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iPod Mini Worldwide Rollout Delayed
falcon5768 writes "Apparently those 4-gig, $249 little buggers are selling faster than anyone expected.... So fast that the original April rollout worldwide has been delayed till July to keep up with the demand in the states and to get enough in production to meet worldwide sales. Given that there where 100,000 pre-orders alone, does this mean that yet again Apple hit on a niche that no one else (including me) thought would sell. I have been hearing a lot of rumors that the biggest buyer of the iPod mini has in fact been those female tech geeks out there. So much for the idea a $249 4-gig iPod was a mistake." Rob Glaser of RealNetworks, though, claims that not opening the iPod (big or small) to other formats is a real mistake; he wants to see iPod support other proprietary formats (like, say, Real's).
100,000 pre-orders alone [...] the biggest buyer of the iPod mini has in fact been those female tech geeks out there
Ha ha ha! Next they'll be telling us about the Easter Bunny and Santa Claus buying them.
Trolling is a art,
...that Apple made a huge blunder there (not supporting Real Networks). I'm sure they're kicking themselves over it.
Tim
Heh, first time I've heard that one. Funny that it's the female demographic too...
"No, give me the smaller one"
As seen on Wired: Get a free desktop PC
I bet Real doesn't like the idea of Apple not supporting their format.
That combined with their other losses these last couple of weeks, I just suspect the statement was made to make it sound like they are still a contender.
Ted
Fantasy remains a human right; we make in our measure and in our derivative mode... -- JRR Tolkien
The question is not 'why female geeks?' but rather 'what female geeks?' ;-)
"Nature doesn't care how smart you are. You can still be wrong." - Richard Feynman
Like the original premise (that the iPod mini was a bad idea), the claim that Apple should support niche formats like OGG or Real is stupid. Apple has demonstrated time after time after time that they and they alone define the lead in technology that the rest of the industry follows. If Apple says AAC is where its at, then that's where it's at. Period. All the naysayers and open sores advocates can go buy something else, but like every other time, they will add up to maybe a couple of thousand people. Meanwhile the rest of us will go on enjoying state of the art portable music. Thanks again Apple!
"No one's gonna buy that! It's only 4 gigs, and it's too expensive! Apple is DOOMED!"
Whatever.
Because men like to have big ipods
Yes, I'm bitter about Real.
I always save my last mod point to mod up a good troll. You people are too serious.
Because females tend to be more conscious of design/looks. In general men tend to care more about specs (my iPod is bigger then yours). That is why so many ./ers were predicting that it would fail, because it is not meant for this crowd in general.
The fact of the matter is that Joe Sixpack will not give a crap what format his music is in, and will mock anybody who tries to explain why he should. As long as it works, that's it. iPods will continue to sell regardless of format because unlike we nerds, normal people only store music on their iPods and listen to it from there. They don't swap their shit around as we would like to. So the iPod Minis will continue to be a raging success.
A lot of Slashdotter's should be getting used to the taste of crow right about now. Many people here predicted that teh iPod Mini would be a bust, that no one would buy a 4GB unit for $50.00 (US) less than a 15GB unit.
/. market.
And they were 100% dead wrong. Why? Because the iPod Mini isn't aimed at the tech-savy
The lesson here: Don't predict the market based solely on your preferences.
Boobies never hurt anyone. - Sherry Glaser.
I'm not sure if it has anything to due with actually hitting a niche market or if it's just a way to be ultra-hip and spend $50 less. The vast majority of people that are buying these aren't techies, they are just average people that have very little product knowledge beyond knowing the iPod plays mp3s and that it's cool. If people shopped around, or if Apple's competitors did a better job of marketing I don't think it would sell nearly as well.
sig.
"Given that there where 100,000 pre-orders alone, does this mean that yet again Apple hit on a niche that no one else (including me) thought would sell."
And all my friends laughed at me when i bought stock in a fruit. But all i know was apple with this news their stock is at 26.87 up 1.37 / 5.37%
30% Troll, 50% Underrated, 10% Interesting
Score:5, Troll
My wife says she wants an iPod, after seeing someone at her office with one. I ask which one she wants, and she sends me a damn link to the mini. I said for a bit more you could get the regular iPod with more storage...apparently this one will fit in her purse better or something. Maybe it's the ability to choose a color, but I thought you can get "skins" for your regular iPod already? In any case, chalk up another possible sale for the female geek market.
Sometimes I doubt your commitment to Sparkle Motion.
Dude, lots of people thought it was a good idea. True, the majority of people on Slashdot thought it was a bad idea, but Slashdot is hardly representative of everybody.
Way to spin the issue, though--it wasn't a sound business decision built from careful research and experience, it was Yet Another Example of (beleaguered) Apple somehow succeeding with a dubious product...
Obliteracy: Words with explosions
Show me this mysterious PocketPC that supports 4 gigabytes of memory and can be had (with the memory) for only $249, please.
Because it's too hard to play games or watch movies while I'm walking through the city to a friend's house, or while I'm sitting at my desk doing some drafting. I like listening to music while I do those (and other) things, and I want something that does that very well, and doesn't have a big color screen to eat up battery life.
One time I threw a brick at a duck.
I've met and known many female geeks. The reason most don't know they are there is because a lot of male geeks LOOK like the stereotypical geek. Female geeks do not.
Uh huh...
So where is it that you buy a PocketPC and equip it with 4GB of memory for less than $250? Maybe you were thinking of the "big" iPod? Can you buy 40GB of RAM for your PocketPC for less than $500?
mp3 music can be imperfect, but it's better than the movies that you'll be playing on your pda...
Technicaly...same reason it was cheaper for me to hook up my computer with a TV-out card, than buying even the cheapest DVD-player. I like having everything and the kitchen sink on the same appliance...most people dont want their toaster to connect to the internet... They like tools focused on particular job... Gameboy for game, Ipod for music, watch for time, etc. To each his or her own.
I was an original Mac person. Way back with the Apple II, then the Mac, etc. Finally I switched to the PC for all the obvious reasons.
/. crowd is obsessed with specs and functionality but I think the iPod is a thing of beauty. What Apple did with the mini is add a color choice which instantly makes it legitimate to the eye of a woman. Most women I know are much more color sensitive than men. The small size helps too.
What got me to buy an iPod was the almost sensual way it felt, the intuitive way it operates and the "cool" factor which is worth a lot to me.
Of course, I wouldn't go near it until the PC interface came out and I still wish it supported more formats. I know most of the
I think secretly I like seeing the Apple logo on my desk full of functional PC crap.
M
This time with iPod mini's. They've arranged a special deal with Apple to reserve the first models to come off the assembly line.
Thanks, Virgina Tech... Thanks a lot....
-Pete
In other news, The head of GM thinks that Germany's Porsche should install Chevrolet LT1 engines in the new 911. "It'll give them a chance to reach a larger audience with that car." a spokesman for the company said.
its modded 5
as funny
lay off the coffee for a while
and relax.
So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.
> It's been on MacRumors.com all day.
Because MacRumors is, by name and nature, a rumors site.
Slashdot only published hard news.
Norman Cook's Ode to Sl
This is why geeks have such a bad rap and a hard time in the real world. LOOKS MATTER. Say it with me again. APPEARANCES MATTER, LOOKS Matter.
Fantasy remains a human right; we make in our measure and in our derivative mode... -- JRR Tolkien
I personally am somewhat happy that there's so much interest in them, but I have a fairly significant personal interest in having these things get shipped as quickly as possible. Here's hoping that Apple can churn the damn things out fast enough to meet demand.
Dont know if this has been mentioned, but I hear the bottleneck is the 4GB drives (rumored to be supplied by Hitachi), Apple says they've totally exhausted the supply sold to them. I hope Hitachi (or whoever it is making those drives) kicks up manufacturing a bit to meet demand.
But I'm a female geek, and I recently bought a regular iPod. I wanted the extra space, true, but I am also offended that Apple thinks they can get away with giving us less for our money because it is "pretty". Bah.
I could kill you, sure, but I could only make you cry with these words
Why buy an iPod when you can buy a PocketPC, equip it with as much memory as you want (it's cheap these days), and do infinitely more things with it beyond just listening to mp3's, such as watch movies or play games?
Apple has had the same strategy for several years now. While it may be cool to have a PocketPC, it is WAY COOLER to have an iPod. The PocketPC is cold and unfeeling, while the iPod has had exceptional marketing exposure... And it seems to be working.
Slashdot Syndrome: the sudden, extreme urge to correct someone in order to validate one's self.
Glaser...said during a panel discussion Tuesday at PC Forum here that Apple is creating problems for itself by using a file format that forces consumers to buy music from Apple's own iTunes site....Apple could not be reached for comment.
Yes, that's because Apple was on its way to the bank. Laughing, I might add.
-Carolyn
Like Daddy always said: if you can't dazzle 'em with brilliance, baffle 'em with bullshit.
To my family... They came out to visit, they had never seen an iPod before, and they have almost zero Apple products in the city where they are from (only 1 CompUSA is the only place that sells Apple products). They all use PCs. I took them to the Apple store, and they walked out with two iPod Minis. They would buy Apple computers if Apple would get some Retail presence in New Mexico - so that they could have a place to buy software and peripherals and such....
The 4GB iPod is not competing with the 15GB iPod. The 4GB iPod is meant as an alternative to the flash based MP3 players offered by everyone else. Take a look: 256MB Rio Chiba is $200, a 256MB Rio Cali is $200, 256MB Yepp is $200, 512MB Creative MuVo2 X-Trainer is $289. I could go on and on. Now $250 for a 4GB iPod looks pretty good right? To say nothing of the fact that it's an iPod and looks so damn cool compared to any of the flash players out there. People saying the Mini iPod is expensive don't understand Apple's strategy here. They want to compete with flash players with the mini, and HD players with the regular iPod.
Support the First Amendment. Read at -1
This has been covered before... factories can only churn out so many of those things per day.
-Rob
Marriage doesn't have to suck!
... and not as a smaller jukebox.
The miniature MP3 players, usually topping out at 256MB or 512MB due to the price of CF/SD cards, sell to a broader audience than the bigger jukeboxes. Even the bigger iPod is a bulky thing to carry around. The clones tend to be even bigger.
The one thing that Apple has gotten right over the years is ergonomics and human interface: the iPods -- like the iMac -- are small, easy to use (which prompts some to call them crippled), few options to confuse (do I need AFLAC? [no, that's that insurance with the duck] What's an Ogg?), and they're smooth: soothing on the eye, and easy on the fabric of the pocket, if not the wallet.
Design for Use, not Construction!
the initial, on-topic part: i never thought these things would sell to anybody for that price, but i guess it makes sense to me that women would adopt it first. i dont mean that to be sexist, but women tend to care more about aesthetics more, i think. also, i would guess women to care a little more about it being tiny. i mean, id be willing to lug around a bigger, uglier dell player if it was superior in the ways i deemed more important. i just dont see my wife thinking the same way. she would rather have the one that is prettier and smaller. (sure, sure, insert joke about that last sentence *here*)
now for the RvB quote:
"didnt i just tell you to stop makin up ficticous animals?"
later...
"so, unless anybody has any other names for it, we'll call it the warthog....chipathangy, how bout that? i like it...got a ring to it."
use your turn signal! you people act like it's divulging information to the enemy
And while we're at it, can we give an iPod a wireless interface and GPS so that it can report to RealNetworks exactly where you've been going and what you've been doing while you've been carrying the thing around.
Doesn't it make you feel good to know that our freedoms are protected by politicans, lawyers and journalists.
Rob Glaser of RealNetworks claims that not opening the iPod to other formats is a real mistake. "I can't run .RM files on iPod. What is this, the Soviet Union ?"
Bill Gates of Microsoft claims that not opening emacs to other formats is a real mistake. "I can't edit .DOC files on emacs. What is this, the Soviet Union ?"
Howard Stern of Loudmouth Inc claims not opening the airwaves on ClearChannel is a real mistake. "I can't say F*** on radio ! What is this, the Soviet Union ?"
Janet Jackson of Boob Inc. claims not opening her bra on public television is a real mistake. "I can't expose my nipples ! What is this, the Soviet Union ?"
Macrumors is both rumors and news...
It's been in the news section all day.
Ummmm... shouldn't that be RealMistake(tm)? ;)
Un-news
*sigh* do we have to go over this again and again? The iPod supports:
AAC (16 to 320 Kbps) with or without Fairplay DRM, MP3 (32 to 320 Kbps), MP3 VBR, Audible, AIFF and WAV
How many portable players support RealNetworks formats?
Those who laugh at you for you having a Mac.. are the people who constantly call you to fix their PC.
So the slashdot crowd was wrong. (Yet again) Good thing I did not short those SCO stocks before... However, I feel that most slashdotters don't really understand what marketing is.
Even though "marketing" is a dread-word around here, Apple seems to have a really good marketing department to me. They get it right quite often.
Remember, marketing does not just reffer to the selling process of a given item, but also the process by which you conduct research into a given area to determine if there really is a market after all. It is important to check to see if the market is there by research, because what you can divine just by intuition is often wrong for marketing.
A very interesting read (even if you are a computer only type geek) on marketing is:
The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing
It covers things like how Listerine was the market leader for mouthwash - because everyone wanted to keep their mouth free from germs - and the medicie taste was irrelevant... Enter Scope, with better tasting mouthwash for "fresh breath" not germ killing so much, and now Scope is #1 in the market - Listerine #2.
Try to hack my 31337 firewall!
The people who say you can get the 15gig for $50 more don't get it - they serve different purposes.
I keep my thrid-generation 30 gig at home most of the time, connected to my stereo, because I have put all my CDs in storage. Meanwhile, on my daily commute, I carry the mini - 4 gig is plenty of songs for an hour a day! And the tininess makes a huge difference, plus the new "click wheel" is, for me, the ideal controller. When I travel, the big one comes with me - more music, plus a FW HD. But for quick trips around town, the mini beats it hands down - and the big one (I realize it's demented to call the regular size big, but that's how it feels, now) can be home, serving as my music library.
Now, of course not everyone buying the mini has both, but I bet there are a fair number. And for those who choose only a mini, well, the tiny size and great interface are powerful draws - and many people think 1000 songs at a time is plenty!
I am also offended that Apple thinks they can get away with giving us less for our money because it is "pretty".
Since 1999 Apple has operated on this principle. It's been working fairly well too. iMac...iBook...Cube...
Less for more.
The G3, G4, and G5 Towers have retained a good bang to buck ratio, but their "consumer" and "eye-candy" machines have become cash sinks.
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
Being a female tech geek myself, I was with you all when I thought the the mini was an idiotic concept priced for failure.
But then they started putting these ads in the InStyle magazine (girly fashion mag touting the latest styles out there). The ad was two facing pages with postcard pop-ups of paper iPod Minis to actual size, one of each color. Damn it if it didn't look as nice as some of those cute little handbags in the same price range a few pages away.
I still didn't get it, but I swear, if they slap a little Hello Kitty on it, I may have to cave in to the cuteness factor.
Sorry Real, but I don't see any need for the iPod to support yet another proprietary audio format. The iPod can deal with stanard AAC and MP3, and Apple's FairPlay AAC. Ogg Vorbis would be nice, as it is an open standard that anyone can implement royalty-free, but I can live with what I have right now. Real and Windows Media? I wouldn't have bought my iPod if I needed them.
The beauty (to me, the consumer) of FairPlay DRM is that every track bought from the iTunes Store comes with the same rights. I don't have to wonder what I can do with my purchases, or read any fine print. I like that. I doubt I'll ever buy off of another online store, because it's a problem I don't need... unless someone else starts selling FairPlay AAC files or standard un-mangled files.
It's kind of sad to see a superior product (IMHO) like the Rio Karma get sidelined due to the iPod mini's momentum/marketing/teenybopper appeal.
It's like seeing your favorite band get no recognition while some guy named "Ludacris" goes platinum several times over.
I loved my iPod when I first got it, but then I got my hands on a Rio Karma. I wanted to believe that my money was well spent, but after playing with the Karma's equally-intuitive UI and seeing their Dev team actually active in their forums and implementing/listening to what their users suggested, I made the switch. Instead of pointless features for a digital audio player like "Breakout" or "Contacts" (I wanted a DAP, not a PDA), the Karma has audio-related features like gapless playback and being able to create/edit several playlists on-the-go. Plus, the sound quality is great, and not as flat as several reviewers have mentioned the iPod as being.
I have a 40 Gb iPod, my husband has a 30Gb iPod - reason, he demands instant gratification, so he got his first, because I had to wait - I got the bigger one cheaper... :)
Sara
Designer, Gamer, Macgrrl in an XP World
What do you expect from someone who funded his company with the proceeds from a criminal act!
I read that whole page, and how do you get anything about them funding the project from a criminal act? They did build a "blue box" which was probably a little illegal. But they didn't make any money off of it, nor fund the company... The biggest thing I see on that page is that Steve Jobs gave Woz a hard time for coming in to work late... Get a clue, and stop bashing Jobs and Apple for no reason.
What is it about Apple that they can generate such huge pre-orders of a gadget that costs $250 and *still* not make a profit?
I know you're a troll but... how many times since 1998 has Apple NOT reported a profit? They're one of the only tech companies that actually make money in this ruined economy.
Those who laugh at you for you having a Mac.. are the people who constantly call you to fix their PC.
/me raises hand
I have no need for more than 4GB of music at any one time (I don't even have 4GB of music that I actually listen to really). The mini is $50 cheaper, fits nicely in a pocket and is made of nice scratch resistant aluminium rather than easily scuffed chrome. I saved money and saved pocket space - the 15GB, while cheaper per gig, would've been a waste since it would end up only holding about 4GB thus making it more expensive per used gigabyte not to mention less pocket friendly.
Again, you're looking at a pretty small cross-section of the consumer audience--people who frequent/run geek tech sites. (The audience at Mac news sites, after all, is not that different demographically from Slashdot--primarily comprised of tech-oriented, male geeks.) While the tech-oriented crowd was indeed screaming about the cost to capacity ratio, plenty of people were swooning over it's compact form factor, it's styling, even the freakin' colors! The iPod mini was never meant to appeal to case-modders and DIY geeks. The iPod mini was designed to appeal to the same crowd that buys ultra-compact, color-screen, flip-lid camera phones. Apple knew that this was a big market from the start, as did a lot of other people.
The tech-geek conventional wisdom was blindsided by the iPod's success because the tech-geek conventional wisdom failed to understand that other people buy digital gadgets, too!
Obliteracy: Words with explosions
"I've met and known many female geeks. The reason most don't know they are there is because a lot of male geeks LOOK like the stereotypical geek."
And a lot of the stereotypical female geeks look like males.
My other machine is a lever.
Actually, I've been using DVD to PocketPC to rip DVD's down to .wmv files and they look really good for such a small size (128MB or 256MB). It does take a long time to convert (about the realtime length of the movie), but framerate and audio sync are perfect on my Axim X3i. My friends are impressed when I show them a full movie on my PDA. Nothing like having 2 full movies on a 256MB card for when things get dull.
Not only that, since DVD to PocketPC uses Windows Media encoder to do the conversion, it turned me onto the usefulness of that software. I converted all my Red vs. Blue episodes to play well on my PDA and I could carry about 30 at a time on a 256MB card. The predefined PocketPC conversion setting does a great job.
Dewey, you fool! Your decimal system has played right into my hands!
Thanks for the tip but I'm already pretty good at hiding my prejudices and ethnic jokes in public.
And I also already have a girlfriend. But the cracker ass bitch don't know a thing about computers so I fantasize about Indian girls debugging software for me.
So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.
would have all of your heads. The correct usage is iPods Mini.
If I could make this sig kill you, I would.
>>Slashdot only published hard news.
I don't even know where to start with that one.
Don't park drunk, accidents cause people.
Apple has had a long history with not being able to predict demand for their products, or they have some obfuscated business model that does this on purpose.
Anyone remember the powerbook 520 540/c, or the first power macs? Anyone remember the magazines (ugh, it was that long ago) constantly reporting the long lead times for newly introduced models? I often wonder how much $tronger the company would be today if they would have nailed every introduction with enough supply to meet the demand. Maybe another factor in the mac price premium?
Try to remember, when sony came out with the walkman eerone said that this is the stupidest idea ever. Who would buy a tape recoder that doesn't record? Turns out, everyone. Its not the ammount of features that matters, its the usefulness to the task at hand (and to some respect, the novelty).
At least on a Mac, it also has many other uses. Everything from being an external hard drive some basic PDA functions. For those who travel, you can also plug in a card reader to download images taken with your digital camera while you're still on the road.
So yes, its great for listening to music, but it can do more!
Should note I'm talking about the iPod, not iPod mini -don't know how it stacks up feature-wise.
"he demands instant gratification, so he got his first, because I had to wait - I got the bigger one"
Yeah, but did you have multiple iPods?
My other machine is a lever.
Why buy an iPod when you can get a Portable PC with subwoofer and 120 GB of MP3s? And it supports Ogg, too!
Fellowship 9/11
I can see why females who like music would go for the iPod mini, of course, though I don't know any that have one.
I went to the Apple store in a mall in New Jersey one day to pick up an extra docking station for my iPod and the line was out the door and snaking around the staircase. I went up to the guy at the entrance:
Me: "Is this the line to get in?"
Him: "Are you looking to buy an iPod mini?"
Me: "No, I need another station for my iPod."
Him: "This line's for the mini. Go right in."
I didn't even realize that it was the same day that the minis came out. [Had I been looking to buy one, I could've beat the crowd too!] I had stopped looking for mp3 players when I got mine as a gift from my wife. (Thx honey!)
I didn't see many females in the line, but maybe I wasn't really looking. I seemed to notice that they were mostly young (read: high school-aged) teens. I guess the minis are what's cool. Then again $50 is a big difference when you ain't got no job. I happen to think they are ugly, but that's just me.
My iPod gets the most looks of any player I've owned, at any rate. I'm not surprised.
Oh yeah, and you can only play one song at a time.
WWJD? JWRTFA!
A lot of people i know who have mp3 portables use them exclusively for the gym, so Apple probably did a little bit of market research and found that a smaller device would be a hit among active people and women. For most people, the 4GB size limitation is not an issue. Remember, most of these active people are using 128mb flash players. The only big issue is the $250 price tag. Apparently apple priced it right, otherwise the device wouldn't be selling that well.
- In Soviet Russia, the .RM file runs YOU! .DOC file edits YOU!
- In Soviet Russia, the
- In Soviet Russia, F*** says YOU!
- In Soviet Russia, your nipples expose YOU!
Sheesh, all the money must be making them stupid.
I had a multimedia PDA before I got my iPod.
I sold it because:
1) PDA memory is slowww. And switching tracks was slowww. The interfaces were slowww. Copying to the memory card, even over USB 2.0, was so slowww I coudn't take it! Copying 30 gig to the iPod took less than ten minutes.
2) PDAs are hard to control one handed or while in motion. I kept screwing it up while running at the gym. Plus I looked stupid, tapping at a pda in a leather case with a plastic stick while running in a circle.
3) PDAs aren't very rugged. I dropped it a lot and would cringe every time. The iPod isn't much better, but there are a number of shock absorbing "skins" that really make it nice. Furthermore, sweating on the PDA can cause it to not work right. The iPod, being nearly seamless, is unaffected by sweat.
4) The PDA sound was awful...besides being hard to control, volume wise, there were noticable problems with the sound. And it wasn't loud enough. And the headset plugged in to a really inconvenient place. Mostly, it felt "tacked on."
Hey freaks: now you're ju
A related article over at The Register made this point rather effectively:
Quack, quack.
I no longer own every version. I have bought each successive model as it has come out because of the increased capacity (and I need one more generation because I've got about 7GB more than my 40 GB can hold and I still buy music).
The 5 GB I sold to a friend when my 10 GB arrived. It, then, was given to a closer friend when my 20 GB arrived. That one I traded to a co-worker in exchange for a handmade weaving when my 30 GB arrived. That went on loan to yet another pal when the 40 GB arrived. I'm sure I'll dispose of that somehow when the next-gens arrive. And now, the mini.
So I guess I misspoke -- I never had a 15 GB model. If memory serves, they were initially released when the 20 GBs were so I skipped that particular capacity.
Having had all those iPods, I feel qualified to assert that while the touchpad wheel was a great idea, the touchpad buttons arranged in a row above the wheel was categorically NOT. It's very difficult to find a button in the dark when the "by feel" method will take you off to the hinterlands depending on which button happens to feel a finger first. I absolutely worship the clicking touchwheel on the mini and I will be stunned if that doesn't adorn all future iPod models.
Oh, and I find that with each new release bringing additional features (clocks, games, contacts, etc) the iPod software is more likely to lock up and require a forced reset. Battery life is also declining more than the reduced size would indicate. I loves me some iPod but contrary to popular opinion each new model is _less_ than the one that preceded it.
Learn to spell: nickel, missile, lose, solely, amendment, speech, kernel, probably, ridiculous, deity, hierarchy, versus
She seemed surprisingly disappointed when I said it only came in white.
Apple's done their market research on this one, folks.
"He'd be a broader guy if he had dropped acid once." - Steve Jobs on Bill Gates
I agree to what the parent post described. Although the Karma is not as elegant as the iPod it has a very good Dev team that actually responds to suggestions and firmware bugz. The only problem i faced when buying it was the price that in the UK where i live the cheapest i could find was 269 pounds, a price 1/3 above the US price ($270). Speaking for myself, i was looking for a versatile mp3-ogg player with enough capacity to cram my Heavy metal collection into and enough space for file storage. Before shelling out that kind of money (as beeing a degree student) i was lurking over the Archos 600 player, a player robust enough for travelling and bouncing about.As soon as i found out that it is more hackable than any other mp3 device out there (whack the HD out and exchange it with a bigger one, upload custom firmware to enhance the capabilities,etc) i decided i'm gonna give it a try as soon as i have the money to spend for it. http://rockbox.haxx.se
Roses are red, violets are blue, most poems rhyme, but this one doesn't...
Because foremost, it is a very practical player in ways many others are not (and women are generally more practical than men and want features that are useful to them as opposed to just existing for possible future use for some remote scenario). Getting songs onto it is very fast, you can use it easily, and even the size while adding to "cuteness" is primarily a practically useful feature rather than just a gimmick or fashion statement.
That really is the key - the primary buyer of the iPod is not buying it for fashion (for what piece of electronics is really fashionable to the level of clothing or accessories) but instead for the practical features it offers to deliver portable music to the user as easily as possible. People keep scoffing at the possible sucess of the iPod because they misunderatand this very key point - as long as you continue to believe people buy an iPod for reasons of apperance you will also continue to be suprised at any sucess they attain in any form because you misunderstand the core of what makes them desireable.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Slashdot: The iPod-mini is overpriced and has no target audience!
Rest of the world: We don't give a flying fuck!
Love the Donnie Darko sig.
The most rabid believers in American Exceptionalism are the exact same people whose policies are destroying it.
I visited my sister a couple of weeks ago, coincidentally arriving on the day that her 13-year old daughter's (blue) iPod Mini arrived. She bought it herself, with her babysitting money. In that age group, there aren't "portable mp3 players", there are iPods. Period.
Are you kidding? Have you ever seen the average woman's handbag? I've seen smaller European cars.
Thankfully, my college days are behind me. More thankfully, they prepared me for a job that pays well enough for me to do stupid things like slap the Buy Now! button at store.apple.com whenever a new iPod appears.
The mini I bought because I was curious about the size/weight/capacity combination. Did Apple have another smash hit on its hands or had they come up with the puck-mouse of music players? Based on the article we're yammering about, a lot of people agree with my assessment of "the former".
It's amazing how light 3.6 ounces is compared to 5.6 ounces. I carried the mini around in a shirt pocket all day last week because I forgot it was there and the weight didn't catch my attention. It's also small enough to fit very nicely into my small hands (and you know what they say about guys with small hands, right? Yeah, we buy small gloves. Thank you! I'm here all week!) so I really like it.
I take the full-size iPod in the car with me pretty much everywhere I go. I take the mini on my person pretty much everywhere I go. They're a great team. I have a playlist of my highest-rated songs that gets randomly shuffled whenever I sync the mini (every week or two) so the smaller capacity is offset by the certainty of not wasting any bytes on Soft Cell's "Sex Dwarf".
Learn to spell: nickel, missile, lose, solely, amendment, speech, kernel, probably, ridiculous, deity, hierarchy, versus
It's because all the tech dorks here are thinking in terms of specs (also the reason Linux on the desktop sucks right now).
Apple knows that specs aren't enough--you have to design a friendly, pleasant, usable device that also looks pretty damned cool. They make it fun.
OSS people hate that because they consider it the forte of "marketing" which is the forte of the proprietary companies they rival against. But Apple has it right. It's like people who design cars, they make the interiors look great. It's not *just* about horsepower and mileage. You have to like driving it.
...
the wheel thing is very cool and functionality is a high point. i just dont think people get an iPod because they played with the alternatives and it worked the best.
The thing is that you can play with them and know that the work really well, without even having used a different model - they work well enough to convince you they would be usable in daily life. That's why I think that functionality may still be a primary reason for choosing them. It would be really interesting to see some kind of breakdown about how many people had had contact with one before buying them as that would go a long way to prove or disprove the theory. My theory comes about from hearing a lot of people relate stories about buying them after playing with one, and seeing people react to them at Apple stores (they show only casual interest as they pick them up, but get really into them when they start using it).
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Yukon do it, all night long!
Saying Java is nice because it works on all OS's is like saying that anal sex is nice because it works on all genders.
STOP IT, that's not an iPod...
I'm a male geek and I bought a mini. I wasn't really sold on the whole iPod concept at least as far as liking it enough to spend money on. Then I used a mini for a while. The tilting scroll wheel is a HUGE improvement over the 3G ipod's buttons [I can use it without looking at it] and the size difference means that it's really pocket-sized now the construction feel 100% more sturdy as well. One of the other tipping points for me was that I didn't want to be carrying $400+ worth of music player on my person. If I get mugged or something I'd much rather absorb a $250 loss. Also, since I can't fit my whole collection on even a 40 gig iPod [at a decent bitrate] I figured I'd just go with the cheapest model since I'll have to manage everything by hand anyway.
I just wish the dock wasn't such a rip-off.
Agreed. Luckily, I don't have that problem. ;)
today is spelling optional day.
http://www.macobserver.com/article/2004/03/25.14 .shtml
Apple Computer confirmed to The Mac Observer Thursday that its announcement in delaying worldwide release of the iPod mini to July is due to a shortage of Hitachi-made hard drives.
"We're consuming almost all of those drives that are being made," Stan Ng, Director of iPod Worldwide Product Marketing, told The Mac Observer. "So we're putting them in iPod minis as quick as we can get them and trying to get them out as quickly as possible.
He decided to just watch the government, and kind of scale it down to size, and run his life that way. --Laurie Anderson
After all, who is stupid enough not to fork over $.50 cents more for a pound or two more of fries!! Even if you end up eating only a few.
Some people might thing that releasing an even smaller iPod for LESS money than the larger versions is amazing. After all, look how much super miniature cell phones go for...
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
is that it's cheaper than the normal iPod, and 4gig is enough disk space for most people
Don't underestimate the size and weight. After shlepping an original iPod around for the past two years, I really appreciate the Mini. And I'm willing to bet I'm not alone.
I have been hearing a lot of rumors that the biggest buyer of the iPod mini has in fact been those female tech geeks out there. So much for the idea a $249 4-gig iPod was a mistake."
Screw that. It's not just females who want pretty colors here, and it is not a nieche market. Its the market of people, like me, who just cannot justify spending 500 bucks to carry around enough music to listen to for 4 weeks straight non-stop, when they only *have* around 1 GB of music they even listen to anyways. It's people who don't have 500 bucks to blow on nonsense like that.
IMO, its still too big and overpriced. I bet a 1GB iPod for 150 would sell 5x as many units as either of these.
I mean, you have USB2 / Firewire, you can swap the whole 1 GB in about 5 mins. You listen to the music for a few weeks, you get sick of it, you spend 5 mins and swap it out. Who needs to carry their whole freaking collection? I sure don't. 1 GB is enough for me.
I'd spend 150 for a 1 GB iPod, but I sure as hell won't spend 250 on a 4 GB one, or 500 on a 10 GB one. We're not all loaded enough to spend money on useless gadgets, when a cheaper alternative is just as practical.
And that's why this thing is succeeding. Has nothing to do with girls or colors.
I was showing my iPod off to a girl a couple of months ago, touting the features and telling her about the smaller pink ones that were coming out soon.
She oohed and aahed that thing for quite a while (playing with it the whole time) and then asked one of the silliest questions I'd ever heard.
"Is it easy to use?"
My only response... "You tell me. You're using it right now."
She's since bought her own pink iPod Mini.
fs
I think it's the smaller size, too. A lot of gym freaks and athletes have been buying it since it's easier to run/cycle/work out with than an iPod.
Same here, my music collection is around 12 GB, but a playlist of my favorite CD's shows a total of around 3 GB. Hence, the iPod Mini is perfect for me.
I considered one of the iRiver iHP models, but memories of the difficulty of using the iRivier disc player I already have made me think twice.
I considered the Rio Karma but reviews on Amazon show many have hit buggy firmware.
Basically, I am more than happy to pay a bit extra for something that just works correctly. Or put another way, I don't have the patience to futz with a consumer electronics device.
just one, but it lasts longer... :P
Sara
Designer, Gamer, Macgrrl in an XP World
But so much for the rest of the wrold. We don't have the iTunes Music Store - now it seems we don't even get the player.
Time for me to send Steve Jobs a globe with a big red arrow stuck on it pointing at England, and a note saying "I am here".
Asssuming by "us" you meant "female geeks" (or just women generally, geek and non-geek alike), what indication do you have that Apple does think that (aside from the fact they are, in fact, selling scads of them, whether disproportionately to women or not)? They don't say anything in their marketing about them being "girl" iPods or anything like that; they show people of both sexes using them (albeit more or less entirely young, attractive people, but hey, that's marketing for you). If Apple does indeed consider them "iPod mini: iPod for women," they haven't said anything about it (and you can be sure they've sold more than a few of those 100k to men, and are just as happy to take men's money as they are women's).
I'm male, and I still would love a mini, myself (oddly, it's my second choice after the 40 GB - my ideal iPod is the most capacious, but my second choice is the least, before either the 20 or 15).
Crap, now 13 year old kids are buying stuff I've been putting off as 'too expensive'. I gotta get myself a piece of this lucrative babysitting racket...
One god, one market, one truth, one consumer.
I don't think Apple is specifically targeting women. I think it is more of a teenage/young adult focus. However, I do think they were trying to break into the "ooh, pink!" market. Why else would they make a pink one?
I could kill you, sure, but I could only make you cry with these words
I got an ipod mini the first day they came out and it wouldn't play AAC's without freezing entirely. They replaced it with a new one and it still has the problem they said they would fix.
Although I initially thought the $250 price was really high, I understand it now. For those of us with less than 4 gigabytes of music, The iPod mini is not only just as good as the original iPod.... it is better. It has a smaller size, and a better design, for $50 less! It is also good for people with 4+ GB of music that don't need all their music, but enough to last an 8 hour work day or a several day vacation. The only real competition is the Muvo2 at $50 less ... but Apple hardware is always more expensive.
And I doubt the iPod mini costs more than $50 less to manufacture than the standard iPod. Compare it to desktop vs. Notebook hard drives. A 40GB Notebook hard drive goes for $119... a despktop hard drive has 5 times as much space is only $20 more!
Having said all that, I am still not buying one because $250 is too much for me to spend on a portable music player.
Rather than waiting for the iPod Mini overseas release (originally scheduled for April), I purchased one on a timely business trip to San Francisco which happened to coincide with the new downtown SF store opening. Patting myself on the back for purchasing it aside, here are some reasons for its success: 1) Appeal Mostly appeals to the female demographic with the pastel colors, primitive shapes, sleek ergonomics, and conspicuous backlight (reminds me of old B&W macs). Looking at their marketing strategy, you will see the iPod mini with fashion items in department store displays. It becomes a must-have accessory like a certain pair of shoes or handbag, but probably has a higher reusability. Take a look at trends in the digital camera market... portable cameras are becoming more portable (e.g. Casio EXLIM, Pentax Optio-S, Canon SD10, Sony ?) and even use brand names such as Porsche and Coach to enhance their stylishness. 2) Price Competitiveness The closest competitor is the Creative Muvo 2 4GB mp3 player $200, which is somewhat ugly and not highly publicized. Many people have been purchasing the Muvo 2 only to extract the 4GB microdrive and use it in their digital cameras since purchasing a high-speed 4GB microdrive would have cost them $400 more. 3) Usability There is a very short learning curve for this device. There are few enough buttons and features to make it simple enough to use similar to the Mac OS. If you search deeper, you can find a lot more hidden features for the power user. This seems to be a pattern followed by many OS designers including Apple and Microsoft. 4) Performance Having compared the iPod mini to other portable mp3 players such as the Yepp and iRiver, the sound circuitry seems to be higher quality. It's not to the point where it could even replace a quality sound card, but good enough to justify using a nice set of headphones/earphones. The only qualm I have about it is that it crashes every so often... and there's no sad Mac or bomb to indicate it. Moving back to the subject, I don't think it's a mistake not to open it up to other formats since MP3 is still the dominant format. I would predict that 10 years from now, mp3 players will lose their style like the digital watch and will become just another function of another device. But, opening it up to all formats would simply accelerate this process and Apple would not be able to reap as much profit.
God damn it, I was going to buy one next week, but no, thanks to you I'm going to have to wait until July, thank you very very much!
;-)
Would you please stop hogging them so that we could get at least a couple over here in Europe too
approximately same size as a tampon???? Either you haven't seen {tampon|mini ipod|woman's genitalia}, or you are part of a supersize race!
Yeah, you do :)
:)
I'm 13 and I'm already reselling for a webhost (not joking, but only to geeky friends at the moment), not to mention the lead Jazilla developer + a whole lot of other stuff.
I refuse to disclose my financial status except to say that I'm in the black and don't have any debt to anybody
You can believe me or not believe me on this one..
but women tend to care more about aesthetics more, i think. also, i would guess women to care a little more about [the small size]
Wow... it's turns out I'm a woman and never knew it until now...
But seriously, there's few things I hate more than sweeping generalizations based on gender. Everyone is different.