iPod: 5th Generation

[Atahualpa]

Originally posted by Drake Tungsten
The morning after, this thread seems more pathetic than funny...

I agree, but I don't care, it's my thread and it's got 3 pages, so either you lengthen or leave it

[Datajack Franit]

The funny fact is that I still don´t know whether it´s a good thing or not to get Apple stuff

[Asher]

Article in the New York Times on the new iPod:

Cool, a Video iPod. Want to Watch 'Lost'?

Among the entries in the portable entertainment derby is the Slingbox, which forwards cable service to any computer.

By RICHARD SIKLOS
Published: October 16, 2005

THE introduction of Apple Computer's video iPod last Wednesday was greeted as an epochal event. The portable, personal, digital world - as you've no doubt heard by now - is here, and there is no turning back. And just as it took the vision and brio of Steven P. Jobs, Apple's founder, to drag the music industry into the 21st century with the iPod and the iTunes online music store, it was only a matter of time before he would do the same with what quaintly used to be known as the moving image.

And so, the video iPod. And with it, Mr. Jobs's particularly clever coup: sealing a deal with his quasi-estranged partner, the Walt Disney Company, to distribute downloaded versions of such hit Disney-produced shows as "Desperate Housewives" and "Lost" on the new gizmo, at $1.99 each. It's not exactly 500 channels of entertainment, but it's a good anchor tenant, supplemented by pay-per-download music videos and other clever features, such as films from Mr. Jobs' other outpost, the animation studio Pixar.

Only a fool would bet against Mr. Jobs, whose iPod now thoroughly dominates the digital music market against rivals like Sony. But here goes: at first blush, the video iPod is not about to revolutionize Hollywood in the way the iPod revolutionized music.

Why? Two reasons. One is that studios are not rushing to make their most popular movies and shows available for the video iPod (note that only Disney shared the stage with Mr. Jobs last week, and the primary motive may have been its desire to repair relations with Pixar). Perhaps even more important, mobile gadgets with access to everything that is already on television are on the way.

Just last week, EchoStar, the satellite broadcaster, released one such device, a portable personal video recorder called PocketDISH; it got much less notice than the video iPod got. Think of PocketDISH essentially as a pocket-sized TiVo - a small computer that lets you record television shows onto a hard drive with the click of a button - with a screen for watching what you've recorded. And like TiVo and its clones, it can record any program you can watch on a full-sized TV at home, and then allow you to fast-forward through the ads when you view it.

The obvious shortcoming of the video iPod (at least in its first iteration) is that by being Internet-based it can offer a scant library of material. Apart from Disney's hits and whatever else iTunes offers in coming months, other media giants like NBC Universal have not yet fully digitized their vast libraries of shows and movies and made them available via the Internet. They're worried about piracy, for one thing, but they're also not quite convinced that there is a good business case for online distribution.

Also, while there is an amazing amount of effort going into mobile entertainment, there is still considerable debate about what kind of video people might actually want to watch on the go. "You have to create new content for these new platforms," says Gregg Spiridellis, who along with his brother runs JibJab Media, a company that creates short-form spoofs like a John Kerry/George Bush cartoon that was widely e-mailed during the last election. "People behave differently when they're walking around with their iPod or a cellphone from when they're sitting on their couch with a clicker."

With portable video recorders like PocketDISH, there is no debate - at least not if the name of the game is taking shows on the road. These portable video recorders enable you to record cable or satellite programs and watch them either on the device itself or on a full-size television, which, let's face it, is what most shows were produced for, and how people feel comfortable watching movies. (The new iPod also plugs into a regular TV.)

Not surprisingly, the biggest proponents of portable personal video recorders are the companies that are already in the business of selling packages of shows and channels: cable and satellite providers. And these companies, unlike Apple, already have all the shows most people like to watch.

The first PocketDISH has a 30 gigabyte hard drive to store programs, matching the capacity of the new iPod. But the iPod gets its programs from iTunes, where Apple plays the toll-master; PocketDISH, which EchoStar created with a French company, Archos, in which it has a minority investment, takes its material off of any television at no additional charge.

Everyone from Microsoft to Comcast - in other words, the usual suspects - is working on or looking at similar pocket-size recorders. At least two companies, Pace Micro Technology of Britain and Samsung of South Korea, have said they plan to introduce models early next year. There is also TivoToGo, a service that can forward recorded shows to various mobile devices, even Sony PSP handheld gaming units.

Other variations on this portable theme are bubbling up in the consumer electronics and software worlds.

One California company, Sling Media, has created a device called Slingbox which forwards your cable service to any computer via a high-speed connection. Another, Orb Networks, offers software that works with a TV tuner card to forward any kind of digital media, including television programs, from your home to a computer or mobile device.

Of course, probably the biggest factor working against the instant success of a video iPod is that the video world has yet to experience the copyright-infringement meltdown that the music industry did a year or two ago, when millions of people were swapping songs free rather than buying CD's in stores.

There are no bogeymen like the original, illegal Napster or Kazaa to bring everyone to Mr. Jobs's table - at least, not yet. Rather, as more people get high-speed connections to their homes, Mr. Jobs is positioning his new device as a pre-emptive strike against pirates and file-sharers.

There is no disputing the wisdom in that, or of Apple's supremacy over just about any rival these days in introducing a device using its marketing and design prowess and brand appeal.

And there are chewy, unresolved legal questions raised by gadgets like the PocketDISH or Slingbox.

Still, the video iPod only has it half right: if it took material from the television as readily as it did from the Internet, it could be a blockbuster. But then who would pay $1.99 to download an episode of "Lost" from iTunes if the iPod could also hook up to your television and record that same episode free?

Unlike its musical forebear, the video iPod may not be ready for prime time.

[Tingkai]

Originally posted by Asher
Where do you get six?

Their online store alone has:

95 white Nanos: http://www.futureshop.ca/catalog/pro...gon=&langid=EN
66 black Nanos: http://www.futureshop.ca/catalog/pro...0066801&catid=

Compare this to either 0 or 1 in stock, depending which color Zen Micro you want...

Obviously, they got more stock.

They didn't have any of the Nano 4gb for a while, now they have 29 white, 41 black Nanos.

Meanwhile it looks like they're selling about 20 of the 2gb nanos a day.

As for the Zen Micro, could be they can't get them, or maybe they don't want to stock them because they're not selling.

They've got 5 light blue. How long will it take to sell them?

http://www.futureshop.ca/catalog/proddetail.asp?logon=&langid=EN&sku_id=0665000FS10058278&catid=

Originally posted by Asher
The fact is, Apple is crying about how the demand is staggering and outstripping supply.

They sold a million nanos in a couple of weeks so it is reasonable to assume they ran out of stock.

CT is probably lucky if they have sold a million Zen Micros in a quarter.

Originally posted by Asher
Interestingly, the above stores are more or less completely sold out of their Zen Micro stock.

Nothing odd about that at all. Stores don't stock something that is not selling.

[Asher]

I don't know how things work out there in Hong Kong, but if a store doesn't sell a product they usually don't list it on their website listed as "out of stock" or "sold out". This is usually an indicator that they do, in fact, sell those products and demand has outstripped that store's supply. Hence the origin of the term "sold out".

What a crazy region you live in.

I'm sure the Party appreciates your stance against a Taiwanese company, though.

[Atahualpa]

Oh come on, Asher, the article in the NY Times is really ****. To me it reads as if the author just don't want to follow the masses, knows little about the topic and makes some alternative suggestions to look clever and even do some hidden advertising.

It's pretty much clear that the movie industry doesn't like video recorders or any such thing as recording from the television. If you look at the new HDTV standard, it's got features that prevent you from storing the digital media stream.
And besides, let's view it that way, you carry a pocket video recorder around, you carry an mp3 player and you carry a mobile phone and maybe even an organizer. This is simply too much gadgeting.
The turning of an mp3 player into a mediaplayer is surely a good idea, but I really doubt that many people will want a portable video player. Portable video players are overrated, where would you want to use them anyway?! Musicplayers don't distort your attention from other things, so you can use them in car, while reading a paper, while working. Video players require absolute attention focus on it and when that happens I rather think they might want to have something interactive. Actually I'd think integrating a video player into something like the GameBoy is the best option - didn't Sony do that with their PSP already?
In the iPod it surely will always be a marginalizing feature.

[Asher]

It's pretty much clear that the movie industry doesn't like video recorders or any such thing as recording from the television. If you look at the new HDTV standard, it's got features that prevent you from storing the digital media stream.

What is it, C4 encryption?

I've already modded my Motorola DCT6412 to ignore the encryption flags (that Shaw doesn't send anyway yet), so I can record HDTV shows directly via gigabit ethernet, Serial ATA, USB 2.0, or Firewire.

[Atahualpa]

Great for you, but the fact that you had to mod the device, makes it already quite obvious that free recording is not intended for the casual user in the future.

Besides, I think this whole recording off the TV and viewing it with a portable device will never be more than a niche market.
When was the last time I recorded something and then watched it? I can't remember. And from other people I know as well that they rather download it from the internet (draw whole series from P2P nets) and then view it. Thus Jobs is not so wrong with his iTunes Movie Store. Ofc, I wouldn't pay his ridiculous prices, but since there are lots of people who are paying his 1 dollar per song for crappy DRM music, I think there will be those who are paying 2 dollars for a clip as well

[Tingkai]

Originally posted by Asher
I don't know how things work out there in Hong Kong, but if a store doesn't sell a product they usually don't list it on their website listed as "out of stock" or "sold out".

Standard sales technique.

By claiming an item is sold out, the store leaves the door open to the odd customers asking when they are getting more stock. If the store doesn't list a product on a website, then customers will assume the store doesn't sell it.

So stores list lots of items as "out of stock" even if it was never in stock in the first place.

Happens all the time.

Originally posted by Asher
I'm sure the Party appreciates your stance against a Taiwanese company, though.

CT is a Singapore company.