The Data Discman is an

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

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

Sony Corporation , commonly stylized as SONY, is a Japanese multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. As a major technology company, it operates as one of the world's largest manufacturers of consumer and professional ...

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

Discman Discman was Sony's brand name for portable CD players. The first Discman, the Sony D-50 or D-5 (depending on region), was launched in 1984. The brand name changed to CD Walkman, initially for Japanese lineups launched between October 1997 and Ma ...

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 CD ...

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 left letter row of the keyboard ( ). The QWERTY design is based on a layout created f ...

-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 grayscale image is one in which the value of each pixel is a single sample representing only an ''amount'' of light; that is, it carries only intensity information. Graysca ...

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

CD drive In computing, an optical disc drive 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 si ...

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 (often abbreviated as the V&A) in London is the world's largest museum of applied arts, decorative arts and design, housing a permanent collection of over 2.27 million objects. It was founded in 1852 and nam ...

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 data. Computers can read—but not write or erase—CD-ROMs. Some CDs, called enhanced CDs, hold both comput ...

designed to be played on the Data Discman, entitled ''The 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 and other digital media via wireless networking to the Kindle Store. ...

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External links

Techmoan Matthew "Mat" Taylor, better known by his channel's name Techmoan, is a YouTuber and blogger active since May 2009, featuring consumer tech reviews and retrotech documentaries about technology of historical interest. Apart from reviews and te ...

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

YouTube YouTube is a global online video platform, online video sharing and social media, social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by ...

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

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