Not everybody loves iPods

Knight Ridder ^ | 5/17/05

[Larry Lucido]

iPod envy?

[eureka!]

Re#34 LOL. Don't be so humble. Heartfelt congrats on the anniversary. Time for me to get back to work as well...

[the anti-liberal]

There are better portable MP3 players than the iPod out there, such as the one's made by Creative Labs and the Dell player, which is a re-badge Creative Labs player.

Better pricing as well.

The iPod is marketing genius, but again, there are better MP3 players out there for less money.

Bears repeating. Like M$, it's all marketing- you're being played.

[papertyger]

well I'm independently poor and have chosen to funnel funds into a cable modem as opposed to food :D

Well at least you have a good head on your shoulders...priorities and all...but that doesn't explain how you manage to stay online 24/7. I mean really. I KNOW they don't make cables that long. Don't you ever go to the bathroom?

[cyborg]

wireless router... You know I could be freeping from my royal washroom right now and you'd not know it :o)

[Flyer]

XM has a handheld now. Hopefully those that know will tell you more.

[Pillows]

Ipods are a little foreign to me. Rush is putting his show on .MP3 download .....does this mean I need an ipod? Is there another player I can get where I can download Rush and then listen to his show?

[cyborg]

I was going to get the XM portable but I spent the $300 (XM radio is actually $350) on an ipod.

[newsworthy]

Boom boxes are my pet peeve. No one has the right to inflict that level of electronic noise pollution on his neighbors. I regularly yell to boom boxers in cars and tell them to turn it down. It works about fifty percent of the time, but I don't see many others challenging them.

A professor of epidemiology told me recently that the boomers are going deaf at a higher rate and younger than their parents did, and he expects that teens today will have an unusually high rate of substantial hearing loss in their thirties and forties.

[RightOnline]

Bought my boys iRiver players (after MUCH research online) vs. iPODs. They love 'em.

Far cheaper; sound fabulous; smaller; include FM radio.

[lainie]

#4.

Hey, Jealousy. Hey, Jealousy.

[lainie]

Not if you use a mac and use the associated mac software, necessarily. It is ultra convenient and very user friendly.

[eureka!]

Agreed. One of many problems with today's youth, the root causes being their homes, Hollywood and public education, IMHO...

[Tanniker Smith]

Hmmmm, am I the only one that thinks that the kid has some semblance of a point in there? Unlike getting the latest videogame system and the hottest new graphics card, an iPod is a solo activity that shuts you off from everyone else. Nothing wrong with that on the train or while jogging alone, but if it gets to the point that it's cutting off your social life and you're being more internally focused, that's a problem. Coming from a high-schooler, I'm wondering if she isn't noticing a pattern that's forming among her peers.

Sure, it's possible that it's sour grapes. OTOH, it's possible that it isn't.

TS

[the anti-liberal]

I wasn't aware that the mac only recognized the ipod. When the ipod first came out I dismissed it as an apple product, and seeing as I have little respect for apple (I have little for M$, but even less for apple) I never gave them a second thought.

People who walk around with headphones on isolate themselves from their surroundings, which is fine if that's what they want to do, but it's an extension of sitting around watching television- the world goes by without you.

Personally, I prefer to be aware of my surroundings.

[Glenn]

does this completely stupid post come in a podcast format?

[lainie]

iPods are able to be used whether you're on a Mac or a PC. I'm not sure what you meant there. Anyway, since the new Apples are basically FreeBSD with an Apple GUI, they're WAY above MS now in my book.

But regardless, I don't isolate myself. I just use it in lieu of cumbersome CD's in the car/out for walks or hikes, etc. And my point was that, if you're on a Mac, using an iPod is easy peasy lemon squeezy.

[OldPossum]

I have no opinion on iPod's one way or the other but I did notice this statement: At least we all know there are real DJs on the other end of the box.

Increasingly, that is not the case, radio stations are turning into Great Jukeboxes in the Sky as huge corporations buy up the stations and operate them in a mechanistic (is that a word?) way, i.e., a computer plays the music and interjects commercials.

A sure way of knowing you're listening to one of these "artificial" stations is if you notice that the time is never given.

I once was in radio and I miss the old way of doing things.

[Sonny M]

Sure, it's possible that it's sour grapes. OTOH, it's possible that it isn't.

If she had skipped point # 4, then you'd maybe, possibly be right.

But number 4 actually makes it clear that it is "Ipod envy" (she even uses the word) and makes a reference to herself not having one.

She (using the word "us") feels left out and uncool because she doesn't have one.

Its sour grapes from a kid who's parents either won't buy her one, or she is to lazy to get a job to pay for one.

[Tanniker Smith]

Not quite. She isn't quite saying that she's uncool for not having one. She's saying that those without them are made to feel uncool. The "in" crowd can belittle everyone else for the stupidest of things, and everyone will join in on it. This may make many wish that they had whatever that "in" thing was, too. Or it may make them wish the others would just frickin' shut up and go away.

I'm a high school teacher. I see both kinds. Granted, I can concede your point on her use of the word "envy". But there was times in high school that I wished I had other things that the other kids had -- and I probably could've bought them (some of them, anyway), too. I just didn't. Don't know why, maybe a little common sense when it came to spending my money.

TS
(who recently bought a memory card for his Palm and now listens to those old-time-radio mp3s that have been sitting on his PC for 5+ years already.