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Pocket PCs Masquerade as iPods
agwadude writes "Wired News has a story about a British software firm called StarBrite that is selling a virtual iPod that runs on Microsoft's PocketPC operating system. It mimics the iPod interface exactly, including the unique scroll wheel. It's a mere $20 but this seems right considering it's only software, and it only supports MP3. MacDailyNews has a shorter story."
Is the software really the selling point of the iPod?
or as we say in German: slashdotted. Darn.
-- Power corrupts, but PowerPoint corrupts absolutely.
I love the black version. That would be hot if you could change the color of the ipod screen and what not. They need to move to a color LCD version. That would be expensive but I think it would totally be worth it. I already pay a lot for an iPod why not trick it out?
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Software doesn;t change the fact that storage is still a problem, especially since you need to use some of it to install this program. For the price of the software plus a memory card you can just buy a real MP3 player...
Fastest reaction time from Apple lawyers ever. Man those guys are good (or bad, depending on how you think of it).
Appended to the end of comments you post. 120 chars.
It's a mere $20 but this seems right considering it's only software, and it only supports MP3.
;)
Well, there's where the iPod emulation starts to fall apart. It should be $60+ if they want to emulate more of the experience.
Besides, the beauty of the interface is how it is designed for your hands, not your pointing device. How do you get feedback and all that on a touchscreen, be it with your fingers or worse, with a PDA-pencil...
A piece of software mimicing an IPod running on a piece of software mimicing an operating system.
MacCentral is reporting that "pBop's resemblance to the iPod was unmistakable, especially when the product first launched: It was originally called pPod, and featured an interface that was practically identical to third-generation iPods."
it was so similar, in fact, that Apple asked them to make some changes, including the name.
Starbrite has "cooperated fully to address Apple's concerns" but, if you ask me, it is still pretty much a rip off of the iPod interface (GUI and physical). Isn't this kind of thing legally protectable?
Tuus crepidae innexilis sunt.
MacSlash had this item on March 01st. See it: here.
considering that 20 gb hard-drives for pocket pc's cost an arm and a leg, this is hardly an 'ipod killer'.
$20 for mp3 player software? why? just make an ipod skin for some free software.
for great justice
Now I can get an iPod mini on the cheap:
$250 PDA
$400 4gb Hitachi CF microdrive
$20 for this software
and the Apple lawsuit?
Priceless.
No extra functionality, MP3 only, not an iPod, and it only runs on top of MS software. Lame.
Integrate Keynote and LaTeX
And the difference between this and this with this. Or simply this.
Do people really want to pay $20 purely to get a skin for their pocketPC, that has less functionality(only mp3's) than something they can download for free.
Not trolling or anything, but to me, this just seems to prove (again) how well Apple has been doing things these past couple years. Would companies be trying to mimic their every move if Apple was on the wrong track?
I don't really like the fact that the software is a total rip-off of Apples UI design, and that it may (potentially?) reduce iPod sales (although probably to a minimal degree, if at all), but it does seem to very much re-inforce that consumers are generally extremely pleased with Apple's products, and the carefully thought out design that goes along with them.
Mikro$haft might get a Klew eventually, but probably not, and in the meantime, I'll rejoice in my Mac OS X bliss, and never look back. (Converted Mac user since July 2002)
java guy, tech blog...
That's completely untrue. The iPod hardware is great, certainly (except the battery... grr) but it's the UI that really makes it - the fact that you can get to any one of 10k songs really really quickly and easily, with one hand.
Lovely hardware working perfectly with lovely software is Apple's modus operandi - at a lovely price (for Apple).
pictures
You've got it backward ^^
They make money on the hardware, not the music. Therefore the harm.
GPL Deconstructed
*YAAAAAAWN*
Hold still little pig. I just have some lipstick I want to put on you...
You know what?
Donate free food here
Well, you are correct in more ways than you realise.
Apple had their way with these guys and forced the renaming of the product (to pBop) and slight modifications to the interface.
Slashdot is behind the times. This story would have been meaningful a couple days ago.
-- Fighting mediocrity one bad post at a time.
Wrong. Apple makes next to no money on the iTunes store, they make their money on the hardware. And this is a pretty blatant rip off.
I thought it was pretty common knowledge that Apple didn't make money on iTMS?
Also, this isn't even reverse engineering. It is a poorly mimicked interface, no actual reverse engineering of the iPod occured I'm sure.
You just keep on buying your $19 CDs for one song and don't mind what the rest of us are doing. But I'm sure you are just stealing hte music and you expect everyone to give you everything for free. Move out of your mom's basement and join the real world.
Prof. Farnsworth - "Oh a lesson in not changing history from Mr I'm-My-Own-Grandpa!"
I'm pretty sure you can sue for infringement on any of the claims in a patent. That said, the only thing Apple obviously mention as being patent-pending (that I can see) is their Auto-Sync technology.
In any case, the design would be covered by industrial design law - it was on this basis that Apple successfully sued Emachines over their iMac lookalike PCs.
- "So our philosophy is that traffic to the music store will lead to iPod sales and iPod sales will lead to the sale of Macs."
And the Seattle Times noted last October:Wow, a lot cheaper, than launching an international legal court case. Just get em slashdotted...
Think Different.
One has to wonder... being that you can now get the 4Gb CF hard drives (i.e. MuVo 2, mini iPod), you can now stick one of these in a PocketPC, and get an "iPod" that can store 800 songs, has wireless internet access, is an address book and all that, plays movies (wmv's, divx), and PLAYS QUAKE!? now that would be kickin, and would be worth the extra cash you would shell out for the form factor of a real iPod.
Skill is successfully walking a tightrope over Niagara Falls. Intelligence is not trying. -- Anonymous
Um, the scroll wheel is a hardware patent.
You can tell a great deal about the character of a man by observing those who hate him.
I have been using PocketMusic from PocketMind on my Samsung i700 PocketPC/Phone for a while, and it's amazing. I have zero iPod envy (I can't balance a budget, get e-mail, web surf, or make a call on an iPod, but I can play my Oggs on my PocketPC -- even to the extent of dagging them from my Linux box).
I mean this to take nothing away from the exquisitely designed, iPod, but I no longer have the desite to possess a single specialized device for every eFunction in my life. Sure, I sacrifice some sizzle sans iPod, some corporate penis-size sans blackberry, and some cuteness sans the postage stamp-sized phone du jour, but I love just having it *ALL* on my Samsung.
The iPod is a slick but over-priced piece of hardware
If it were over-priced someone would have come out with a copy that is the same storage/size/weight but cheaper. Can you point me to such a product?
Posted by pudge on 13:39 09 March 2004
from the i-smell-a-lawsuit dept.
Shouldn't that be the iSmell-a-lawsuit dept.?
Maybe you should educate the morons of tomorrow so they'll stop believing the leaders of tomorrow. - Dogbert
The FONT is stolen and that's not nebulous. It's called CHICAGO.
I installed the pPod demo last Friday mainly to piss off my roommate (big iPod fan) and I must say that besides looking kinda cool it doesn't do much else. Using a stylus as in place of your fingers worked haphazardly at best, and I am certainly not going to run out and buy a microdrive for it. It's mainly just a fancy skin for a MP3 only player (if it had support for alternate formats, then I'd reconsider). If I want to compete with my friend's iPod, I find it much easier to use programs like Net Use to create a network drive and stream the MP3 wirelessly to my PDA. Sure this limits me to staying within my network, but if I want to go out, a 256MB CF card has more than enough storage for any short trip.
Sadly, PS/2 was yet another victim of USB, which doesn't care what you plug into it, the electrical slut.
Won't be long until iPod is emulating whatever the hell it can, too ...
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
iRiver iHP-120
Practically the same size (2-3mm thicker), exactly the same weight and capacity. about GBP40 cheaper than the 20GB iPod here in the UK and it comes with a built in FM radio and a great LCD remote.
It plays OGGs and WMVs but not AAC (plus MP3s obviously).
I think this will have the opposite effect of what many people think. PPC owners can check this out, realize it's a damn good interface, and then they might decide that the iPod is worth the dough.
Or, they go look for a CF hard drive for more space, learn about the iPod mini being much cheaper than the drives by themselve, and wind up buying a mini instead.
However, I don't see many people using this *as* an iPod... it's just not cost-effective. I bet some people who only need a few songs will use it, but more than likely those people would not be in the market for a real iPod no matter what.
I think pPod will actually increase iPod sales.
I've got more mod points and GMail invi
are pretending to be something that doesn't suck to use? It's bad enough business relies on the ass of an interface called MS Windows, now they want to foist it on me in palm and phone based devices? No thanks, Apple should make a PDA and put PocketPC and Palm OS out of thier respective miseries, although as phones evolve I would guess the whole standalone Palm thing is near death as is.
He only has one hand!
Ironically, the word ironically is often used incorrectly.
Apple licensed from Xerox the elements they incorporated. The lawsuit with Microsoft was that, having licensed Apple IP for earlier version(s) of Windows, Microsoft chose not to do so in a later version but continued to use Apple's IP. The judge in the case just didn't get it and sided with Microsoft.
Wonder if he works in the Patent Office these days?