Word: ipod
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Dates: during 2001-2001
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...then there's Microsoft's X-Box, Nintendo's Game Cube, Apple's iPod, and (according to the Wall Street Journal, anyway) disco-era throwback Shrinky Dinks, which sentimental boomers are apparently trying to pass on to their kids. And there's always this year's batch of "must-own" DVDs of didn't-need-to-see movies, the kind of stocking stuffer that tends to pile up in shoppers' hands (and on their credit-card bills). Maybe all retailers will need this Christmas is a few hot "magnet" items (sufficiently stocked) to get shoppers into the stores...
EXPENSIVE $399 APPLE IPOD Once again, the folks who brought us the iMac have seized the design-and-engineering high ground. The elegant, stunningly easy-to-use iPod is the size of a deck of cards yet can hold 1,000 songs. Apple can't say if or when it will let Windows users join the fun. www.apple.com/ipod...
Apple excels at this kind of so-simple-it's-brilliant stuff. Steve Jobs may be a few years late to the MP3-player race, but with iPod he has shot into the lead. No one else has this much storage in a package this small. Never has digital music been this well organized. The trackwheel on the front scolls quickly and precisely through all your songs, arranged by title or by artist, and the display is crisp and readable. When I gave the iPod to my techno-suspicious parents, they figured out how to select and play in under...
...part of the PC-owning majority, however, you're out of luck--for now. Jobs has not ruled out producing Windows-compatible versions of iPod, but making tools for operating systems other than his own has never been his style. Better to hope iPod shakes up the MP3 industry the way the iMac shook up the makers of boxy beige PCs. There will probably be lots of generic cut-price, cross-platform knock-offs of the iPod by Christmas...
Meanwhile, there are more than enough Mac users in the world for Apple to make out like a bandit this holiday season. There really are no downsides to the iPod other than its relatively weighty price tag. It would be nice to see that lowered soon, although the Mac universe is an expensive place to begin with. If price does turn out to be no object, expect Jobs to capitalize on his "digital hub" strategy with a few more Apple-only peripherals: the iCamera, perhaps, or the iOrganizer. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have some Beatles-inspired housework...