Portable music players have evolved dramatically as time has gone by. The walkman was one of the earlier devices that people would use besides the transistor radio. They would run on AA batteries and you could plug in your cassette tapes and head out. I remember how popular they were in the 80-s. Walkmans paved the way for portable music devices. As we progressed toward and into the 90-s, the portable CD players became popular as cassettes were phased out of the market. CDs and computers came together to pave the way for the digital media revolution that would change the music industry as a whole forever.
As computers became more prevalent and the internet became a household tool, MP3s became more the norm. Music players that ran the MP3 files (such as the IPod, Zune, and Zen) made it possible for someone to have thousands of songs at their fingertips at any given time. Microsoft, Apple, and Creative all led the charge and brought in an era that caused a lot of strife between most of the music industry and consumers. The players themselves got smaller and could hold more music, and even phones started supporting MP3 playback as a function. MP3 is here to stay, and who knows what the next step will be.
