Thursday, November 23, 2006

I'm in an abusive relationship with Steve Jobs

Call me a sucker, but after my 4g iPod died (and thank you to everyone for their condolences), I’m going back for more. I ordered a 30gb 5g iPod from Amazon yesterday (£20 cheaper than the Apple shop) and it should arrive today. So, considering the disappointing lifespan of my last iPod, why am I buying another? Am I mental?

Is it the power of brand loyalty? In the case of Apple, it often feels like being hopelessly in love with an abusive partner. No matter what they do to you, you try to see their good side, make excuses for them ("Steve didn't mean to rip me off, it was that Jonathan Ive and his bleedin' form factors") and always go back in the end. But are there rational reasons for buying another iPod?

There are 4 reasons actually…

  1. Seamless synchronisation – no fiddling about with files. Maybe I’m lazy, but I like the fact that everything just…works.
  2. The closest rivals to iPod are Zen and Sony –their products in this bracket are more expensive and have less memory.
  3. Call me eccentric, but I actually prefer to buy music. iTunes is a great place to do so – and, again, it’s integrated with iPod
  4. The ipod just looks so bloody good

Mind you, if the next iPod dies after less than 2 years, I’m definitely saying goodbye to my one-sided relationship with Apple.

4 comments:

recycled android said...

I happened upon your blog from wired mag, so hello.

anyways I have been contemplating buying a ipod for at least 2 years, and I did not realize the batteries were that bad. But your reasoning is the exact reasons I would buy a ipod right now.

I even bought a minidisk player about 2 years ago that was awesome to use.
even working in a archeology lab around dust everyday. It had everything I wanted in a player, even had the seamless gap in it that ipod did not fix until this generation. Honestly I miss my minidisk player, I would buy another one but the ipods are so easy to work with. so I'm still on the fence about this one. But you are right about another thing, they are just so damn cool looking...

Tristan said...

Hello there. I've never ventured into the world of minidisc, but I remember some designers had them and swore by them. It's interesting that people who've left messages seem to define themselves by their music players - which would make you hardy, dependable and reliable? Visited your Flickr site, by the way - nice photos!

recycled android said...

thank you for the complaints, and im glad you liked the photos...

recycled android said...

i ment compliments, sorry drank a bottle of pinot and Firefox's auto spell check brought that up..