What they got so wrong with Betamax, Sony made up for with a little box called the Walkman: on 1st July 1979, portability became king and headphones escaped the house for the first time. Sound quality might have suffered, but for $200 you could finally rollerskate while listening to Pink Floyd.
The Sony MDR-3L2 headphones were the Apple earbuds of their day, but with only one pair bundled in the box and two sockets for shared listening hundreds of third party knock-offs and fashion focussed alternatives flooded the market.
Denon even managed to predate Apple with their in-ear AH-P1 way back in 1981.
But it wasn’t all cute Californians on bikes in the 80s. Check out Eddie Murphy and his AKG K240.