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Steve Wozniak Predicts Death of the IPod
Slatterz writes "Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, better known in the industry as 'Woz,' believes that the iPod is on its way out and has revealed his discomfort with some aspects of the iPhone. Wozniak said that the iPod has had a long time as the world's most popular media player, and that it will fall from grace due to oversupply. Wozniak also commented on the iPhone's proprietary nature and locked service provider, and compared it to Google's open Android platform. 'Consumers are not getting all they want when companies are very proprietary and lock their products down,' he said. 'I would like to write some more powerful apps than what you're allowed.'"
First post. damn I feel all strange./joke
Well who knows ... the hype with apple products is the reason why so many people like it. Usually it's not the "best" technology who gets approval but the one who is used by most people see Windows, we all know that it's relatively crappy but so many people use it that finally it doesn't count that much.
But clearly android phones are going to be a refreshing new option for the horrible windows mobile platform or the jail'ed Iphone.
Correction. Woz a genius.
I can't understand the appear of iXXXX's either. Locked proprietary technology with limited scope for a geek to truly enjoy.
What I've noticed though is that the people who buy them don't seem to care...
Sure they'll die, but I doubt they'll die just because there's something better on the market.
And as for open alternatives? I've had a Symbian phone for years. Lots of free apps and developer tools, built in GPS and great touch screen, been around for years... That didn't stop the iPhone coming out either.
GrpA
Enjoy science fiction? "Turing Evolved" - AI, Mecha, Androids and rail-gun battles. What more could you want?
I did read tfa. His prediction on the iPod does not seem to take apple's innovation history.
I do agree with his discomfort with the iPhone. Apple had the chance to revolutionize the cell phone market in the US and flubbed it.
I recently played around with an iPod (classic) and to be honest I really dont get why people tout its great UI ('clickwheel') - at least for me it was completely counter-intuitive and just plain stupid. I mean why no dedicated buttons for volume? The iPod UI in the iPhone works much better for me.
I never liked iTunes and thus also not iPod, and that all because ONE TIME, years ago, iTunes was installed on my PC during the installation of other software without me asking for it (or making the stupid checkbox to turn it off not visible enough) and me since then associating the name iTunes with malware. That association has never left my head, and continues on for iPod and iPhone. If everyone would have been like me, Apple would have had to change the name of their brand because their brand would be dirty in everyone's memory.
I would like to write some more powerful apps than what you're allowed.
Clearly Woz is not in Apple's demographic. It's been said time and again: Apple succeeds at delivering coherent, easy-to-use products that admirably perform tasks that typical non-techy users require. As long as Apple continues to design the products with that mentality, they will do well. If the iPod/iPhone stops selling briskly, it will be because everybody who wants one already has one, not because an Android phone lets you ssh into your home slackware server.
I hate to say it, but I bought an iPod Classic 80 GB about a year ago. Before that I owned an iAudio 30GB XL player, but the screen broke on that one.
This iPod of mine is in use every day. I use it in the car (hooked up to the car stereo via a built in Aux Jack) for my 2.5 hours of commuting, I use it on planes, I hook it up to my home system to randomly meander through the 850 albums I ripped on it (it's too small though, it won't fit my entire collection). I use it at the office with my Altec Lansing travel speakers to provide me with tunes.
The battery still runs ~28 hours if I don't screw around with the screen too much, and the thing operates flawlessly. Plus, the fact that I got six ways of finding the same song (Search, Genre, Artist, Song, Album, Compilation browsing) and all the trimmings of cover information display and whatnot make it a pretty sweet device. Objectively speaking (and I didn't want to even like the iPod because I've never been a Mac fan with their closed platform bollocks), it is still the best player out there even if they're seeing competition from MicroSoft according to critics. But the market has voted with its wallet.
When this one does, I'm hoping I can replace it with the same device, except a ~250 GB Solid State version. So as long as they keep up with the Joneses, I don't see how Wozniak will be right in the foreseeable future. Then again, on a long enough time scale, and product/individual/company/society has a survival rate of zero, right? Doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure that axiom out.
Maybe not quite in the discomfort-with-lack-of-openness sense that he meant it, but the iPhone is supposed to be a temperamental item to own, much like a Chihuaha.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Woz is looking at the iPhone with engineering eyes, not consumers eyes. It's a strange culture shock to geeks when they find out the universe of non-geeks doesn't work like them. Yes, the API is locked down, yes, it is locked to a single service provider but the average user really REALLY doesn't care. Even if they do know better, they really don't care. It's why McDonald's sales are high. They know a better burger, but they don't care. I'm not sure if this is a problem or not, to be quite frank. But when a geek tells me is a better solution, they're not realizing that "better" is incredibly subjective. Yes, OpenMoko is open, but is that better to me? I don't want to edit config files unless i'm being paid for it.
Is the iPod going to die out? Sure. Not before moving much much more product in the mean time.
Non impediti ratione cogitationus.
I doubt the iPod will go out of market because of it's limitations.
All they have to do is see they loose market share and address the issues. I know it sounds easier than it is, but the marketing team that kept the ipod where it is for so long cannot be so incompetent as to not get over it.
Perhaps a better framing would have been "iPod as it is now is on it's way out".
That said, I got myself a Sansa e280 instead of iPod, especially due to the iPod's lock-in, so take my comments with a grain of salt.
Tie two birds together: although they have four wings, they cannot fly. (The blind man)
Not to be a prick, but my Sandisk Sansa does almost all of that, lets me change "collections" and use Micro SD cards, runs rockbox, plays games, and even lets me watch video in just about whatever format I find best (using rockbox). It also cost me a whopping $30. Still cant see what all the iFuss is about, with the exception of much nicer aftermarket accessories due to market domination.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order- Ed Howdershelt Via Tass
IMO, all stand-alone music players are on their way out. Convergence is the future.
Apple is in the business, especially for consumer devices, of promoting solutions. This is a big differentiator from the competitors who usually focus on feature checklists and component integration.
However, someone like Woz is a hacker in the purest sense of the word - he wants to get tools and pieces that he can use to make his own solutions. An iPod he cannot change things on is not something he's interested in.
But for most people, the fascination with Apple comes simply from Apple 'getting it' - most consumers want to pay for problems to be solved for them, not to be given tools to learn to solve the problems themselves.
Steve Wozniak saying "the iPod is going to die some day" was in the same vein as someone saying "we're all going to die some day". It's trivially true and that was what he was getting at.
once the patent on that wheel navigator runs out. im surprised you can patent the thing, shows what i know about patents i guess.
Yeah. But it's not an apple i-pod. And that is essentially what sells an i-pod.
I'm a die-hard linux geek but deliberated and bought a 10GB ipod about 6 years ago, never once using itunes software. I just replaced it this week with a 16GB nano and am thrilled with the tiny size, much better battery life, and otherwise identical musical experience. The old one still works, but just barely, on its second battery which I installed myself.
I can see myself buying another nano in 5 years at whatever the newly expanded storage space is for $200. As long as I can still get gtkpod or equivalent to work on it.
How can something become not popular because there are too many of them? Can someone please explain it to me? Did cars fall from grace because there were too many? Buttons perhaps? Children, are they not popular any longer?
Really? So a new iPod costs less than $40 like the battery replacement kits? They're not that tough to do. Heck, if you're worried, mail it into Blue Raven for $70 and let them do it. They'll replace it with a higher capacity battery and ship it back to you within three days. Still cheaper than a new one.
Well my iPod already died, so he was spot on with that one. The proprietary battery lasted about a year, and it would cost about as much as a new iPod to replace it.
The battery in my old iPod Mini gave me several good years of hard use, but is now defunct. I have now relegated that machine to the car, where it remains permamently plugged into a RoadTrip FM transmitter. Figure if anyone steals it, it won't be worth a cent at any hock shop.
This gave me the "excuse" to go and treat myself to a 160GB iPod Classic, which meets my storage needs better. Say what you will (and I think Woz is wrong about this) the iPod does offer pretty much the best bang for your buck in terms of capacity, at least here in Australia, and while there's a market for portable music players, I see no reason why the iPod should die any time soon.
The person who posted this last time must not have got the response he was looking for.
I think this is the third time it's been posted in the last two weeks.
I'm suffering from troll-overload.
Steve Wozniak is a smart guy but he is, to put it mildly, an extreme "power user". He left Apple to develop a programmable IR remote control (http://www.ktronicslc.com/core.html) with 256 functions split over 16 code pages.
It had programmable macros, scheduled timers, and absolutely no way to label what a button *does*. If the batteries ever ran down it had to be re-flashed via a serial link. It's technically sweet, it filled a niche that Woz perceived in his daily life, and it remains completely unusable for 99.9% of the world's population. (I'm sure it generated some fantastic patents, though!)
I would trust Steve Wozniak to design firmware for a battery powered car, or to build a lifesaving medical device, or to write a graphical Tetris clone that fit entirely in the unused bytes of a LILO boot sector. But I don't think his opinions on the marketability of consumer electronics are worth a damn.
Do you ever wonder if all the ipod evangelicals are actually trying to relay a great experience with a product, and not actually brainwashed by a corporation?
Perhaps US and few other countries are indeed starting to be "oversupplied" with iPods (though I wonder how is that a sign of death...), I don't know.
But IMHO iPod sales still have bright future in many places where, until recently, iPods were waaaay too expensive for all but small minority (rest choose cheap chinese noname mp3 players). I see it happening around me right now (ex-soviet bloc, central european, new EU member country) - for most of their presence on the market, iPods were almost shunned as extravagant, unnecessary and few times overpriced.
But during the last year and a half, perhaps two, this started to change. Partially thanks to new, cheaper with each revision, models and growing life standard, they are now...fashionable. Now, also here, it's "I can choose iPod or one of that other mp3 players...I'll try to have an iPod"
One that hath name thou can not otter
First evolution gets cancelled and now there's no more iPods? If it wasn't for the fact that I've got a ton of money in the bank I think I'd jump off a bridge.
At the bottom of the
You can buy an iPod or you can pay less for another mp3 player that does more has longer battery life
You are paying for some white earphones and a style ....
Puteulanus fenestra mortis
Troll or Flamebait...
Place your bets now!
So finally iPod users will have a chance to experience blue? touch-screen of death ...
Not here.
There is no firm in this country called "Blue Raven". Seems to be some American thing.
Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
>Scary, isn't it?
Only in as much as some Christians apparantly believe this sort of rubbish.
I want a list of atrocities done in your name - Recoil
I remember when Apple included iTunes with Quicktime by default. But then, that's not too different to the whole Safari fiasco earlier this year ...
Most human behaviour can be explained in terms of identity.
This was a bad move, not only hurt in terms of sales but damaged the Apple brand image, pushing them towards the sort of resentment that MS manage to generate.
Wozniak must be one of those Apple haters who has never used a Mac in his life. Quick, mod him down! Oh, wait...
It's simple, at least as far as I'm concerned. The ipod offers the most amount of space in the smallest package for the least money when you're looking at the largest disk sizes.
For the flash based ones, you're right though. I don't get it.
Yeah. But it's not an apple i-pod. And that is essentially what sells an i-pod.
Actually, I'm not so sure about that. If anyone other than Apple had come up with such a sleek design and neat interface, it would quite probably have done just as well. I have no quarrel with the SanDisk device mentioned by the GP, but micro-SD cards tend to hold a maximum of only 8GB (last time I looked) and the interface is IMHO only OK if you've never had better.The iPod is just a really well-thought-out product in its own right. It does (pretty much) only one thing and does it well.
Which is why, although I love my iPods, I am not considering buying an iPhone. The latter just doesn't have the storage capacity I (now) find I need, I don't need all those bells and whistles and shiny things, and I do not want any gadget that has to be charged every day, especially if the battery is non-removable.
They're seeing competition from Microsoft according to MS's fans in the press. The market considers the Zune material for comedy. I was joking when I mentioned the possibility of a Zune phone ...
Microsoft's problem is that Apple is clearly much better at evil these days than they are. Microsoft used to have the best and most popular evil; these days they can't even successfully pay people to use their evil. And they've been trying for a while.
To keep on-topic, Android's main function will be to lift the iPhone's game. Existing and not sucking will be a win for Android and Google. Then, as others have noted, someone will come up with a killer Android app that leaves Apple playing catchup as they've pissed off too many developers. Interesting times and a win for credible competition. Which Microsoft just isn't in this space.
http://rocknerd.co.uk
for boosting AAPL's share price at the perfect time.
Your Sansa holds 80GB for $30
It's iPod, not IPod you insensitive clod!
End users don't care about specs, but they do care about functionality.
Features like downloading and syncing over the air, updating podcasts, shopping at multiple music stores, place shifting, better E-mail clients, and laptop Internet access matter even to non-geeks, and Apple is preventing a lot of that from happening.
I think the reason that hasn't mattered for initial iPhone sales is because most US consumers are so inexperienced with smart phones that even the iPhone seems like a big step forward and because the only other smart phones US carriers are pushing are the Blackberry and Windows Mobile shit, often with carrier restrictions. But Android and Symbian are going to change that. We'll have to see whether Apple can reverse course quickly enough, because it won't be long before regular users do care about all this.
nice try
This statement is not interesting at all. Sooner or later, every piece of technology will die. I will die. You will die, Woz will die.
It's a trivial truth not worth the all the attention.
So, where is the news on this statement? the fact that was Woz who said it?
http://www.ghastlycomic.com/d/20040418.html
3laws: No freebies, no backsies, GTFO.
The ipod offers the most amount of space in the smallest package for the least money when you're looking at the largest disk sizes.
Nope.
I ride on trains and a subway to work every day. About a quarter to a half of the passengers have headphones stuffed into their ears. Most of the times the headphones are connected to a cell phone, and not an MP3 player.
Granted, where I live even kids in their early teens have cell phones.
If you have a cell phone that offers good quality audio, why bother with an extra gadget?
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
Ms Palin (or may I call you Sarah?), have you ever considered signing up for an account here?
At the bottom of the
I just decided against an iPhone ( in australia ) and went with a walkman phone from sony-ericsson instead.
remember walkman?
same deal for iPod methinks.
iPhone will probably have to open up once android gets momentum
i talked the provider into 12 months contract on the w980 phone - with the express intent that my next handset will be android based - hey i write java for a living, the api for android is reasonable, and given how cheap flash storage is these days, i'd expect 32gig + in 12 months time. this new handset has 8 gigs built in, which is fine for my needs for now.
and while i have dabbled in j2me for phone software in the past, what the android sdk looks more like is a full blown stack with an implicit 'always connected' promise. gimme gimme gimme!
thing that woz seemed to be getting more toward was there will be a diminished need for the straight up ipod media player, and as a result ipods themselves will probably drop off and things like iPhone will take their place.
The big question is whether, beyond storage, the iPod has any further to go. The latest releases suggest that it's run out of steam and the whole large flash/HDD MP3 player market is heading to be far more of a comodity market that is is now.
Also, the cost of an 8GB cellphone is coming down quite rapidly. You can get an N95 in the UK for free on a £35 contract now. The future is more likely phones with storage.
Ok, I have mixed feelings of the merits of the iPod. As a caveat, I have to mention I do own an iPod touch 16GB. I also own a Nokia n95, a SonyEricsson k800i, an iPaq, and Motorola bluetooth headphones. I have also used an iPod Shuffle, an iPod Nano, and a creative Labs Muvo.
I would be first to admit, the ipods are not all that hot in terms of features and sound quality. I have read a review earlier this year, where various music players (including phones) were tested for pure sound quality including dynamic range, etc (testing the analogue side of the hardware too). The Ipods generally came on the middle to the bottom of the range, witht he iPhone and iPod touch coming at the bottom of the ipods, and the ipod Shuffle performing best, and above average compared to other devices from other manufacturers.
The best Player Only devices were from Sony, followed very closely by Samsung and Creative. Even the Phones came very highly rated, with the SonyEriccson K800i coming on top, and only "beaten" by some really good player only devices by Sony. My Nokia N95 is also "better" than the iPods. Add to the fact that many other devices also have FM radio.
The N95 allows direct download of podcasts (something the iPhone does not allow, AND apple have banned an app that tried to allow that).
Even the so called "simplicity" of iTunes has been called to task. I now know of many other music managers that do a pretty good job of managing sound libraries. In fact, many (including Windows Media Player) can even sync with ANY standard USB Mass Storage Device. Considering that itunes cannot "monitor" a set of folders to see changes, and update a library on its own (you need to download ITLu to do that), it is poorer in many aspects.
The iPod touch does not support the Bluetooth headphones I have. The iPaq, the K800, and the N95 did. in fact, before I got the ipod touch, I used to connect my Ipaq and my k800 to the headphones simultaneously. the iPaq would feed music wirelessly, and when a phone call came through, the headset would automatically switch to the phone, and send a pause command to the iPaq, resuming automatically when the call was ended. All this happened seamlessly, and wirelessly, despite being made by different manufacturers... it "just worked".
But..... despite all this, I still use the iPod Touch.. why?
a) the iPod's screen is VERY nice, yet portable. I watch a lot of podcasts, and sometimes movies on the train to work. the N95 is not as good as the iPod.
b) ability to sync "Played" statuses between iPods and iTunes, which allows me to manage the podcasts effectively (deleting played ones in itunes). I understand this is not a very strong reason, because if I used the N95, to download (via wireless/3g) I dont even need to involve a computer in the first place.
c) On a day to day basis, I don't like my phone running out of battery. the N95 does not charge from USB, and Although it may be a better music player, I would rather have the battery for other reasons, such as making calls.
d) Maybe because I paid so much for a iPod Touch, I feel more compelled to use it. (maybe despite my better judgment, I am subconsciously attracted to "pretty things", as well as the Jobs Reality Distortion field.)
e) I am just a lazy procrastinator.
But as You can see, a lot of these reasons are flimsy at best, and I will be doing a test where I will replace my ipod with my n95 for one day, and see how that goes on the morning commute.
I am also scoping Android.....
So maybe Woz has a point.
Have a nice day!
I do not want any gadget that has to be charged every day, especially if the battery is non-removable
Does that mean you're going to be selling your brain? I'm dabbling in a bit of aftermarket brain replacement, and am prepared to offer anything up to $50.
which is totally what she said
The Android!
wow, scary!
see for yourself:
http://skitch.com/slowburn/2fyx/wozniak-death-prediction
I think you may find that the iPod _also_ runs rockbox.
...oh, and yo momma's so fat, her Schwarzchild radius is visible to the naked eye.
In the same time I can play music almost continues for the 72 hours that you have to wait. I only miss the time where I need to swap the rechargeable batteries. Which take less time to charge then the mp3 player discharges.
Not to forget batteries are way cheaper then $40/$70.
A few years ago soon after the iPods came out, they weren't good value for money on hard drive models either. Maybe the casing was a couple of mm thicker, but my iRiver had an FM radio and microphone in addition to a 2GB HD, and was still cheaper than the 20GB iPod of the time..
The only thing to "get" about the market is that the iPod is already the best known, best marketed device, with the greatest number of accessories (you even get cars that have built in docks just for iPods for crying out loud..) so the average consumer wanting a digital media player will just get it without even researching alternatives. Excellent marketing on Apple's part, but I've always found it a little sad that it took an MP3 player to make them popular again. I still like Mac OS, but I've never owned an iPod yet. I admit I've been tempted occasionally like when the first Nanos came out, but I currently have 30GB of music (mostly MP3s ripped at ~192kbps), so I'd need something bigger like the 32GB Touch if I wanted a solid state storage player that held all my music.
which is totally what she said
Not to be a prick
Yes you do. You don't find people whining about how a Honda Civic lacks a 5,000 lbs towing capacity or seats as many people as a minivan, yet you'll find plenty of people overly impressed with themselves who poo poo an Apple product because it doesn't have feature X which 99% of the population doesn't give a shit about.
If an iPod doesn't do what you want...don't fucking buy one. Nobody's holding a gun to your head.
And a really nice user interface.
It's the fact that just about anyone can work out how to do anything with it that sells iPods, not the external design.
What model is this Sansa of yours? I couldn't find one that has MicroSD for less than 99 EUR (about $140 I believe).
Similar to buying Louis Vuitton, or Rolex etc.
Maybe Apple should create another brand, where the products have fewer features, extra "avantegarde" BS, a 20x bigger price tag and an artificially limited production run.
>Scary, isn't it? Only in as much as some Christians apparantly believe this sort of rubbish.
I just love how no matter what the subject is, it somehow leads back to Christianity. Amazing isn't it.
I just traded up from a Sansa e270 6gb to an iPod Nano 8gb. It is -so- much better.
Granted, I haven't put thirdparty firmware (Rockbox) on my Sansa, but I absolutely hated my Sansa. You -have- to use their proprietary software to put video on it. Guess what happens if you lose your CD? You have to BUY a new one! They won't let you download it. Apple's software (iTunes), while still proprietary, is extremely easy to get another free copy of.
I never DID get playlists to work correctly on my Sansa. Podcasts worked okay when used with iTunes, but not at all otherwise. If you put it in USB stick mode, it reports every time you unplug it.
I've never tried games on my Sansa, but games on iPod Nano 4th gen are great. They are very clear, sound great, and the accelerometer lets me play games like 'Maze' (aka Labyrinth) where you guide the ball around the maze by tilting.
I'm far from a Mac fanboy. I say 'It just works!' in a nasty tone about 3 times a day at work, where we're all on Macs and have as much problems with the Mac Pros and xServe as any Windows machine I ever used. My personal preference there is Linux, too.
But the iPod is done right. It's going to be very hard to improve on it.
"If you make people think they're thinking, they'll love you; But if you really make them think, they'll hate you." - DM
Not to be a prick, but I've used a Sansa (previously) and an iPod video (now) regularly, and:
1. iPod has better UI;
2. iPod has better sound quality;
3. iPod has longer battery life;
4. If I want to run Linux or develop my own infinitely configurable embedded system I have access to a dozen laptops, desktops, PDAs, phones, calculators, etc - and I do. But I use my iPod to listen to music and talk ("podcasts") and occasionally watch videos;
5. In particular, I don't use it to "play games";
6. I don't have any reason to care what detailed format the video is stored in on the iPod, since it's on there to watch, not to edit. I can resize for space before transfer if necessary;
7. Database+metadata+synchronisation are more powerful concepts than straight hierarchical filesystems, i.e. iTunes is actually quite lovely once you get used to it;
8. Finally, good luck with carrying around 80GB (per GP post) of MicroSD cards.
An average user treats an electronic device as a tool which must do one or more particular things well. An average geek treats a tool as something which can be made to do as many things as imaginable. An elitist geek treats a tool as something which must do as many things as imaginable. You appear to fit in this third category.
You're welcome to argue that you aren't interested in an iPod's particular benefits, but most people are.
You're right, and loathe though I am to admit it, Apple are capable of taking someone else's cool idea and frobbing the usability right up to eleven.
It all sounded fine up until the intolerance part.
Put identity in the browser.
How did this get modded +5 insightful? The only sansa that you can get that's anywhere near 30 dollars is a glorified iPod Shuffle that you somehow managed to buy _without any memory card_. To get feature-parity as far as storage space and screensize, you'll be paying more for a sansa unless you got it stolen somewhere.
Well, I predict that the iPod will outlast Steve Jobs if that boy doesn't eat a freaking steak once in a while. He looks like an ugly Fiona Apple.
I just checked newegg, and the only models of sansa that were cheaper than their equivalent ipod were the ones that come in sizes smaller than the smallest ipod. So uh, I call bullshit, I guess
Modding Trolls +1 inciteful since 1999
So what's your choice of a 120GB non-ipod model? I would have been satisfied with somethin 50 or 60 GB, but it's just not there.
I have to agree,
From in the store the Sansas are compelling machines.
Navigate like an ipod, but with a real wheel.
Android phones will take iPhone sales down faster than a fat guy at a buffet. The reason why: customization. I know as a cell phone user I have always hated the way certain companies made there OS, like the RAZR hides everything under Tools (calc/alarm , etc) or the way Samsung phones are just weird, you can tell it's not thought out by someone from the US. but with Android you can change everything, even the dialer can be replaced by YOU the user. that's what I'm talking about, let me change the layout: It's my phone why did it take this long to let me have it my way?
If Jobs is Jesus, then clearly Wozniak is God. (He is to me and I don't even like Apple)
Your God just dissed you. Summon your power and try to bash your God.
Long Live Wozniak!!!
I'll try anything once. Twice if it tastes good
Woz came to my house.
"I see dead iPods."
"How often do you see them?"
"All the time. They're everywhere."
Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain with all your metadata.
It's easier in the sense that it takes 5 seconds to learn the interface compared to the 10 seconds to learn the interface on my Muvo (which I DO use). But once you've learned the interface, the ipod is slower and more cumbersome.
My ipod hasn't been touched in a year, whereas my muvo goes everywhere with me. Actually, one of my muvos. I have bought several.
This space available.
Expandable memory and any playable video format are features 99% of the population don't give a shit about? Hmm...
This is another example, certainly one of the iPod skus will be removed (probably those large HD based ones.) but small music players will always be a hot item. The iPhone & Touch are designed to cannibalize the high end iPod sales, and it has done so effectively.
So now apple are selling a more expensive device to the same audience who bought all those big ipods years ago.
oops - obviously that's meant to say 20GB HD for the iRiver, not 2GB
which is totally what she said
"Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, better known in the industry as 'Woz'"
The entry part of the article should be:
"Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, better known in the industry as 'The Irrelevant Steve'"
Now the whole story makes much more sense, trust me on that.
Catalin Braescu
Ofaly.com
You need to watch woot.com more often. They have insane deals on Sansa players all the time.
iPods won't die as long as Apple keeps pumping out incremental improvements, and as long as the competition doesn't catch on to the accessory effect.
Like, say... iPod Touch with a hard disk, or with >40G of flash.
Or iPod Bluetooth, to get rid of the tether.
Or an iPod Shuffle headset.
Or ...
They've got plenty of room on the upgrade treadmill.
There a reason that Woz is not at Apple anymore. He doesn't get the products and he is so wrong and has been for a long time.
Do *YOU* ever wonder if every evangelical is exactly the same? Just because your experience was great, doesn't mean you have to relentlessly yammer on about it and get personally offended when someone criticises it.
It doesn't have wireless. It has less space than a nomad. It HAS to die.
That's the ONLY reason I own an iPod.
my ipod connects to the car, motorcycle, and my crestron whole house audio system perfectly with full control is the killer point for me.
I so wish that there was a standard interface so that ALL mp3 players could do this. but only the iPod has that.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Now that it DOES have Wireless and has as much space as a Nomad?
Consumers have no understanding or care about "proprietary" or customization. They just want cool stuff that works.
As long as iPods work and are perceived as cool, they will reign supreme.
There will always be a market for niche consumers, which make up a large portion of Slashdot.
And don't forget the power of geeks. They usually have some money to spare for gadgets,...
Any technology distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced.
Isn't it more pretenders with enough money, doing it partly to show of?
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
Normal people don't care about things like vendor-lock in and DRM. Geeks do. Based on the huge market share held by iPods, it appears that there are far more normal people in the world than geeks (not a good or bad thing, just is). And why do we keep posting opinion pieces from a guy who hasn't had any impact in the industry in the past 20 years? Maybe silly conclusions like this is the reason Woz hasn't been involved with Apple since the 1980s?
He'd better be careful - that's a pretty intense bunch, and he just slammed iPhonies pretty hard.
If I were him, I'd call Salman Rushdie and find out where to hire a good car starting assistant.
Ahhh... yes... what a feature... the battery eventually becomes useless, providing you with a reason to buy buy buy more stuff.
Apple should try that with their computers - have the LCD breakdown so that users don't have to justify buying a new machine.
Huh? If there's one thing that iPod doesn't do it's offer good bang for buck.
It's expensive as hell in terms of the capacity and featureset you get compared to other players. iPods are popular like designer clothes are popular, they're not necesarily any better but they have a higher level o prestige artificially attached to them to justify the higher cost.
Woz is an economist now? Read his autobiography. Language of a 10 year old. A smart one, no doubt, but the guy knows how to put circuits together. It certainly doesn't qualify him to comment on economics any more than the Bush Administration can comment on separation of powers.
Eric
If the human brain were so simple that we could understand it, we would be so simple that we couldn't. - Pugh
""Consumers are not getting all they want when companies are very proprietary and lock their products down," "
Well Woz is half right. No consumers aren't. However in exchange consumers usually are getting a cheaper price or better service, or something that the consumer desires in exchange for not getting full and complete freedom to do whatever they want. So the situation isn't as lopsided as some would make it appear.
The interface that Apple paid USD $100 million to Creative to licence the use of it's patented interface technologies ...
This is why I have a Creative Zen ...cost less, does more, lasts longer than the equivalent iPod, and the interface I think is better ....
So just nice styling then ....
Puteulanus fenestra mortis
The ipods are nothing like any other mp3 players, but off course why be logical when there is Apple hate.
The iPod is nothing like other MP3 players? Really? I mean, doesn't it play music and video?
I understand what you're trying to say (the design and interface of the iPod is superior to that of other MP3 players), but the way you say it makes it seem like the iPod is an entirely different device. It would be like me saying, "Acuras are nothing like other cars, but of course, why be logical when there is Acura hate."
We all know what to do, but we don't know how to get re-elected once we have done it
And your $30 bought you a whopping ? GB of storage space. Yeah, some of us want a LOT of music on hand. For a smaller player go with a phone or non iPod, sure.
"Even the so called "simplicity" of iTunes has been called to task. I now know of many other music managers that do a pretty good job of managing sound libraries. In fact, many (including Windows Media Player) can even sync with ANY standard USB Mass Storage Device. Considering that itunes cannot "monitor" a set of folders to see changes, and update a library on its own (you need to download ITLu to do that), it is poorer in many aspects.
Windows Media Player is ok, but it does not automatically manage your file system like iTunes does. Yes its true that iTunes does not monitor your file system for changes, because it doesnt need to.
The brilliance of iTunes is that it handles all of the file system stuff for you!!! Simply drag your music into itunes, and it reads the mp3 tags and automatically creates a directory structure based on artist/albums/
Windows Media Player is quite poor at organizing music. I dont like it at all. It performs far better than itunes. Itunes is the SLOWEST program on the planet in terms of scrolling through its database.
The other thing that itunes does that NO OTHER music player or organizer does... is iTunes has a "remember last position" feature which will remember where you pressed stop on an audio or video file. Its an option you can turn on or off per track.
This is required for podcasts and long form things such as tv and radio shows.
Windows Media player does not have this feature!!! Its such a brilliant feature and i just cant find it in any players such as WMP or Winamp.
iTunes isnt perfect... For example i have to convert all FLAC to Apple Lossless. I dont mind because theres really no difference, except one plays in itunes and my ipod, and the other doesnt :)
iTunes is so simple to use, so easy to manage your music because its all handled for you behind the scenes... All you need to do is make sure all of your songs are tagged nicely. AND THEY SHOULD BE.
I just cant use WMP. Yes it can monitor your folders... but that means you have to manage the folders by hand through the file explorer. Thats more work, and i have plenty of other things to do. So i drag and drop.... Itunes does it all for me.
You can shit on itunes all day and night... but from my experience its a very good program for organizing music, listening and syncing with of course ipods and iphones. Its a VERY well thought out system that works seamlessly.
Are there problems? Yes. Performance issues with scrolling through the song lists, and while the "smart playlists" are good, they are too simple and lack real sorting/filtering features.
Overall Apple has the iTunes thing really well done. It could be a lot better, but its simple and easy to use.
Somethings i would like to see are Smarter Playlists, The ability to store "portable" versions of lossless files, meaning having itunes intelligently store a 192 AAC (user definable quality setting of course) for any apple lossless file you decide you want to have on your ipod. I'd like it nice and seamless. I dont need to listen to the 192 AAC while at my desktop, but I do on my ipod for space saving and battery life issues.
The other major thing is performance. Itunes runs like shit on a quadcore intel system. That is unacceptable. I do 3d animation, i model characters will MILLIONS of polygons in programs like Zbrush which render them in realtime on my cpu... and Itunes can barely scroll through its music list?
Itunes is perhaps the worst peice of programming ever. I cant imagine just what supercomputer is required for iTunes to run smoothly... but it doesnt exist yet. I know that much.
Back in the 80s you had many different kinds of PC (IBM and compatible, Apple's Mcintosh, Amiga and several others depending on the country).
Apple's one was the best, no question about it. Neat graphical interface (against MSDOS or Windows 1.x, ugh!) responsive, fast (Motorola RISC processor against Intel 8086) networked from the start (Appletalk was really user friendly compared to the abominations that existed for IBM compatibles).
But the IBM platform was open (in the sense that everybody copied it), unlike Apple's, and this created a boom which we are still enjoying (or suffering, if you consider the poor sods that continue to use Windows).
Fast Forward to today. Apple has the best platform (at least from the point of view of the market share, technically I am not so sure) but they are doing their damn best to lock it (again).
Google is creating an open architecture for mobile devices that all carriers are ready to support. This will increase the synergies (horrible but necessary word) between carriers, phone manufacturers and application developers, creating many new, exciting business possibilities.
Open (Internet, IBM PC, TCP/IP) beats closed (AOL, Mcintosh, Netware). Apple is not paying attention and clearly did not learn the lesson.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Hell, just take it. I hardly ever use the damn thing and it keeps using up all my glucose.
Obligatory Soundbite Catchphrase
I have never owned an ipod, and I have no desire to own one.
I listen to music in three places - my garage, my car, and my office.
In my garage, I have a stereo.
In my car, I have a radio.
In my office, I have a computer.
The last portable music player I owned was a cassette Sony Walkman way back in the 80s when I was a kid. The novelty of having portable music didn't last long for me. Probably because the batteries ran out so fast and my folks weren't going to buy me batteries every 3 days!
A work that expires before its copyright never enters the public domain and thus enjoys eternal copyright protection.
It's expensive as hell in terms of the capacity and featureset you get compared to other players.
I did say "in Australia". Many of us don't care to shop online for something that small, stealable and expensive. So I stand by my point, as it is demonstrably true here.
The history of Personal Computing is a stern reminder of this.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Be honest now, how much use have you gotten from the microphone? I don't listen to music on the radio, which is my I have an MP3 player, so I've never cared about that as functionality.
Do you need to carry your entire music collection on your portable player? My PC holds my entire music collection. My iPod has three different playlists of music that I get to choose from depending on my mood, and when I need to change it, I update the playlists and sync the damned thing. Some of my playlists are set to choose the songs from that grouping which are least recently played, so that I roll-over through my music library and hear it.
I find there's a limited amount of music I need to carry with me at any given time. The 400-500 songs I have is plenty. I think how you use it drives what features you need. My 4GB nano carries more than enough music to get me through an extended period of time.
Cheers
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
"Users do care about openness, not necessarily because it's openness, but rather for the things that it allows."
Correct, but it would be a false impression to think that "open" doesn't have as much a price as "proprietary". For example all the advantages you listed wouldn't be worth as much if one had to stand on their head, whistling Dixie, while hand-editing files in hexadecimal. As some open source projects are finding out it costs money to gain some of "proprietary"'s advantages. e.g ease of use.
Shai Schticks:"You don't make peace with friends, you make peace with enemies"
What a surprise.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
nokia s60 phones are better as they are unlocked.
They don't have 1 app store that you must you with out hacking your phone.
They have mem card slots.
You can take the battery out of them.
Yes, I do need to carry my entire music collection on my portable player. I don't want to have to sit at home and think, ok, these are the 8GB of music I want to take with me TODAY. I just want to be able to listen to whatever music I feel like whenever I pick up my music player, and not have to worry "I wish I'd put album X on this thing this morning, that's what I really want to hear."
That Apple's core (OSX) is based on taking advantage of an open license, but here you are, embarrassing yourself in public claiming that we all are unthinking FOSS apologists. Apple recognized open is better with that move, but as soon as they reached some success they went back to their old ways. It may be their downfall.
As for Linux not having replaced all other OSes, well, you are not paying attention. Linux is the most deployed OS in the world, of course it is not deployed in most desktop PCs yet, that to the uninformed gives the impression that the little penguin is not achieving all the success it should, but this will change.
Just yesterday I went to one of the most important computer shops in the UK and there were several Linux laptops in show, side by side with their Windows counterparts, the Linux machines £50 cheaper in average.
There are 2 points to make: companies are no longer afraid to err out of Microsoft's influence and the people are seeing the price differential and will start to ask questions about why this is so.
And all the above is in the consumer market only, add embedded and mobile devices and servers, and frankly there is no world domination yet, but the bandwagon is rolling quite nicely.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
TFA is just a crude summary of the actual interview in the Daily Telegraph.
your not exactly spot on with predictions or with your business sense. Clearly Jobs was much more the design concept and marketing genius then you would ever be. I love Woz as a person but he is a limited hack when it comes to engineering. He could not keep up with the times and changes. And from a business point of view he knows nothing compared to Jobs. While Jobs has many faults taking care of business is not one of them. Why people listen to this washed up one time great hardware designer (we are talking the days of 8 bit procs and simple circuits) is beyond me. Simply put...Woz...nice try to troll but you dont have a GOD DAMN CLUE. Which is good for Apple...Cause if Apple was in your control we would all be still clicking away on BS computers using a BS OS. Get a farking job WOZ and quit crying sour grapes. Jobs kicked your ass no questions asked.
. I love the sound of burning women and screaming rubber....
the hype with apple products is the reason why so many people like it.
Not ONE of you thought this was flamebait? I didn't think it was even subtle. Ridiculous.
Wow, you and I listen to music entirely differently.
I've always played music by building playlists, choosing some subset of that playlist and putting it on the iPod, and playing that list in either order or random. I've got 3 non-intersecting playlists to cover ranges of what I want to listen to, and I play them.
For me, the same 4GB of music might stay on my iPod for weeks. I don't spend time actively trying to decide what to listen to.
I just can't fathom needing my entire music collection with me at any one time.
But, hey, it's your music collection. Use it how you need to. :-P
Cheers
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
You do have a really good point there with the phones. Still most of the phones lack a decent mp3 interface. I find them way way way too slow to do anything. My use of these phones for mp3 is kinda limited but im looking at you motorola. Not to mention it kills your cellphones battery. When that dies you also lose your txt/phone ablity. My ipod dies then I just put it away and listen to the sounds outside. My cellphone still works tho.
Now a mp3/phone with dual batteries (one for the mp3 part and one for the phone) would make alot more sense I think. I still like my ipod. I can operate it fine while driving. I used my moms sansa mp3 player one time while driving and it's really difficult to bounce around music and such compared to the ipod.
Solosoft.org - Your Online Resource to Nothing
I recently loaded it on my teenage kid's Sansa, and yes it does have to reboot into the Sansa firmware to transfer songs. However it does this automatically -- plug it in, and it auto-reboots into the Sansa firmware, directly into the transfer app. Unplug it, and it goes back to Rockbox (takes only a few seconds).
The kid doesn't mind, he likes Rockbox much better than the default firmware (for the games, and tweaking the audio settings).
I suspect you would call that a plaster.
I'm a septic, so I might be wrong.
[UID-HeinzIntel]
...they buy it because it's a dream. A lifestyle choice. They're not buying iPod, the MP3 player, that's more of a secondary thing. They're buying cool, a dream of being "unique".
Bought it as a refurb from Woot.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order- Ed Howdershelt Via Tass
For most of us that have kids in the teenage years the IPOD is the thing all the kids think is better the sliced bread. That is until you show them that other MP3 players do the same or more for less money. Some won't care because it is a status item but some will appreciate the value and being not having to be the same by having something different. I have a Sansa Fuze with 4 gigs of ram that cost me a whole 66 bucks. IPOD nano with 4 gigs of ram 150 dollars. No brainer. Plus no itunes lock in. I got the free converter and have put TV shows on the player and watch at lunch hour at work plus the microSD slot that some record companies are going to start bring music out for. I bet the minute they do IPOD will come out with a model with microSD but it should be too late.
Its the space, silly.
How on earth is apple able to cram 16 gigs in an iphone, while the newest tmobile thingie can store, what, up to a gb?
Thats the driving force behind jobs: some strange space cramming genius (or exclusive patent license).
NO SIG
For most people, time=money and the more you earn and the less free time you have causes the value of that time to rise.
Jesus was a compassionate social conservative who called individuals to sin no more.
iPods will stick around until they are replaced by new and improved technology. Likely we'd all still be using Walkmans if the iPod hadn't come along. While the market may be saturated as far as new sales, replacements for old / broken iPods will continue for a long time. I know I'll replace my nano iPod when the battery goes dead. Like most people I'm used to mine and don't want to give it up. That suggests continued iPod sales for the foreseeable future.
But I think Woz is correct on the iPhone. The lack of innovation (open development platform) and single carrier could be a serious impediment to adoption by the larger public. While several million iPhones have been sold that's a tiny fraction compared to the 50 million Razrs in existence. I think Apple could be making the same mistake it made with their computers in the 1980's. An industry leader with great design that eventually suffers because of the locked-down, proprietary control. I hope for Apple's sake the iPhone doesn't turn into a blip in cell phone history.
Apple has done a good job evolving the iPod it went from a trendy music player to the most useful PDA I have ever had. The Touch generation of iPods has little similarity to the other line and that will probably be the way they go. The strength of the iPod is no longer its trendiness and while it has nowhere to go but down (in terms of market share) Its not going to 'die' anytime soon.
"Ahh! Arrogance and stupidity in the same package, how efficient of you!" --Londo Molari
What is the monetary exchange rate on the amount of time it takes to look at a pop up from gmail to tell me what todays woot is? .10?
And my refurbished, warrantied sansa has been going strong for 2 years now, I beat the hell out of it, and I can replace the battery myself, if need be, anytime I want.
Being able to replace the battery myself means a lot to me as a consumer. It means that the manufacturer understands that I might keep this item longer than the average consumer (my car has over 500,000 miles on it, I tend to like to fix my own stuff) and that fact alone is likely to urge me to buy another sandisk product in the event my Sansa fails me.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order- Ed Howdershelt Via Tass
Or is it that as current and previous news reports on /. shows, the music industry wanting a larger cut of iTunes profits, and Europe wanting removable batteries on the iPhone, Steve Jobs is murmuring about taking his ball and going home?
Just because you can mod me down, doesn't mean you're right. Shoes for industry!
The dynamic may be a bit different here though. The Google Android == IBM PC isn't a real good match, as we are talking consumer AND enterprise here, and "nobody ever got fired for buying Android" is not an oft-muttered phrase (yet).
Jobs is not Wozniak. They don't even look alike.
Steve Wozniak is just an (empty) talking head these days. Need a calculator built? He's your man. Anything else? His opinion is worth no more than any other random person on the street.
Bad analogies are like waxing a monkey with a rainbow.
The largest hitch in convergence is ubiquitous wireless TCP/IP. Once that happens, VOIP will be added to music players and most other phone services will either need to find something spectacular to add to the mix, change business models, or wither away and die.
I jailbroke mine and have never looked back. an unjailbroken iphone is a hindered iphone. If you use PwnageTool/Winpwn/Quickpwn, it's also 100% reversible if you don't like it. Joey
This is more like the iPod is the trendy Smart car which isn't much of a car and the other MP3 players are SAABs, good cars but never trendy.
The Sansa sounds NOWHERE near as good as my iPod. I've listened to both, the iPod is much closer to audiophile quality. Even the first gen iPod shuffles sounded awesome (not sure about second gen)
Granted, most people don't really care about audio quality or can even appreciate the difference between speakers from Acoustic Research and RadShack/RCA $50 crap.
If you're content with the sound quality of the Sansa, that's great. I'm certainly not.
I agree most Apple hardware is horribly overpriced and OSX's true advantages are played down for glitzy glam in advertising but give them credit where credit is due. They do make some cool stuff.
I really liked my PPC macs but the Intel macs are not special in any way shape or form. Hell, I've gone to running OSX on Wintel hardware.
Regardless, Apple has some very talented folks working for them. I really don't like them as a company and the iPhone is a joke compared to what it COULD be without their closed idiocy but dammit, they do make some very cool stuff.
Virtually all of my portable music listening is done on a bike or running. Every previous generation of MP3 player eventually bounced off my belt or tugged annoyingly as it bounced up & down on my shirt, or required an annoying band or harness. The shuffle, at 30g, can't be noticed, and with that clip that exerts about a pound of force, it just can't fly off. Hell, if it does (because I was hasty & incompetent clipping it on), the friction of the 1/8" jack in the socket will keep it from going off the sound cable, and the friction of the buds in my ears will hold it from pulling them out. It winds up swinging back & forth from my earbuds, unharmed.
Any multi-function device must necessarily be larger, to have any user interface bigger than one button. It must weigh more, enough to go back to the annoyances I have gratefully left. That's why my cell phone is in my pack en route to the train: I hate little weights bouncing up & down on my waist as I run.
Long live single-function and UI that is utterly minimal - preferably a single button. You don't have to push it for me at the factory, I can take it from there.
Still cant see what all the iFuss is about, with the exception of much nicer aftermarket accessories due to market domination.
That right there is why I bought an iPod. I don't need a portable music player. I have a computer at home and one at work that play music just fine. However, I wanted an easy way to have all of my music in my truck.
And as much as I fought it, that easy way turned out to be an iPod. All the other solutions were too expensive, took too long to start, etc. With the iPod hooked to my Alpine HU, I turn the key and have music seconds later.
There are tons more different accessories for the iPod than any other mp3 player. And that gives it a huge leg up.
Being honest, if I was the type of person who liked to record lectures then I really think I would have had a lot of use from the recording function - but I stopped even taking notes in lectures after the first semester at university, because I never looked back over them when it came to revision time (just used textbooks). I did try recording one of our band practices but it was too loud for the mic to cope with - think it kept clicking when there was heavy bass. Maybe would have been better if I'd used an external mic, but someone else had an old tape recorder that worked well enough and we just used that. So, in the end I didn't get that much use. I did use the radio occasionally though.
I stopped using the whole thing a few years ago anyway - I lost the charger a couple of times when moving/travelling and just grew out of the habit of using it (if I get another player it will most definitely be able to charge via USB!). I'm getting a Pandora at the end of November though - it might start seeing some use as an MP3 player. I bought a 16GB card for it, as I know that I'll probably be happy enough with a select few albums most of the time. :)
which is totally what she said
I think the iPod has a few more iterations to go before it goes belly-up in favor of technology that removes the need for large-capacity satellite devices to be kept on our person.
Instead, I think we should be more worried about the death of the personal computer as we know it.
If cloud computing takes off in a way that allows currently popular software to run faster and more powerfully than possible on any single computer, it's possible this excuse may support could-only distribution models as a form of DRM. Instead of running actual software on our computers, we'll merely run software-nodes that won't be capable of processing our data locally. Instead, our computers will become glorified dumb terminals with mass storage and the ability to run a few minor programs, while everything else is handled by a cloud.
So, instead of actually buying software, you'll rent a seat on the cloud hosting that software, with the option to pay extra for better performance or multiple sessions. Your computer will simply be an observer to all of this.
The only benefit, is that this should bring the cost of hardware way down as demands on individual machine performance decline.
Personally, I see this occuring before the end of the iPod.
8==8 Bones 8==8
I avoided the iPod shuffle series because of how limited it is. I have an old Samsung player that is comparable in size as the current generation iPod shuffle, only it has a colour LCD screen, can play MP3/OGG/WMA/Audible, has WOW/SRS/TruBass effects, a manually configurable 10 band EQ, realtime VU meters for playback, voice record, line in record, FM radio, can display images, can display text files, has no DRM whatsoever and can be used as an external storage device. Oh, and the casing is mostly made of metal.
Back when I bought it, circa 2005, it was $50. The first generation iPod Shuffles were $99 back then and the new ones are $79.
Samsung YP-T7Z
62x37x14mm
1.25 oz
iPod Shuffle (2nd gen)
41x27x11mm
0.55 oz
So it's a little bit larger, a lot less expensive and does infinitely more.
You're asking why an iPod is better when likely the child does not yet (or likely ever will) know the words and phrases needed to describe things well enough. But this could be a great chance to teach some critical thinking. In fact, give the child some material so she can answer you back. Since she is 9 years old, help her find some reviews on youtube. Try to make it an interesting activity.
I'm going to stray from the core conversation topic just a bit, so bear with me. There are cases where people may read or hear things about a something and figure out something generally better for them, but never really absorb the details. Keep in mind too that the kinds of recommendations different groups will hear will be fundamentally different. Nerds are much more likely to recommend hard to use products with features that will likely never be utilized by an average non-technical user. They are also much more likely to recommend products to other nerds. Average non-technical users will recommend what they like, but the description will usually be much more vague as to why. It just feels right. They are also much more likely to recommend products to other average non-technical users.
Once you start despising the jerks, you become one.
Apple's one was the best, no question about it.
Wow! Looks like you've never had a run in, real or virtual, with an Amiga freak before. I'd prepare for "incoming," were I you.
Any technology distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced.
... stop claiming you have a wife who watches Kathy Griffin's show, or that you have ever seen a naked woman!
Admit it, you think Kathy Griffin is hot!
Laugh, so do I... carry on brother!
They want it to be as easy as possible to use and anything else is a bonus.
Conversely, you would say that /.-ers and FOSS hippies "want it to be as easy as possible to HACK..." They find it supremely important to be able to break into a given gadget as readily as possible, else it's "closed."
Funny thing: ever since the first electrical cord was plugged into the first electrical outlet we've been dealing with NOTHING but "closed systems." Someone else above mentioned the term "appliance" as opposed to "platform."
When I buy a phone/PDA/whatever-you-call-it, I personally WANT an appliance, because I'm an END USER.
There are people, like my stepson, who love to buy junk cars and tinker with them for months and even years, and get them running again, new paint job, new engine, everything.
My wife and I, and just about everyone else, just want to get in, turn the key in the ignition and drive to our destinations.
For years, her son wouldn't even THINK of getting a car built after the mid-70s or so, because of electronic ignition. See, to him, that's a "closed system," because there was no carburetor with which to fiddle. And we're talking a kid who just turned 29 last month.
Hobbies are great, but if you're going to tell me I can't have electronic ignition becuase you love carburetion, please get out of my face.
Any technology distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced.
Tethering is explicitly forbidden by Apple.
That bothered me at first - until I started playing around with the iPhone 3G and realized "my gosh, with this thing I really don't NEED to use the laptop outside of a wi-fi hotspot! It already does pretty much everything I need the laptop for in a fully-mobile environment, with the exception of being able to touch-type. And I can live with hunting and pecking.
So, when I'm at the hotel or in a restaurant, or waiting for a LONG TIME in the airport, I'll break out the laptop. Everwhere else, the iPhone 3G is just fine. Suddenly, I don't need "tethering" any longer.
Any technology distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced.
Children, are they not popular any longer?
Well, apparently not in THESE places anyway:
COUNTRIES WITH BIRTHRATES BELOW REPLACEMENT (with births per 1,000 population):
New Zealand ---13.7
Montenegro ----13.6
U.S. Virgin Islands ( United States) 13.4
Puerto Rico ( United States) 13.3
North Korea 13.2
People's Republic of China (mainland only) 13.1
Serbia --------12.8
Armenia -------12.5
Netherlands Antilles 12.5
Australia -----12.4
Martinique ( France) 12.4
Cyprus --------12.2
France (metropolitan) 12.2
United Kingdom 12.0
Norway --------12.0
Luxembourg ----11.5
Moldova -------11.4
Sweden --------11.3
Denmark -------11.2
Finland -------11.2
Netherlands ---11.1
Barbados ------11.0
Republic of Macedonia 10.9
Estonia -------10.8
Georgia -------10.8
Spain ---------10.8
Russia --------10.7
Portugal ------10.5
Belgium -------10.4
Canada --------10.3
Cuba ----------10.3
Slovakia ------10.0
Malta ----------9.8
Romania --------9.8
Poland ---------9.5
Belarus --------9.4
Greece ---------9.3
Hungary --------9.3
South Korea ----9.3
Latvia ---------9.3
Austria --------9.2
Czech Republic --9.2
Italy ----------9.2
Switzerland ----9.2
Ukraine --------9.2
Lithuania ------9.1
Croatia --------9.0
Slovenia -------9.0
Bulgaria -------8.9
Bosnia and Herzegovina 8.8
Japan ----------8.3
Germany --------8.2
Singapore ------8.2
Hong Kong ( People's Republic of China) 7.6
Macau ( People's Republic of China) 7.6
Any technology distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/mediatechnologyandtelecoms/3145691/Steve-Wozniak-interview-iconic-co-founder-on-the-iPod-iPhone-and-future-for-Apple.html
Next time don't be so lazy and find the original article, that way I can be lazy.
Nothing against him as a person, but what's he been doing that's so brilliant in the past 2 decades that makes him an authority? He's like the Pete Best of Apple.
Disagree does not equal -1, Flamebait. Support Apple over Linux does not equal -1, Flamebait.
I find the parent post to be quite insightful - would've been braver had it not be AC'd.
Taking offense with a final sentence in an otherwise well-thought-out post and flexing mod points is throwing out the baby with the bathwater.
The first post was flamebait, no one modded that, choose this instead. Shame.
Pathological kinda promises Path + Logical - but instead, you get stuck with pathetic.
With apologies to Pratchette before hand...
My mathter thath I am authorithed to offer theventy five for your brainth thir. - Igor
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
He's basically channeling Yogi Berra, who once said of a popular restaurant, "No one goes there any more. It's too crowded."
He points two popular products, the transistor radio and the Walkman, and said they both died. But he neglects to mention why they died--they were replaced by new technology. The transistor radio was replaced by the Walkman. The Walkman was replaced by the portable CD player. The portable CD player was replaced by the MP3 player. The iPod is currently the #1 MP3 player. Until a new technology comes out, there's no real reason for it to become less popular.
"An average geek treats a tool as something which can be made to do as many things as imaginable. An elitist geek treats a tool as something which must do as many things as imaginable. You appear to fit in this third category."
Categories are for tools. You fall into that category, you tool. Hah i win! :)
Yes, along with swappable batteries and FM radio, as proven by the iPod's dominance of the market over players that do offer those options. Any more stupid questions?
It's not dead till I buy one dammit!
Pug
An Invisible Entity of Vast Power whose existence must be taken on faith alone: Liberal Media
Appears to have vanished. The smallest MP3 at samsung.com now is about 50mmx50mm - but has no screen, and only a uni-button like the shuffle, audio output.
Not sure I'd be interested in video and all that. (And, I mean, video on a 62x37mm screen? Why?)
I just want my music.
Yeah, it's an older model and a shame they don't still produce them.
I couldn't agree more about the video thing. My current player is a Creative Zen V Plus and although it has a really nice OLED screen, I can't handle watching any video that is longer than a few minutes on that small of a screen (music videos only perhaps; great for rickrolling people in RL). The old Samsung doesn't do video, but it does have pristine sound quality, possibly even a little better than the Zen.
I have been an iMac/Mac OS X (Leopard) user for quite some time. And as some pointed out, Apple has been good at including nice-to-have features in any device. A couple of years back only a couple of laptops had included webcam, now most do. One of those was a Sony and the other was the MacBook. Linux is free, but OS X is not and it has a superb GUI. Even non-geeks love that, that is the difference, now no one has to be a geek just to love a piece of technology. And that is where Apple succeeds. my $0.02.
"Hoover" also is a play on words for "hover".
Do not mock my vision of impractical footwear
I was sitting waiting for take out food and fooled with my iPhone. The "about" function told me how much memory was in use. It turns out buying the 16GB iPhone was important because I was down to 9.3GB available and I didn't have anything significant stored on the phone besides the latest firmware and 50 entries in my address book. It seems the operating system takes quite a bit of space, like almost half of the storage in an 8GB unit. I bought the 16GB unit because I am a software developer, but I am not developing because they have made me afraid with their NDA and non-approval policies. The Apple marketplace is well thought out in term of giving them the lion's share of the control and profit. Although those of use who bought stock hoping to share the profit have not. In fact that was a major disappointment. I was ready to buy a hundred shares just before the 3G rollout, but sanity arrived in time.
My father is a resident at an extended care facility. He cannot get dsl or broad band for any amount of money, and edge/3G based USB dongles don't seem to work reliably in his room. He has a MacBook and an iPhone. The iPhone seems to have better connectivity than the dongles. He can't stand browsing on the iPhone, and he shouldn't have to. He already bought $1500 of Apple hardware and has an AT&T contract (pays $30/mo for inet). I just can't understand why, having spent all that money, he can't take one small step and get satisfaction. I just kick myself for not getting the tethering app when it was available. This is a problem that just doesn't seem to have a solution, and it bothers me a lot. I want to love apple, but they are falling short in so many areas these days.
This woman was alive and cogent when Roosevelt was president. Browsing is something one does at a store and surfing is what some young kids do at the beach.
The offspring of her child's daughter bought her an Ipod. Now cats and parakeets are more tech savvy than this woman yet when she hooked up her Apple I-pod to a computer, downloaded a podcast from NPR and showed me it on the screen I was ---FLABERGASTED.
Now I know why all those other Mp3 player with VCR clock like user interfaces are still in Apple's shadow.
I predict Wozniak will be correct in the year 2099 (maybe).
My father is a resident at an extended care facility. He cannot get dsl or broad band for any amount of money, and edge/3G based USB dongles don't seem to work reliably in his room. He has a MacBook and an iPhone. The iPhone seems to have better connectivity than the dongles.
That's odd. Dongles (or PCMCIA cards) should have exactly the same connectivity as the iPhone. Are they from the same provider or a different one? Not every provider has the same 3G coverage.
My biggest problem at the moment is actually GPS doesn't work half the time. UMTS not working might be explained by lack of coverage, but that excuse doesn't work for GPS: it covers every inch of this planet. So why does GPS fail me when I'm out of the city? That makes no sense.
He already bought $1500 of Apple hardware and has an AT&T contract (pays $30/mo for inet). I just can't understand why, having spent all that money, he can't take one small step and get satisfaction. I just kick myself for not getting the tethering app when it was available. This is a problem that just doesn't seem to have a solution, and it bothers me a lot.
There is a solution, although it might not be legal: jailbreak the iPhone and install a tethering application. And it's also supposed to be possible to install the tethering app by hand without jailbreaking, but I don't know how yet. (And I think that's still breach of contract.)
I agree in principle but when I tried the cingular/at&t 32-bit USB dongle (sierra) it didn't work at all, trivial email took forever, browsing like 300 baud... really sad. The iPhone is not blazing, but does get some 3G throughput. The firmware/software/driver behind the hardware is different I guess. Maybe the dongle gives up too easily, and the iPhone is like the eveready bunny. This is what I have observed though. Maybe the antenna of theiPhone is better...