is an

electronic book An ebook (short for electronic book), also spelled as e-book or eBook, is a book publication made available in electronic form, consisting of text, images, or both, readable on the flat-panel display of computers or other electronic devices. A ...

player introduced to the Western market in late 1991 or early 1992 by

Sony Corporation is a Japanese multinational conglomerate headquartered at Sony City in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. The Sony Group encompasses various businesses, including Sony Corporation (electronics), Sony Semiconductor Solutions (imaging and sensing), ...

. It was marketed in the United States to college students and international travelers, but had little success outside Japan. The

Discman was a brand name used by Sony for their portable CD players. The first Discman, the Sony D-50 or D-5 (depending on region), was launched in 1984. The Sony brand name for Discman changed to CD Walkman, initially for Japanese lineups launched ...

product name had originally been applied to Sony's range of

portable CD player A portable CD player is a portable audio player used to play compact discs. The first audio player released was the Discman D-50 by Sony.Lungu, R"History of the Portable Audio Player." 2008-11-27. Features The basic features of a portable C ...

s such as the Sony Discman D-50, first released in 1984. The Data Discman was designed to allow quick access to electronic reference information on a pre-recorded disc. Searching terms were entered using a

QWERTY QWERTY ( ) is a keyboard layout for Latin-script alphabets. The name comes from the order of the first six Computer keyboard keys#Types, keys on the top letter row of the keyboard: . The QWERTY design is based on a layout included in the Sh ...

-style keyboard and utilized the "Yes" and "No" keys. A typical Data Discman model has a low resolution small

grayscale In digital photography, computer-generated imagery, and colorimetry, a greyscale (more common in Commonwealth English) or grayscale (more common in American English) image is one in which the value of each pixel is a single sample (signal), s ...

LCD A liquid-crystal display (LCD) is a flat-panel display or other electronically modulated optical device that uses the light-modulating properties of liquid crystals combined with polarizers to display information. Liquid crystals do not em ...

(256x200 early on, later models would have up to 320x240 and in colour),

CD drive In computing, an optical disc drive (ODD) is a disc drive that uses laser light or electromagnetic waves within or near the visible light spectrum as part of the process of reading or writing data to or from optical discs. Some drives can only ...

unit (either

Mini CD Mini CDs, or pocket CDs, are CDs with a smaller diameter and one-third the storage capacity of a standard 120 mm disc. Formats Amongst the various formats are the * Mini CD single, a small disc. The format is mainly used for audio CD s ...

or full size), and a low-power computer. Early versions of the device were incapable of playing audio CDs. Software was prerecorded and usually featured encyclopedias, foreign language dictionaries and novels. It was typically created using the Sony Electronic Book Authoring System (SEBAS). A DD-1EX Data Discman is in the permanent collection of the

Victoria and Albert Museum The Victoria and Albert Museum (abbreviated V&A) in London is the world's largest museum of applied arts, decorative arts and design, housing a permanent collection of over 2.8 million objects. It was founded in 1852 and named after Queen ...

and is currently displayed in the V&A's 20th Century Gallery. This early model did not include the ability to play sound. An updated model, the DD-10EX, was released in 1992 or 1993. The accompanying manual gives a copyright date of 1992. Unlike the DD-1EX, the DD-10EX also had the ability to play audio files. The British version came with a disc containing the ''Thomson Electronic Directory'' for April 1992, plus another containing the ''Pocket Interpreter 5-language conversation book for travelers''. A DD-10EX was included in an exhibition entitled ''The Book and Beyond: Electronic Publishing and the Art of the Book'', held at the

, London, from April to October 1995. The exhibition also included a

CD-ROM A CD-ROM (, compact disc read-only memory) is a type of read-only memory consisting of a pre-pressed optical compact disc that contains computer data storage, data computers can read, but not write or erase. Some CDs, called enhanced CDs, hold b ...

designed to be played on the Data Discman, entitled '' Library of the Future'' and published in 1993. The DD-1EX and DD-10EX both made use of a flip or clamshell form, while the flat, rectangular design of the DD-8 was closer to later e-book readers such as the

Amazon Kindle Amazon Kindle is a series of e-readers designed and marketed by Amazon. Amazon Kindle devices enable users to browse, buy, download, and read e-books, newspapers, magazines, Audible audiobooks, and other digital media via wireless networking ...

References

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External links

Techmoan Matthew "Mat" Taylor, better known by his YouTube handle Techmoan, is a British YouTuber and blogger, specializing in consumer tech reviews and retrotech documentaries about technology of historical interest. Apart from reviews and tests, Ta ...

e-books in the '90s with Sony's Data Discman

YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...

, published on 5 July 2018 Sony products Audiovisual introductions in 1992 Electronic paper technology

See also

References

External links