[opendtv] Re: News: Video board approves Apple-supported codecs
- From: Craig Birkmaier <craig@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Wed, 1 Dec 2004 09:39:11 -0500
At 12:28 PM -0500 11/24/04, John Shutt wrote:
>Could it be that people buy $400 iPods instead of $99 knockoff mp3 players
>for the same reason they buy $200 Nike shoes instead of $30 knockoff
>athletic shoes?
>
>It's all about the image.
No doubt this is a factor. The music business is all about coolness
and following the crowd.
But i do not think that this is the driving force behind the success
of the iPOD.
There is another, more important factor.
IT WORKS!
VERY WELL.
The iPOD is not just a portable music player, or photo player. It is
part of Apple's digital lifestyles strategy that extends across both
the Mac and now PC platforms and the Internet.
The iPOD without iTunes would be just another portable music player.
But with iTunes, you have an application that runs on both the Mac
and PC platforms that provides all of the tools needed to manage
large music libraries, to buy music online, and to synchronize the
iPOD with your music library...automatically. Dittos for the photo
iPOD, which will provide similar management tools for your digital
photo library via iPhoto.
One other note about the Photo iPOD. The album cover or CD liner has
long been a component of the packaged music experience. It seems a
natural extension to be able to view this stuff on an iPOD while
listening to music. This may even induce some artists to release more
photos with their music.
The recent revelations that a significant percentage of iPOD (for the
PC) owners are now buying or planning on buying Macs, suggests that
the iPOD is really a Trojan Horse that Apple plans to ride into the
Consumer Electronics business. To do this, Apple will need a variety
of products that are optimized for different aspects of the consumer
entertainment business. These will include portable devices to take
media and data with you; gateway devices to share media among the
various venues of entertainment in the home; and management/creation
tools that will allow consumers to take full advantage of their
digital media collections AND to create content to add to these
collections and to share with friends.
No doubt there will be many attempts to create cheap iPOD knock-offs.
But most of these companies do not have "the rest of the tools"
needed to manage your digital lifestyle.
Regards
Craig
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