Pagers

Pagers were commonly used from the seventies to the nineties, when widespread adoption of cell phones rendered them obsolete for mass market use. They are still used by emergency responders as they are not subject to network outages or similar disruptions in communication.

LED Watches

The watch pictured is the Pulsar, the first LED watch. The watch’s designer was inspired by the film 2001: A Space Odyssey, having worked on the timepiece props for the movie.

TV Watch

While the concept of this watch was attractive, it faced the same lack of channel availability issues as the Watchman.



Seiko Wrist Computer

The smartphone of 1984: this took the idea of the “computer watch” to a whole new level. Think this is too much? Consider the nuclear watch, whose invention was rumoured in this Time magazine article. Be very glad that never happened.

Calculator Watch

The eighties saw watches infused with more gizmos than ever before. The most ubiquitous watch in geek culture was the calculator watch. Since most of us now have computers attached to our hips, it is no longer necessary. Unless you’re Dwight Schrute.




Slide Projectors