We can thank the relentless onward march of technology for many things, not least for scything gadgets down to a reasonable size. Twenty years ago, mobile phones were the size of a house brick, generally installed in cars to facilitate their easy transportation, and, at around £2,000, only on the most exclusive of Christmas wishlists. However, market research firm Mintel predicted in 1986 that “pocketphones” (how cute) “will be as common as Walkmans” – and Sony’s range of personal cassette players were indeed becoming ubiquitous. The word “Walkman” had entered the Oxford English Dictionary earlier in the year, and they were permanent fixtures around our waists, pumping out tinny sounds from the likes of Billy Ocean. Along with a slew of poorly-built, cheaper competitors, the Walkman managed to prolong the life of the cassette format, with sales of pre-recorded cassettes even overtaking those of vinyl LPs at around this time. CD players, however, were still relatively expensive and mainly owned by classical music fans, eager to hear orchestral works in crystal-clear hi-fidelity, free of click, or indeed hiss.

JVC’s VHS video format continued to bludgeon Sony’s Betamax rival into submission, with sales of Betamax machines now only accounting for around 7.5% of the UK market. Sony would soon quietly begin to manufacture VHS players, and the word Betamax would become synonymous with lamentable commercial failure. Videogames, however, were about to have a resurgence after a three-year slump during which a number of console producers went bankrupt; the arrival of Nintendo in North America back in February had revitalised the market, as had the simultaneous release of Super Mario Brothers. Propelling a miniature Italian plumber through the Mushroom Kingdom became an obsession for many, and it went on to become the best-selling videogame of all time. Home computing in the UK continued to be dominated by the Commodore 64 and Sinclair’s ZX Spectrum, but in the USA Apple Computer had just launched the MacPlus. It retailed at a wallet-busting $2,600, but was neverthless a great success, remaining in production for the next 4 years. IBM’s first laptop, the “Convertible”, emerged in 1986 to a much less enthusiastic fanfare; the narrow screen squashed the letters down to half their size, and the chassis was size and weight of a small suitcase. Perhaps if laptops didn’t need their own sturdy carrying handle, and we didn’t need a backbrace to get them off the ground, they might just catch on. But for this, we would have to wait.