Sony has issued a press release in which it has announced its new "Designed for Walkman" program which will allow third-party manufacturers to make accessories for its Walkman range of digital audio players.

Sony has disclosed the specifications of its proprietary "WM-PORT" connector which is used to interface with the Walkman players to various accessories, as well as to a PC for loading music onto the players.

Sony has only disclosed the specifications to approved licensees, so don't expect any cheap tacky accessories to carry the "Designed for Walkman" logo, although we'd expect there to be a few "unlicensed" products now when the spec is out.

We can't but wonder why Sony didn't do this some time ago, as Apple has offered its "Designed for iPod" program for quite some time, and even Sandisk has offered a similar program for its Sansa players. In saying that, Sony has a fairly small market share with its digital audio players, so maybe there hasn't been enough interest from third parties until recently.

You can find the press release here.