Slashdot Mirror


iPod Mini Hits The 'Sweet Spot'?

Tooky writes "The BBC is reporting on a survey carried out by Jupiter Research which found that most consumers were only storing about 1000 songs on their portable MP3 players, claiming that ' The finding seems to be borne out by the demand for Apple's Mini iPod'." According to the piece: "Jupiter said digital music players with capacities of 5,000 songs will provide too much space for most people. It added that consumers rate other features as highly as the ability to store all the songs held on their PC."

15 of 481 comments (clear)

  1. There's a Limit by Nom+du+Keyboard · · Score: 5, Funny
    most consumers were only storing about 1000 songs on their portable MP3 players

    Hey, there's a limit to how much I can get through this P2P pipe. The university keeps shutting down my Internet connection for filesharing. Give me time!

    --
    "It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
  2. More space is useful for other things, though. by DrEldarion · · Score: 4, Funny

    Sure, you may not have enough music to fill up that 20GB, but that doesn't mean that you'll never use the space.

    I have a 10GB Archos MP3 player, and while I only keep about half of that full of music, I find it incredibly convenient for transporting groups of large files between places. It works just like an external hard drive.

  3. Some of us prefer to save money by bludstone · · Score: 3, Funny

    By buying a 30$ mp3 cd player and a spool of 100 disks for 20$

    And those of you that complain about skipping. Thats okay, mine doesnt skip, I cushion it by about three hundred dollars IN CASH.

    http://www.penny-arcade.com/view.php3?date=2003- 05 -28&res=l

    --

    no .sig
    1. Re:Some of us prefer to save money by happyfrogcow · · Score: 5, Funny

      and your MP3 CD player is about 3-4 times the size of my Karma. Which, for the record, won't skip when dropped several feet. I found this out the hard way.

      That sounds like the easy way to find out. All you do is let go of it, and hear if it skips.

      The hard way would surely involve differential equations or a computer simulation on a beowulf cluster.

    2. Re:Some of us prefer to save money by barthrh2 · · Score: 5, Funny

      That's a really good idea! It's great for jogging. Thanks to you, I've just invented an alternative to traditional jogging hand-weights: Imagine a handle, and at either end is "spool" storage for 25 disks. You can then jog along, have 100 CD's at your disposal AND get a great upper body workout.

      Of course, shuffling songs between disks may take a bit of dexterity, but that's just another benefit! Before you know it, you'll be seamlessly mixing tunes as you go!

      Thanks for the tremendous idea. It's amazing how coporate America can create these artificial needs in an attempt to bilk us out of $100's of dollars.

    3. Re:Some of us prefer to save money by NineNine · · Score: 3, Funny

      I agree. When I'm out jogging for 1083 hours straight (assuming an average of 1 meg/minute, 650 MB/CD), it's great lugging around those extra 100 CD's. Of course, mere mortals that only jog for an hour or two would be perfectly happy with one MP3 CD, but who are we kidding? I need a 5000GB IPOD for my 45 day long workouts!

  4. Re:Let's collect data... by Neil+Blender · · Score: 5, Funny

    Thought I'd share a data point for what it's worth...

    About the only thing more worthless than simple anecdotal evidence would be attempting to extrapolate trends from data gathered on Slashdot.

  5. More data.... by ptomblin · · Score: 5, Funny

    I have a 100Gb of MP3s on my hard drive at home (and the CDs they were ripped from), and so the 20Gb on my 2nd generation iPod requires a lot of reloading. On the other hand, my step-daughter has a 3rd generation 30Gb iPod (which she got for babysitting the children of somebody who works at Apple) with only about 5Gb of songs. And do you think she'd swap iPods? No way! She's *so* selfish.

    --
    The next Cmdr Taco duplicate will be ready soon, but subscribers can beat the rush and see it early!
  6. Re:Mini; New Market Research Tool! by David+Hume · · Score: 5, Funny

    The iPod Mini was almost universally laughed at on Slashdot, and we seem to have a bad record of predicting these things (the original iPod announcement comes to mind..."Lame"). Apple does research which they use to develop new products. All we have is our personal preferences and better-than-you attitudes.


    Yes, but our personal preferences and "better-than-you attitudes" could be the basis for a valuable new market research tool. Whenever the consensus on Slashdot is that a new product is "lame," the only proper conclusion is that it is going to be a big hit. If you're lucky enough for the Slashdot consensus to be that your product "sucks," then, Yoo Hoo!, buy your company's stock.

    On the other hand, if the Slashdot crowd praises your product -- particularly if they go on and on and on about its infinate configurability and the fact that there are many ways to accomplish the same task -- you might want to take a second look.

    For example, I just criticized the new WiFi radio as a crippled WiFi laptop. So how do I buy the stock?

  7. Re:Let's collect data... by nolife · · Score: 5, Funny

    Yeah, Compusa.
    I see the following scenario..
    It was $999 with a $300 instant rebate, $300 mail in rebate from CUSA, a $100 mail in rebate from Apple, a $50 bundle rebate, and when purchased with a 5 year contract on a cell phone along with TurboTax and Norton Antivirus, you got a $50 gift card that can be used in the next 3 days on 2 different items in the store.

    --
    Bad boys rape our young girls but Violet gives willingly.
  8. /. predictions by lelitsch · · Score: 3, Funny

    Actually, /. is really terrific for predicting the success of consumer products. Almost any product that gets ripped a new one when it's introduced is going to be a success (iMac, iPod, Windows XP, OS X, Photoshop...). And anyone that gets lots of favorable comments it going to fail miserably as far as mass adoption is concerned most of the time (OggVobis, the Linux-based Zaurus, GIMP, Linux on the desktop, the WiFi internet...). The only one better at being wrong than the /. consent is Taco who's track record is basically pefect.

  9. Too much space? by Webmoth · · Score: 4, Funny

    Saying a portable device has too much space is like saying your bathroom has too much toilet paper, your bank account has too much money, or that your S.O. gives you too much sex.

    --
    Give me my freedom, and I'll take care of my own security, thank you.
  10. I have a 10 GB iPod... by steevo.com · · Score: 3, Funny

    ...because it has excellent sound quality, it can host most of my music, and I can take it with me almost anywhere.

    My girlfriend has an iPod Mini because it is pink.

    4 giga-what? Pink.

  11. Re:Let's collect data... by AhBeeDoi · · Score: 4, Funny

    I recall years ago speaking to a customer representative of a large long distance telecom provider. Her office was located in Florida and she spoke with a soft Southern drawl. Her name was Charlotte. I remarked to my colleague that half the women from the south are name Charlotte. Coincidentally, my colleague had also finished talking to another customer service representative from another telecom company who was also a daughter of the south. However, her representative's name was not Charlotte. Based on the our sampling, I concluded that my observation was correct.

  12. Re:Let's collect data... by Drakonian · · Score: 4, Funny
    I slide my mini about 1" downward on the cli...

    I got a laugh when reading that line out of context. ;)

    --
    Random is the New Order.