iPod Takes Japan by Storm

conq writes "BusinessWeek reports on the soaring popularity of the iPod in Japan. From the article: 'iPod mania is alive and well in Japan -- one of the most competitive consumer-electronics markets on the planet. Despite an array of well-entrenched Japanese rivals, such as Sony and Matsushita, the iPod had cornered 51.3% of the digital-music player market as of the end of 2005, up from about 32% in 2004, according to research firm BCN. Sony was a distant second with 16.2%, while Panasonic grabbed just 8.2% of the market.'"

Comments

iPod not Xbox 360

[hchaput]

Slightly off topic, but I wonder... Will this finally put an end to the theory that the Xbox 360 bombed in Japan because the Japanese are faithful to Sony? As if baseball wasn't proof enough of Japan's willingness (eagerness) to embrace western culture.

Maybe the trend here is that Japan doesn't like big, brawny electronics. Perhaps they like simple, cute, almost frivolous electronics. Less is more!

...because you haven't tried it?

[TCQuad]

My Rave MP has up and down arrows instead of a virtual scroll wheel. The latter may be somewhat cooler, but it's not any more efficient.

When you want to scroll down faster to get to the bottom of your list, how do you do that? Can you hold the button down harder?

The beauty of the scroll wheel is I can go faster or slower or many subtle degrees in between depending on how fast I move my thumb around.

Re: I guess I still don't get it

[gidds]

PS...

It's just struck me that the Apple philosophy (do one thing and do it well) is rather like the Unix philosophy (where each command does just one thing and does it well). As contrasted with that of most other gadgets (try to do everything), which you might consider more similar to another OS entirely...