I've had an iPod for about 3 years now (first a 5 GB that I sold on eBay 2 years ago when I bought my 30 GB), and Bluetrip is the "last thing" that I needed.
I have a CD player that's gone unused for over a year now because of my iPod, but to play on my stereo receiver I've used a Monster RCA cable of sorts.
Apple should be including Bluetrip as part of their hype, much as they used Belkin's to show off how to get photos from your digital camera to the iPod for storage.
Only Bluetrip looks cooler. Sit the iPod down in a charging spot, and you've got a music remote control and never need a CD player again.
The only way to make this better now is to let us sync our iPods to our computers as well. This way, I could buy music online, tell my iPod to Sync, and get my latest music on the Pod without having to move it from its perch (well, until I take it out to drive to work, but that's a different issue).
I thought it would be just as easy for them to take an iPod Mini, rip out the HDD and put in the flash memory, and call it a day.
But I can see where this idea will pick up. The fact that it works as both a 512 MB/1 GB flash drive as well as a MP3 player makes me go "Well, a regular 1 GB USB drive is $80, so for $99 I can have a 512 MB one that's an MP3 player. Use it for jogging and such."
I jog with my iPod and while it never skips, it is a little odd to have it flopping around inside my sweats pant's pocket. (No comments from the peanut gallery.)
So for people with only $99 - $150, iPod Shuffle will be pretty cool. I'll still probably just get my wife an iPod Mini anyway, since she has over 1 GB of music in her special playlist (which I'm desperate to get off my own iPod. Country does not go in my personal music life, no offense meant.)
But now there's a range:
Cheapo: $99 - $150. No screen, but plug it in, get your playlist, and walk away.
Mid-range: $249. Have some additional tracks for longer drives or periods away from the computer.
Expensive: $299 and up - for the folks who need to carry everything around with them all of the time.
I still wish for an iPod Razor (iPod Mini with the flash and think as a credit card), but I think you can see lots of families where one personal already has an iPod, and wants to get another for the wife/kids but doesn't want to spend $1000 on electronics.
Which, with me, my lovely wife, and my three kids (including a daughter that's listening more and more to her own music), $150 is pretty affordable.
I have a copy of WoW, and it's probably the first MMRPG that I've played that I've enjoyed. I tried Ultima when it came out, Anarchy later, and some others - but WoW has me.
Why?
1. Attention to detail. Ever played a game and thought "You know, this would be better if I could do X"? Well, here it is. X is 99% of the time right in WoW. Chat - easy. Macros - simple. Able to compare what you have with what you want to buy - just hover the mouse over the item.
2. Mac/PC compatible. I know, I know - Mac's only include 4% of the "new computers sold" base or some such. But I know several Unix geeks who got Macs just so they could play some games on them (as opposed to Linux, which is even less native ports than for the Mac). So after the kids are in bed, I can sit in the living room with my Powerbook and play the same game my friends are playing in my living room.
3. Performance: you don't need a brand spanking new computer to play. It helps, of course, but I know a guy with a 867 Mhz Powerbook who plays without missing anything.
4. Ease for newbies and oldies alike: Even on PvP servers, you can be a newbie and be fine. Do you lose money for dying? No. Experience? No. Just inconvience (and maybe a little equipment damage, but that's easily repaired). Once Blizzard has the true battle areas in place to stage "wars", there will be a place for those who want to kill other people to head off to.
If you're an oldie, there's lots to do as well. Elite dungeons that you share with your direct friends, not everybody and their brother (so you don't have to worry about waiting forever for some particular monster to respawn - your group and your group alone will get the chance to get him in your custom dungeon).
Most of the time the game is as hard as you want it to be. I usually challenge creatures 2-3 levels above me, where it's "hard but fair". I like that it's pretty fair. If I fail, it's because I wasn't watching what I was doing, not because some arbitrary bit got flipped that said it was my day to die.
Is it perfect? No - I do wish they'd let clerics wear leather (especially as their attacks are underpowered, which is why I switched to a Hunter), and the respawn is almost too fast (there's been a few times I'd died because I was fighting a monster, got it down to 99% dead, then a new monster spawn right on top of me and killed me before I could run off - would be nice to have a 10 second countdown before they started attacking), but otherwise, it's close enough to perfect to make it the only MMRPG that I'll play.
Now, if you'll excuse me, I need go hunt some wolves so I can learn to make Lean Wolf Steaks....
Re:Nyko's iPod movie player
on
CES Tidbits
·
· Score: 1
Considering that you missed the part that said "Long 10-12 hour car trips", not "everyday use", I'll thank you for your advice - though it completely missed the mark of what I was trying to convey.
Nyko's iPod movie player
on
CES Tidbits
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
I read the press release for this a day or so ago, but didn't know it would be this cool.
My wife and I have been talking about getting a pair of portable DVD players for the kids - or, as I call it, "sanity preservers" so during the 10-12 hour drive to Grandma's house, Dad doesn't kill them after the 6000th "Are we there yet? I'm bored!"
I can take their entire "Angelic Layer" and "Magic Knight Rayearth", rip the DVD's to AVI's and then slap them onto an iPod. 20 GB of data should store about 60 movies (at about 300 MB apiece) - plenty to store an entire season at once, with room left over in case Daddy wants to watch one of "his" movies while Mommy drives for a little while.
No worrying about the DVD disks getting lost in the car or damaged (a problem since the cartoons belong to Daddy who gets very upset when they get scratched), and since the 5 year old is now listening to her own music she can either watch her movie or listen to something.
Very cool idea from Nyko. Depending on the cost, I can see myself snagging one of these things.
Without the presence of nearly nude dancing girls jumping up and down, rap music every 5 minutes, and the nominations of all the games that came out between November and December, how will I know this is a gaming awards?
I imagine this (if it will actually exist) would be like the eMac: base model low specs with the combo drive and 256 MB ram, but you can upgrade from there so a Superdrive will set you back an additional $100.
Kind of like the Dell machines that start at $400 or so, then by the time you add on the usual needs (bump up the RAM to at least 512) they come out to $500 - $600.
If this is the case, Apple now has a great chance to gain market share. I've wondered for years what would happen if a headless iMac comes out (since everybody already owns a monitor, why buy a machine with another one anyway?).
If it becomes popular, I wonder if more game companies will go the Blizzard route and dual-release their software for both the PC and the Mac. Hm. Well, I've got an hour before I have to go to work - time for a little Warcraft;).
It's the way stock ownership works - votes are based on percentages.
Take Ubisoft. With EA getting 20% of the stock, that means when the company takes votes on what to do, EA has 20% of the vote right there. Increase employee hours without overtime pay? EA has 20% of the vote, and so they only need to convince 30% of the total shareholders that they're right. (And usually, you can convince 1 out of 3 people that any stupid idea is right.)
They don't need 100% - just "enough".
20% is not enough to completely rule a company, but it's large enough to seriously influence decisions - which could be construed as a "takeover".
[sarcasm] See! Windows is a lot cheaper than Linux - I mean, look how much money you have to spend on it!
Hm? How much would it cost to do the same thing with Windows? That's not the point - look! Shiny object! [/sarcasm]
The cleverness of "Bow Nigger" and the other
on
New Games Journalism
·
· Score: 4, Insightful
And of the Eve piece (just finished reading it) is that unlike normal "reviews", you don't wade through "here's how you play, blah, blah, blah, and then you click this".
The author in both pieces inserts just enough information so you get the ghist, and you understand why it's so enjoyable. I read "Bow Nigger" some time ago and nearly fell out of my chair with enjoyment. After reading several reviews of "Jedi Knight II", this was the first piece that made me want to go play it - right now.
Not every game review should be like this - but I'd rather read 100 "Bow Nigger" tales than yet another "Halo 2 rocks because it's pretty!" Tell us why you loved it - and don't bog me down in the details, tell me why you liked it. What part? What scene in the game? Was there a moment that made you go "woah", or was it just the constant puzzle of trying to find the best place to stay alive with the adrenaline pounding in your ears?
Agreed - I'd much rather see a slot. That way, I could "upgrade" or, even better, have different ones (one for me, one for my wife, maybe another for the kids).
My wife would like an iPod, but doesn't need more than a "bit o' music" at a time, so a 256 card for her would be perfect.
Right now, the iPod and iPod mini have a lot of marketshare because of two things:
1. Look 2. Feel
Look: If you pull out either an iPod or the "white headphones" (um, like the ones I have in now attached to the iPod on my desk), you'll have people who know what it is. When I was in DC on business, I was easily able to notice the people with iPods.
Feel: The Jog Wheel (patented or copyrighted by Apple, I'll let the lawyers here complain about which) is a perfect medium for MP3 players. Up, down, find the song and fast forward or back - all in one interface.
So what would an iPod flash look light?
Here's my $0.02: it will look like an iPod mini.
Take an iPod mini. Take out the hard drive and squeeze the electronics together. With just flash RAM, you could probably have a device that looks the same, acts the same, costs $100 - $150 (256 MB - 1 GB), and looks like an iPod Mini only with the thickness of two stacked quarters, and weighs a little more. Battery could still last 12 hours (remember - no moving parts).
So, for Apple to make a "display-less device" that nobody would recognize as an iPod, I call "bullshit".
I'll use the same skills for when I was 12 and heard about a new "Star Wars Episode I" coming out "someday": until I saw a trailer, I wouldn't believe. Saved me about 10 years of unhappiness. (Granted, not seeing Episode I would have saved me more, but that's another story for another day.)
Yes, I plan on renting it within the next month or so, if only because I think it looks interesting and quirky.
But how far can you really take "roll around the ball and watch it get bigger"? I read the review from Mr. Roberts on InsertCredit.com and got pretty much all i needed to know (and in true Mr. Roberts style, more than I bargained for) - but what could you do in a sequel?
This device actually comes close to what I want. I have 3 children, 2 of which are old enough to put DVD's into the machine. The problem is they don't always hold them right (hey, they're only 5 and 2 years old, go easy), and because of that, the DVD's are getting scratched up.
I've been thinking about buying a mod-chip for my Xbox for some time (cost: about $70 including shiping/handling for the no-sauter kind) and using the Xbox Media Center, using Handbrake on the DVD's, leaving them on the Powermac, then streaming them to the TV through a SMB share. DVD's stay in the cases, kids get to see movies, and Daddy doesn't kill anybody.
But the idea of using a "real" product (not just a self made hack) is always appealing - but $500 is a lot of money to spend. Then again, my iPod cost $399, so I really can't talk for a similiar device that does video as well as audio.
Still, you'd think they could create an iTunes like system for the video and music files. I mean, is a database of MP3 tags really that hard to come up with?
Delayed help would probably work out. Leave your mouse over the grayed out option for more than 2-3 seconds and a little "click here to find out why this has been disabled" could be useful.
Most of the guys other items were just kind of "blah" to me - the dock, removal of hard drives from the powerbook, but the "grayed out for no reason" at least made some sense.
Don't let the same people who brought us Cinderella II: Now it's just for 2 year olds, Little Mermaid II: The Sea Shells got Bigger and the Story got Dumber, Lion King 1 1/2: The Pointless Version, and Pocohontas II: We Just Can't Take Historical Innacuracy with a Native American Pamela Anderson Clone Far Enough make "Toy Story 3".
I don't think it if I had to suffer my children asking me for another movie where Andy loses his Woody again, and the kids take a trip to Neverland Ranch to find it.
The second reason why Mr. Jobs isn't offering "video on the iPod" is for legal liability.
Yes, the Archos lets you watch xvid/divx movies on it, but I'm willing to bet they don't include a DVD ripper. So this is a niche product where they assume the buyers know how to get xvid movies (or rip them themselves instead of sucking them via P2P).
So if Mr. Jobs were to offer an iPod with video capability, he'd have to have the infrastructure in place to support it. iTunes offered out of the box MP3/AIFF ripping for the iPod.
Odds are, once he can convince the MPAA the way he convinced the RIAA that having digital movies available for download is not the equivalent to the "Boston Strangler", then we'll see an iPod Video as well as an iPod Photo. (Though, I am rather curious to see how an iPod video would handle battery life - a moot point at this stage.)
Slashdot Mirror
I've had an iPod for about 3 years now (first a 5 GB that I sold on eBay 2 years ago when I bought my 30 GB), and Bluetrip is the "last thing" that I needed.
I have a CD player that's gone unused for over a year now because of my iPod, but to play on my stereo receiver I've used a Monster RCA cable of sorts.
Apple should be including Bluetrip as part of their hype, much as they used Belkin's to show off how to get photos from your digital camera to the iPod for storage.
Only Bluetrip looks cooler. Sit the iPod down in a charging spot, and you've got a music remote control and never need a CD player again.
The only way to make this better now is to let us sync our iPods to our computers as well. This way, I could buy music online, tell my iPod to Sync, and get my latest music on the Pod without having to move it from its perch (well, until I take it out to drive to work, but that's a different issue).
[sarcasm]Dang, if only that had sued him 2 years earlier he'd still be a minor and wouldn't be responsible....[/sarcasm]
I thought it would be just as easy for them to take an iPod Mini, rip out the HDD and put in the flash memory, and call it a day.
But I can see where this idea will pick up. The fact that it works as both a 512 MB/1 GB flash drive as well as a MP3 player makes me go "Well, a regular 1 GB USB drive is $80, so for $99 I can have a 512 MB one that's an MP3 player. Use it for jogging and such."
I jog with my iPod and while it never skips, it is a little odd to have it flopping around inside my sweats pant's pocket. (No comments from the peanut gallery.)
So for people with only $99 - $150, iPod Shuffle will be pretty cool. I'll still probably just get my wife an iPod Mini anyway, since she has over 1 GB of music in her special playlist (which I'm desperate to get off my own iPod. Country does not go in my personal music life, no offense meant.)
But now there's a range:
Cheapo: $99 - $150. No screen, but plug it in, get your playlist, and walk away.
Mid-range: $249. Have some additional tracks for longer drives or periods away from the computer.
Expensive: $299 and up - for the folks who need to carry everything around with them all of the time.
I still wish for an iPod Razor (iPod Mini with the flash and think as a credit card), but I think you can see lots of families where one personal already has an iPod, and wants to get another for the wife/kids but doesn't want to spend $1000 on electronics.
Which, with me, my lovely wife, and my three kids (including a daughter that's listening more and more to her own music), $150 is pretty affordable.
We'll have to see if the market thinks the same.
Probably because he's someone with an addictive personality, and has no life.
I have a job, wife, three kids, bills, and training, so I have to budget my time. So, I just remove the time I'd spend watching TV and play instead.
Sounds like your friend needs an intervention. And I'm being mostly serious on that - get the man a damned life.
I have a copy of WoW, and it's probably the first MMRPG that I've played that I've enjoyed. I tried Ultima when it came out, Anarchy later, and some others - but WoW has me.
Why?
1. Attention to detail. Ever played a game and thought "You know, this would be better if I could do X"? Well, here it is. X is 99% of the time right in WoW. Chat - easy. Macros - simple. Able to compare what you have with what you want to buy - just hover the mouse over the item.
2. Mac/PC compatible. I know, I know - Mac's only include 4% of the "new computers sold" base or some such. But I know several Unix geeks who got Macs just so they could play some games on them (as opposed to Linux, which is even less native ports than for the Mac). So after the kids are in bed, I can sit in the living room with my Powerbook and play the same game my friends are playing in my living room.
3. Performance: you don't need a brand spanking new computer to play. It helps, of course, but I know a guy with a 867 Mhz Powerbook who plays without missing anything.
4. Ease for newbies and oldies alike: Even on PvP servers, you can be a newbie and be fine. Do you lose money for dying? No. Experience? No. Just inconvience (and maybe a little equipment damage, but that's easily repaired). Once Blizzard has the true battle areas in place to stage "wars", there will be a place for those who want to kill other people to head off to.
If you're an oldie, there's lots to do as well. Elite dungeons that you share with your direct friends, not everybody and their brother (so you don't have to worry about waiting forever for some particular monster to respawn - your group and your group alone will get the chance to get him in your custom dungeon).
Most of the time the game is as hard as you want it to be. I usually challenge creatures 2-3 levels above me, where it's "hard but fair". I like that it's pretty fair. If I fail, it's because I wasn't watching what I was doing, not because some arbitrary bit got flipped that said it was my day to die.
Is it perfect? No - I do wish they'd let clerics wear leather (especially as their attacks are underpowered, which is why I switched to a Hunter), and the respawn is almost too fast (there's been a few times I'd died because I was fighting a monster, got it down to 99% dead, then a new monster spawn right on top of me and killed me before I could run off - would be nice to have a 10 second countdown before they started attacking), but otherwise, it's close enough to perfect to make it the only MMRPG that I'll play.
Now, if you'll excuse me, I need go hunt some wolves so I can learn to make Lean Wolf Steaks....
Considering that you missed the part that said "Long 10-12 hour car trips", not "everyday use", I'll thank you for your advice - though it completely missed the mark of what I was trying to convey.
I read the press release for this a day or so ago, but didn't know it would be this cool.
My wife and I have been talking about getting a pair of portable DVD players for the kids - or, as I call it, "sanity preservers" so during the 10-12 hour drive to Grandma's house, Dad doesn't kill them after the 6000th "Are we there yet? I'm bored!"
I can take their entire "Angelic Layer" and "Magic Knight Rayearth", rip the DVD's to AVI's and then slap them onto an iPod. 20 GB of data should store about 60 movies (at about 300 MB apiece) - plenty to store an entire season at once, with room left over in case Daddy wants to watch one of "his" movies while Mommy drives for a little while.
No worrying about the DVD disks getting lost in the car or damaged (a problem since the cartoons belong to Daddy who gets very upset when they get scratched), and since the 5 year old is now listening to her own music she can either watch her movie or listen to something.
Very cool idea from Nyko. Depending on the cost, I can see myself snagging one of these things.
Without the presence of nearly nude dancing girls jumping up and down, rap music every 5 minutes, and the nominations of all the games that came out between November and December, how will I know this is a gaming awards?
I have a Powerbook, my wife has an iBook. I imagine the split would be much like that:
Low end, affordable machines for the masses
High end, expensive for the pros
This new Mac could fill that in, so you would have:
Laptop: iBook ($1000) vs Powerbook ($2000)
Screen: eMac ($800) vs iMac ($1200)
Headless: myMac ($500) vs PowerMac($2000)
I imagine this (if it will actually exist) would be like the eMac: base model low specs with the combo drive and 256 MB ram, but you can upgrade from there so a Superdrive will set you back an additional $100.
;).
Kind of like the Dell machines that start at $400 or so, then by the time you add on the usual needs (bump up the RAM to at least 512) they come out to $500 - $600.
If this is the case, Apple now has a great chance to gain market share. I've wondered for years what would happen if a headless iMac comes out (since everybody already owns a monitor, why buy a machine with another one anyway?).
If it becomes popular, I wonder if more game companies will go the Blizzard route and dual-release their software for both the PC and the Mac. Hm. Well, I've got an hour before I have to go to work - time for a little Warcraft
It's the way stock ownership works - votes are based on percentages.
Take Ubisoft. With EA getting 20% of the stock, that means when the company takes votes on what to do, EA has 20% of the vote right there. Increase employee hours without overtime pay? EA has 20% of the vote, and so they only need to convince 30% of the total shareholders that they're right. (And usually, you can convince 1 out of 3 people that any stupid idea is right.)
They don't need 100% - just "enough".
20% is not enough to completely rule a company, but it's large enough to seriously influence decisions - which could be construed as a "takeover".
[sarcasm]
See! Windows is a lot cheaper than Linux - I mean, look how much money you have to spend on it!
Hm? How much would it cost to do the same thing with Windows? That's not the point - look! Shiny object!
[/sarcasm]
And of the Eve piece (just finished reading it) is that unlike normal "reviews", you don't wade through "here's how you play, blah, blah, blah, and then you click this".
The author in both pieces inserts just enough information so you get the ghist, and you understand why it's so enjoyable. I read "Bow Nigger" some time ago and nearly fell out of my chair with enjoyment. After reading several reviews of "Jedi Knight II", this was the first piece that made me want to go play it - right now.
Not every game review should be like this - but I'd rather read 100 "Bow Nigger" tales than yet another "Halo 2 rocks because it's pretty!" Tell us why you loved it - and don't bog me down in the details, tell me why you liked it. What part? What scene in the game? Was there a moment that made you go "woah", or was it just the constant puzzle of trying to find the best place to stay alive with the adrenaline pounding in your ears?
Anyway. Just my $0.02.
Agreed - I'd much rather see a slot. That way, I could "upgrade" or, even better, have different ones (one for me, one for my wife, maybe another for the kids).
My wife would like an iPod, but doesn't need more than a "bit o' music" at a time, so a 256 card for her would be perfect.
Ideas abound from there.
Now that I think about it, if any part of my body came loose when you rubbed it, I'd be really worried.
I kind of like my body parts to stay, well, attached.
Right now, the iPod and iPod mini have a lot of marketshare because of two things:
1. Look
2. Feel
Look: If you pull out either an iPod or the "white headphones" (um, like the ones I have in now attached to the iPod on my desk), you'll have people who know what it is. When I was in DC on business, I was easily able to notice the people with iPods.
Feel: The Jog Wheel (patented or copyrighted by Apple, I'll let the lawyers here complain about which) is a perfect medium for MP3 players. Up, down, find the song and fast forward or back - all in one interface.
So what would an iPod flash look light?
Here's my $0.02: it will look like an iPod mini.
Take an iPod mini. Take out the hard drive and squeeze the electronics together. With just flash RAM, you could probably have a device that looks the same, acts the same, costs $100 - $150 (256 MB - 1 GB), and looks like an iPod Mini only with the thickness of two stacked quarters, and weighs a little more. Battery could still last 12 hours (remember - no moving parts).
So, for Apple to make a "display-less device" that nobody would recognize as an iPod, I call "bullshit".
I'll use the same skills for when I was 12 and heard about a new "Star Wars Episode I" coming out "someday": until I saw a trailer, I wouldn't believe. Saved me about 10 years of unhappiness. (Granted, not seeing Episode I would have saved me more, but that's another story for another day.)
Just because, you know, for the rest of us who want to plug in our systems to our TV sets without having to shill out money for a modded Xbox or a PC.
Why?
Yes, I plan on renting it within the next month or so, if only because I think it looks interesting and quirky.
But how far can you really take "roll around the ball and watch it get bigger"? I read the review from Mr. Roberts on InsertCredit.com and got pretty much all i needed to know (and in true Mr. Roberts style, more than I bargained for) - but what could you do in a sequel?
Well, other than make Namco more money, I guess.
This device actually comes close to what I want. I have 3 children, 2 of which are old enough to put DVD's into the machine. The problem is they don't always hold them right (hey, they're only 5 and 2 years old, go easy), and because of that, the DVD's are getting scratched up.
I've been thinking about buying a mod-chip for my Xbox for some time (cost: about $70 including shiping/handling for the no-sauter kind) and using the Xbox Media Center, using Handbrake on the DVD's, leaving them on the Powermac, then streaming them to the TV through a SMB share. DVD's stay in the cases, kids get to see movies, and Daddy doesn't kill anybody.
But the idea of using a "real" product (not just a self made hack) is always appealing - but $500 is a lot of money to spend. Then again, my iPod cost $399, so I really can't talk for a similiar device that does video as well as audio.
Still, you'd think they could create an iTunes like system for the video and music files. I mean, is a database of MP3 tags really that hard to come up with?
Delayed help would probably work out. Leave your mouse over the grayed out option for more than 2-3 seconds and a little "click here to find out why this has been disabled" could be useful.
Most of the guys other items were just kind of "blah" to me - the dock, removal of hard drives from the powerbook, but the "grayed out for no reason" at least made some sense.
If you're in college, can you get college credit when your instructor threatens to flunk you for playing The Sims 2 all the time?
Makes you wonder if there will be those who spend more time in their virtual college classes instead of the real ones....
Now, when I tell those guys I want my pizza in 30 minutes or less, there is no excuse!
I really don't care if Pixar or Disney get along.
But I beg of You, please, PLEASE!
Don't let the same people who brought us Cinderella II: Now it's just for 2 year olds, Little Mermaid II: The Sea Shells got Bigger and the Story got Dumber, Lion King 1 1/2: The Pointless Version, and Pocohontas II: We Just Can't Take Historical Innacuracy with a Native American Pamela Anderson Clone Far Enough make "Toy Story 3".
I don't think it if I had to suffer my children asking me for another movie where Andy loses his Woody again, and the kids take a trip to Neverland Ranch to find it.
Oh, and thanks for Metroid Prime II.
Amen.
The second reason why Mr. Jobs isn't offering "video on the iPod" is for legal liability.
Yes, the Archos lets you watch xvid/divx movies on it, but I'm willing to bet they don't include a DVD ripper. So this is a niche product where they assume the buyers know how to get xvid movies (or rip them themselves instead of sucking them via P2P).
So if Mr. Jobs were to offer an iPod with video capability, he'd have to have the infrastructure in place to support it. iTunes offered out of the box MP3/AIFF ripping for the iPod.
Odds are, once he can convince the MPAA the way he convinced the RIAA that having digital movies available for download is not the equivalent to the "Boston Strangler", then we'll see an iPod Video as well as an iPod Photo. (Though, I am rather curious to see how an iPod video would handle battery life - a moot point at this stage.)
iPorn