Why the iPod is losing its cool
Apple has added ever more extras to its digital music-player in a bid to stem falling sales. But fears are rising that the device is now too common to be cutting edge. The iPod, the digital music player beloved of everyone from Coldplay's Chris Martin to President George Bush, is in danger of losing its sheen. Sales are declining at an unprecedented rate. Industry experts talk of a 'backlash' and of the iPod 'wilting away before our eyes'. Most disastrously, Apple's signature pocket device with white earphones may simply have become too common to be cool. On Tuesday the eyes of iPod-lovers the world over will be on Steve Jobs, the co-founder and chief executive of Apple, when he seeks to allay fears that it could follow Sony's tape-playing Walkman into the recycling bin of history. Industry-watchers warn that the iPod could soon be regarded by teenage cynics as their 'parents' player' because a mass-market product rarely equates with edgy fashionability. Although it has sold nearly 60 million actual iPods and a billion downloaded songs worldwide, cracks have begun to appear in the edifice. The Zandl Group, a New York-based trends forecaster, which regularly interviews a panel of 3,000 consumers, aged 25-35, recently picked up its first significant criticisms. 'The iPod is far and away the most popular tech gadget with our panellists - however, for the first time we are hearing negative feedback about the iPod from some panellists,' said the organisation's spokeswoman, Carla Avruch. 'Panellists cite that the batteries are not replaceable, so when they die the entire player must be replaced,' she said. 'We have heard from some conspiracy theorists that the batteries are made to die soon after the warranty ends. 'Other complaints are that iTunes [Apple's online music store] is overpriced and the format is not easily transferred on to other players. In our ethnography interviews, some long-time iPod-users told us that they have stopped updating their iPods because it's too much work, while other consumers who had bought iPods more recently had not even taken theirs out of the package to set it up.' She added that the iPod is in danger of becoming a victim of its own success: 'Some backlash is against the ubiquity of the iPod - everyone has those white headphones on the train.' Analysts warn that the iPod has passed its peak. From its launch five years ago its sales graph showed a consistent upward curve, culminating in a period around last Christmas that saw a record 14 million sold. But sales fell to 8.5 million in the following quarter, and down to 8.1 million in the most recent three-month period. Wall Street is reportedly starting to worry that the bubble will burst. He cited new mobile phones with improved MP3 players as the cause of the iPod's decreasing appeal. 'In 2005 all the big phone manufacturers released phones that play music. Phones are outselling dedicated MP3 players by six to one. Apple had the market for MP3, but they lost it.' Ahonen, author of Communities Dominate Brands, predict that in the long term the iPod will have only a narrow audience. 'It will continue to dominate a niche at the top end: if you're a musician or a DJ you'll use it because it's the best, like a photographer with his Nikon camera. But the average mobile phone user gets a new handset every 18 months, and a quarter of mobile phones sold this year will have an MP3 player. In the same way as camera phones have pushed cameras to one side, this is an automatic replacement.' Apple is famously tight-lipped about plans, but its invitations to Tuesday's event show an Apple logo in front of crossed searchlights and the slogan 'It's Showtime'. Sources in Hollywood, where Jobs sits on the board of Walt Disney, suggest Apple has been trying to secure deals to sell films through iTunes for around £8 each. Apple added video downloads of television shows such as Lost and sporting events to its iTunes service last October. James Beechinor-Collins, editor-in-chief of T3 consumer gadgets magazine, added: 'It's cool across the board: everyone from my seven-year-old niece to my 60-year-old uncle has one. But as the leader Apple needs to keep innovating, not resting on its laurels. We haven't seen a new product for a year, so Tuesday's announcement had better be bloody good.'
Questions J
1)
a) Last Christmas how many ipods were sold?
b) What colour are the ipod headphones?
2) What are the main factors of why the ipod its loosing its cool?
3) What features could apple add to the ipod to make it more popular again?
4) Do you believe that the fall or rise of the ipod will or won’t benefit other media industries?
GOOD LUCK AND HAVE FUN!!!!!!
