The iPod is the coolest gizmo that I’ve seen in at least four years. I mean it’s incredible. Pricey? Sure. Snobby? Well yeah, since the iPod requires FireWire (rare on most PC’s) and iTunes2 which requires Mac OS 9 or higher only – the $399-$499 price tag doesn’t help any either. Elegant? You better believe it. So what make it so good? Design. No other way to describe it. IBM had a spurt of great design some time in the 90’s. Remember the butterfly keyboard? Great idea, but who could have foreseen notebook screens growing to 14″ and 15″, allowing a near full size keyboard? And the TouchPoint (or whatever they called it) – that mini-joystick in the center of a keyboard that buried the trackball but got itself buried by the touch pad common on most notebooks today.
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