yeah, whatever
I sort of, kind of, agree with the thrust of this article about the iPod from the Guardian:
There are two things about the iPod that make me uneasy. First is the monomania of it, the sense that a personal player isolates the individual from the world. I've been as guilty as anyone of sitting on the bus with a CD or cassette player, but somehow the idea that you can bury yourself in an entire music collection and never emerge to change sides or switch disks, goes further. Sure, there are other ways of listening to iPods, through stereos, or in your car, but I wonder why you would. If you've got a choice between the full-fat song or the compressed, thinner-sounding version of it, I go for the full fat every time.
The other thing is the way the boosters are pushing it to be the Walkman of the 21st Century. Because I know it ain't gonna happen. Because once you've invented the personal stereo, different variations of it are just variations on the same theme. It's not a new thing in the world but a new way of doing the old thing.
Expect to hear more along those lines at the Macworld Expo later today (Steve Jobs stands up at 5pm UK time). There are rumours of a mini iPod, cheaper and smaller, so that more people will have them. As a reseller, I like the iPod because it's Apple's 400 UKP computer. But instead of selling a shitty 400 quid PC, Apple sell a deluxe 400 quid personal stereo. We may not have been selling quite the number they got through in central London during December, but we did do a fair few (360 actually, with another 380 or so related items, so a fair few).
Like most technology trends, it became a bit of a fad among the early adopters (why the Guardian writer kept banging on about adapters I don't know; it doesn't make any sense, for a start), but like all early adopter fads, once it becomes more mainstream, they'll make a fad of something else. It's an accelerated culture, and the iPod won't have the 20 years of the Walkman to take off. It'll inevitably be usurped more quickly than that. But come back in 20 years and tell me I was wrong.
Because they're boosting it as this huge phenomenon, as soon as it is usurped people will crow that Apple has failed, has lost it, and that just annoys me, in the same way that the BBC "Most Powerful" programme did, when it plumped for Bill Gates over Steve Jobs, just because Gates made more money.
Personally, I'm with Caroline Sullivan. You have to edit your life, and be more selective. Less is more. I have enough trouble, most of the time, selecting 6 CDs to go in my car autochanger.
"It's just a gadget that appeals to men who want access to everything - all the indie schmindie stuff they think they should listen to, a rock critic's wishlist of songs. They think it offers limitless potential, but our lives need editing, or it ends up like digital TV - hundreds of channels and nothing to watch."
There are two things about the iPod that make me uneasy. First is the monomania of it, the sense that a personal player isolates the individual from the world. I've been as guilty as anyone of sitting on the bus with a CD or cassette player, but somehow the idea that you can bury yourself in an entire music collection and never emerge to change sides or switch disks, goes further. Sure, there are other ways of listening to iPods, through stereos, or in your car, but I wonder why you would. If you've got a choice between the full-fat song or the compressed, thinner-sounding version of it, I go for the full fat every time.
The other thing is the way the boosters are pushing it to be the Walkman of the 21st Century. Because I know it ain't gonna happen. Because once you've invented the personal stereo, different variations of it are just variations on the same theme. It's not a new thing in the world but a new way of doing the old thing.
Expect to hear more along those lines at the Macworld Expo later today (Steve Jobs stands up at 5pm UK time). There are rumours of a mini iPod, cheaper and smaller, so that more people will have them. As a reseller, I like the iPod because it's Apple's 400 UKP computer. But instead of selling a shitty 400 quid PC, Apple sell a deluxe 400 quid personal stereo. We may not have been selling quite the number they got through in central London during December, but we did do a fair few (360 actually, with another 380 or so related items, so a fair few).
Like most technology trends, it became a bit of a fad among the early adopters (why the Guardian writer kept banging on about adapters I don't know; it doesn't make any sense, for a start), but like all early adopter fads, once it becomes more mainstream, they'll make a fad of something else. It's an accelerated culture, and the iPod won't have the 20 years of the Walkman to take off. It'll inevitably be usurped more quickly than that. But come back in 20 years and tell me I was wrong.
Because they're boosting it as this huge phenomenon, as soon as it is usurped people will crow that Apple has failed, has lost it, and that just annoys me, in the same way that the BBC "Most Powerful" programme did, when it plumped for Bill Gates over Steve Jobs, just because Gates made more money.
Personally, I'm with Caroline Sullivan. You have to edit your life, and be more selective. Less is more. I have enough trouble, most of the time, selecting 6 CDs to go in my car autochanger.
posted by Anonymous at
Tuesday, January 06, 2004
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