It goes without saying that the dawn of the 21st Century has brought with it new forms of technology that have revolutionized man’s stay in this life, making it well a bit more pleasurable to say the least.
Man has come a long way from the time of gramophones and cassettes to the era of plasma television sets, mobile phones with internet access, laptop computers that are storehouses of data.
Slim and trim is the word on the street among the tech-savvy.
Just last week alone, Amazon Chief Executive Officer, Jeff Bezos announced the launch of the new e-book reader, the Kindle 2. This book reader can store a whooping 1 500 books and with the technology of its kind book publishers, newspapers must be afraid, very afraid as consumers are bound to change their reading habits.
Amidst all this melodrama taking place, there is one that is king and seems set to rule for a long time to come.
Introduced to the public in the summer of 2001, Apple released its iPod music player that has, over the years, grown in leaps and bounds and even saying this is an understatement in explaining the Apple ‘phenomena’ that has changed the face of the music industry.
The iPod is an mp3 music player with tonnes of storage capacity ranging from 5 gigabytes to the current storage capability of as much as 160gigabytes of storage space. It can also play movies, games, slideshows and songs turning the iPod into virtually a portable media center. The iPod family includes the iPod Classic, iPod Nano, iPod Touch and the iPod Shuffle, giving consumers a wide choice.
It is almost reminiscent of the trip that one makes to buy a new dog and they have to choose either a Poodle, Doberman or a Pitbull. They are all dogs, but come in different shapes and are endowed with different abilities.
Shape and size is a matter that Apple Inc, the company that launched the iPod, is no newcomer to. Their products are centered on design and are slim being on record for making the world’s first touch screen phone, the Apple iPhone and the thinnest laptop, the MacBook Air.
The small size of the iPod means that one can have access to their music anywhere and anytime. The latest offering, the iPod Shuffle is small, it weighs 15.6 grams, is 1.07 inches high and 1.62 inches wide and is only 0.41 inches thick. Coupled with this it comes with a clip that can attached on collars, belts and sleeves making it a daily necessity and man’s best friend wherever he goes.
Far from being short of enterprising and advertising the iPod as an indispensable ‘friend’ to consumers, Apple has partnered with sportswear giant, Nike, and have launched a new range of straps that can be worn on the arms so as to enable the user to listen to his or her music whilst taking an early morning jog. Now that’s bound to keep joggers running the whole day, considering that on average an iPod can store more than 500 songs!!
Maybe this is a new way to keep us all fit and strong, giving us running music?
Music lovers, both young and old testify of the wonders of the ‘heaven sent’ music player and how it is an important part of their daily lives. “My iPod is like a friend, I can’t imagine ever being without it at all because my whole life is stored there, songs, photos and movies just about everything”, said Dineo Sitabule a
student.
A father of two, Mr Frank Ramutswa, came to appreciate the iPod music player only when his sons received theirs from the United Kingdom. “What struck me is that it is small, but it stores lots of music; that really is unbelievable,” he said.
The iPod, however one looks at it, in less than a decade of its existence has impacted the music industry. Those who have tried to copy its success, such as Microsoft’s Zune player only serve to testify that the iPod is big business and it is a futile attempt to dethrone it.
Music can never be the same without the iPod.
