Only because we've been trained to turn devices off when we're not using them. But why do we need this? The iPod has a pretty good idea when they're not in use: music is not playing. Leave an iPod alone for a minute without anything playing, and it turns off.
They did add the ability to "turn off" the iPod for those who insist: hold down the Play/Pause button until it turns off.
Most computers will automatically sleep or turn themselves off (via hibernation) if they're inactive for a while. In fact, the iMac G5 works similarly - the power button is on the back, because you're not expected to use it. Just leave the computer on, and let it go to sleep. Move the mouse, click the mouse, or hit a key on the keyboard and the computer wakes up.
The iPod isn't even the first non-computer device I've seen without a power switch - look at a TiVo! The original devices didn't have an "off" button - because the TV did that just fine, and the TiVo was designed for continuous operation.
Of course, this really bothered a lot of people. Later TiVos added a "sleep" mode - and the Sony-branded version even had a power button on the remote! The only thing the power button/sleep mode does, though, is turn off the audio/video out. If you turn a TiVo on, you'll still have the last 30 minutes of video in the live buffer, just like it had been on.
I speak from experience. My household has 2 3G iPods, 1 iPod photo, 1 Sony-branded standalone TiVo, and 1 DirecTiVo (integrated TiVo/DirecTV receiver).
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Only because we've been trained to turn devices off when we're not using them. But why do we need this? The iPod has a pretty good idea when they're not in use: music is not playing. Leave an iPod alone for a minute without anything playing, and it turns off.
They did add the ability to "turn off" the iPod for those who insist: hold down the Play/Pause button until it turns off.
Most computers will automatically sleep or turn themselves off (via hibernation) if they're inactive for a while. In fact, the iMac G5 works similarly - the power button is on the back, because you're not expected to use it. Just leave the computer on, and let it go to sleep. Move the mouse, click the mouse, or hit a key on the keyboard and the computer wakes up.
The iPod isn't even the first non-computer device I've seen without a power switch - look at a TiVo! The original devices didn't have an "off" button - because the TV did that just fine, and the TiVo was designed for continuous operation.
Of course, this really bothered a lot of people. Later TiVos added a "sleep" mode - and the Sony-branded version even had a power button on the remote! The only thing the power button/sleep mode does, though, is turn off the audio/video out. If you turn a TiVo on, you'll still have the last 30 minutes of video in the live buffer, just like it had been on.
I speak from experience. My household has 2 3G iPods, 1 iPod photo, 1 Sony-branded standalone TiVo, and 1 DirecTiVo (integrated TiVo/DirecTV receiver).