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Actually there are no alternatives to the Macintosh right now, and the world seems to be waking up to this.

Vindication rules, esp. when it's something that will make the world better!

Better late than never.

I agree. Just think about all thoes people in the uk waiting for cash. If the world had already woke up to Apple these would be out shoping right now. LONG LIVE THE MAC, LONG LIVE APPLE!

Now if they can get a Japanese ITMS up you will really see a blow out.

above all this underscores sony's arrogance in the market. The Playstation beat the crap out of the lame N64.. and Xbox hasn't yet built up the library to compete (give it time) but Sony has been soooo slow to react here.. Reminds me of IBM back in the 80's..

Come on.. They're trotting out the sales figures of the WALKMAN from like the past 30 years? The iPod's been out for like 3 years.. of which half that has been in obscurity..

Sony gets no respect and should be heralded as the most overrated Electronics company out there...

BUT most of what they do really kicks ass.. TV's, Camcorders, etc.. I don't want to take any of that away from them.. really.. I can't believe they were so stupid with the MP3 player issue (until i remember Sony Music and Sony Pictures..)

Sony has done it to themselves.. They'll claim the PSP is gonna threaten the iPod (by copying it at every turn) but it's really not.. the PSP does too many things to beat the iPod at what it does best, music.

The Japanese iTMS is supposed to be open for business March 2005. Only a few more months! The Apple Store in Ginza is always packed. The whole first floor is dedicated to the iPod and its' accessories. Go Apple!

SONY is not late, SONY is never.

Maybe Jobs can just make them out in his rear view mirror?

Why does Sony have to catch up ? Sony is king of the game console market, isn't that enough. Everyone should spend time and energy perfecting what they're good at. Not making a half assed attempt at something just to compete. Remember, you may lose if you compete.

It's the times, they are a changing...

Interesting how SONY proudly tells everyone about how many Walkmans they sold...

Shame they DIDNT INVENT THE WALKMAN!!!

A German guy successfully sued SONY earlier this year after 10 years in court - HE invented the Walkman and got $50 million from SONY to prove it!

LOL - makes me laugh how SONY built their whole company on a device they never even invented!

Just like Microsoft!!

Who are these fools running my company?

The ironic thing is Jobs approached the Chairman of Sony before the iTunes stores opened and offered a partnership.

Sony turned them down.

Not only did they not show up to the party, they turned down an invitation from the host himself.

And that, above all, shows how stupid Sony is. (That, and maybe not including the ability to play MP3 files in their big "iPod Killer." That was beyond moronic.)

i don't own much sony stuff... but they are excellent at what they do. They make some of the best phones... Sony Ericcson rock... and they offer excellent designed products. Their stuff is cutting edge, and like Apple, like doing things proprietary... which is probably why jobs admires Sony so much. They are in a MUCH bigger field than Apple, in reality, Apple only does a few things well. Apple may be a beautiful tree... but Sony's an Orchard.

If you look at the range of products that Sony creates, instead of focusing on the small niche products like ipod (i personally have never had use for a portable CD player, or walkman, so i would never "Need" an ipod.) Sony does quite well.

Sony should discontinue their music download site and re-brand an iPod. The Walkman is ancient history and I wonder why they associate their hard drive-based music players with it. Whatever deal was offered to them by Apple should have been accepted. Now they are wasting money trying to establish a non-existent user-base for their ATRAC players.

Apple didnt invent the iPod either - someone else did.

Solar Flare - just to back you up :

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/06/01/walkman_patent_case/

>>"BUT most of what they do really kicks ass"

>>"i don't own much sony stuff... but they are excellent at what they do."

Actually, Sony has been slipping for a while. I'm a video repair tech, and I've been working on Sony equipment for a long time. There's only so much one should expect of any consumer grade device, but when the professional/industrial line of products start looking cheap...

Sony is NOT the best at what they do. There was a time when everything they made was excellent. Nowadays the thought of servicing Sony equipment makes me cringe. "What kind of cheap, rivetted-on corner-cutting am I going to find now that will make my life miserable?"

Sony very recently sponsored a series of music programmes on the UKs Channel 4 TV station. At each ad-break they ran a short 'promo' showing a long stream of the many various models of their portable music players. The message they wanted to get across seemed to be that of a 'vast choice' 'established' and (of course) a reminder of the 'Walkman' heritage. It failed. I was left with the impression of a confusing array of familiarly bland-looking devices with nothing 'iconic' leaping out as a point of focus. How unlike the original Walkman - remember those cool ads with the cassette case completely obscuring the player with just the headphones showing - and how unlike the successful iPod branding. With stuff like this, it seems Sony WANT to show themselves as one of the many 'also-rans'.

to the guy who has never had a need for a CD player..?

what the fuck is your excuse for not listening to CD's!?!?

And to Ken..

Seriously man.. be very very careful about that statement.. the PS2 is kicking ass, yes.. but Sony may not necessarily be making a ton of money on it.. their stock isn't doin' so hot, so yes, they should be concerned with stuff other than the ps2...

As far as 'focusing on what they're good on'.. well it's a little late for that.. the PS2 wouldn't exist if they stuck to.. er.. tape players and televisions 20 years ago..

And because Sony knows nothing about software (n-o-t-h-i-n-g) it's not making as much money as it could from the PS2 (which is supposedly a pain to program for)... like Nintendo whose software sells millions..

Mike, you silly arse, he said 'portable CD player.

And what if the guy was deaf ? Might that not be a legitimate 'fucking' excuse ?

retro cat:
"The ironic thing is Jobs approached the Chairman of Sony before the iTunes stores opened and offered a partnership."

I've heard this rumor too. And thing of it is, it's a *rumor*. Not that I don't like speculation, I've done a fair bit of it myself, but don't quote rumors as fact unless you have a reliable inside source on this one retro, or can sling me a link from an article (not including rumor sites), then this story is just rumormongering. Not that I don't think Sony is dumb enough for this story to be true...

Benn:
"Apple didnt invent the iPod either - someone else did."

***BZZZZZZZZT*** WRONG.

Someone came to Apple with the idea for a portable (hard drive based) music player, but that was *not* the iPod. The iPod is about the interface, including the scroll wheel (invented by Phil Schiller and patented recently by Apple), as well as the menu structure (Steve's idea). Apple very much invented the iPod, as we know it today.

On top of that Apple had been working on iTunes, and the iPod is inseparable from how it works in conjunction with this program as well. Further, the sales for iPods really did not start taking off until Apple opened its music store.

The iPod is not just a portable music player based on a hard drive, it's *far* more than that.

Hey Twilight moon - somebody coming to Apple with the idea for the iPod means that Apple did not invent it in my book. The bits you are talking about that WERE invented by Apple like the scroll wheel, etc. were adons to the basic idea - an idea that did not come from Apple but from outside.

At least be honest in your argument. Sure Apple polished that idea and produced what we now see today - but to say that they came up with the idea in the first place is just spinning it a bit too far.

Is that you Aki? Come back and fix your company. It's easy ... start by cutting some heads off....

This post is brought to you by the magic word "since" -- not to be confused by the similar sounding but meaningless word "sins."

Bennn.. that's so annoying.. who's added more value to the iPod brand.. 'some guy who came to them with an idea for a music player' or the Apple guys who've patented and perfected, as well as marketed their asses off...

An idea is nothing.. ideas come and go.. the one who does something with it and creates something great deserves the credit.. a music player is not a novel idea..how much royalties you think 'some guy' is getting.. what crap

"Actually there are no alternatives to the Macintosh right now, and the world seems to be waking up to this."

This is a bit strong, Mike. Comments like this do little to attract mac-curious as they are beginning to break free from the predominant - and false - attitude that "there is no alternative to Windows."

Once they've switched then many will indeed agree with your sentiments. But only after they've become accustomed to OS X.

thanks hywel... although I am not deaf, it would appear that Mike is selectively blind.

I've only ever owned one portable disc player... but didn't use it as my car had a CD player, and so does my home and I don't need a portable between the two... therefore, altho I would probably use the ipod more, it seems an unecessary complication to me.

Bennn:
"Hey Twilight moon - somebody coming to Apple with the idea for the iPod means that Apple did not invent it in my book.

At least be honest in your argument (...) to say that they came up with the idea in the first place is just spinning it a bit too far."

Woah!! Where do I begin here??

"Someone came to Apple with the idea..." C'mon you'd be hard pressed to find a company with more people coming up with new ideas for what they should do next than Apple. Just because someone came up with the idea for a portable digital music player and pitched it to a few people (including Creative) and Apple ran with the idea means that person deserves credit for "inventing" the iPod??

No. Sorry.

That person did not "invent":
1. the portable digital music player (it already existed)
2. hard drive based portable digital music players (they already existed, more than one model in fact, including one from archos, and the nomad something or other).
3. the hard drive that went into the original iPod, that came from Hitachi.
4. the interface (operating system by Pixo) the menu structure, the scroll wheel...
5. the firewire interface that made transferring large amounts of digital data practical (10 minutes instead of an hour). Apple invented firewire.
6. the "look and feel" of the player, that was Apple design team.
7. the internal electronics, that was farmed out by Apple to a special design team.
8. Battery, screen, ports... literally *anything* that makes up the internals of the player.
9. iTunes was created by Apple with help by programmer from SoundJam...

But other than that he invented the iPod, and you're right, all Apple did was "polish up" someone elses idea...

:-\

Seems like a lot of folks around here cant stand to hear the truth about Apple sometimes. The didnt invent the iPod and they didnt ivent the GUI - yes, they are an innovative company and no doubt pushed the iPod forward fare more than its creator had in mind, but when an idea is someone elses - like the iPod and the GUI then at least have the honesty to acknowledge it.

Apple has made that product a complete whole, something that no doubt Sony et. al. would have failed at doing looking at the current state of play, but the fact remmains - it is not Apples invention, any more than the mouse was.

Hey twilightmoon:

"The iPod was almost not released by Apple. The products creator, Tony Fadell, had shopped the idea to Phillips and RealNetworks before proposing the idea to Apple. Fadell found a welcoming enviroment at Apple, who agreed almost immediately to produce and market the device."

Source: http://mlagazine.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=128&mode=thread&order=0&thold=0

Notice it says, the products "creator, Tony Fadell" and not Apple ....

And the article goes on to say that "Apple did not develop the operating system or MP3 player software." So there goes you whole Apple invented argument out of the window. In fact wasnt iTunes also someone elses product to start with?

When you have Steve's veto-power -- exercised as ruthlessly as only he does -- everything your company makes is your baby.

Benn, I'm with twilightmoon on this one. It depends on how fine we want to split hairs on what "invent" means. Apple didn't invent the hard-drive based "mp3" player, but like so many other things they do they darn near perfected it. Apple didn't develop the operating system for iPod, that's true, but my reliable music industry source tells me that they specified how it would work and outsourced development.

"In fact wasnt iTunes also someone elses product to start with?"

In fact, SoundJam was created by an Apple employee in his spare time. I suspect he was well compensated.

Benn..

Apple invented the iPod. Period. Someone came to them with the idea for a "hard drive based music player." Big deal, I've already demonstrated that those already existed. The iPod is more than that.

Apple invented the modern GUI. It's true that they got some of their ideas from PARC, but those were all concepts, and not a full fledged operating system. And lets not forget how much the GUI has evolved from the early Mac OS. Since MS ripped off Apple and created Windows, there has been a lot of back and forth between the two, but Apple remains the most intuitive full fledged GUI around right now.

I never said Apple invented iTunes, and the creator of SoundJam based his idea around WinAmp for the PC. So even he can't take credit, Apple did create a very clever system to navigate your music files in iTunes however, they even hold some interface patents. So Apple can claim partial credit here too. I know what I'm talking about here, because I owned and used SoundJam before apple created iTunes. Apple improved iTunes past SoundJam in enough important ways that I switched pretty much immediately (tho there were things in SoundJam that took a long time to make it to iTunes).

I'm not "afraid" of someone saying Apple didn't create something when they did not. I give them no credit for hard drives, even SCSI was invented by someone else, and modems were not Apple inventions... I'm only giving them credit for things that they transformed beyond what other people thought of, or entiredly created themselves: the iPod, the GUI, and iTunes.

twilightmoon,

I'm with you. It's the wheel and the menu that make the iPod (along with iTunes integration).

Edison didn't "invent" the light bulb. But he gets the credit because he is the one who developed it, turning it into what we recognize today.

Apple didn't invent portable players, but they sure did the work to make iPod what it is now.

Nothing else is an iPod, just like nothing else is a Mac.

The evidence is right there in the sales numbers. iPod still holds about 70% market share, right? And this with every other electronics firm gunning for them and almost every media outlet proclaiming each new pretender an "iPod killer".

The iPod did not spring forth whole from the brow of Mr. Fadell, though he may have had an idea, it was not what we now call the iPod.

Whatever the starting point Apple deserves credit for inventing the iPod, at least as much as Thomas Edison for inventing the light bulb, if not more.

And as for the mac GUI...

The people who created it have said in their own words that while Xerox utilized a graphical interface concept, it bared little similarity to the GUI on the Mac.

Many of people who worked on the Mac team early on had also spent time at PARC, cross pollination was inevitable. For anyone not familiar with the history, try poking around at folklore.org.

~M

Mozfan,

I should have said that while Apple did not invent the GUI, they invented the GUI OS. PARC had a lot of concepts they build upon, but PARC had no fully developed GUI OS.