I haven’t heard of anyone buying an iPod is years so I was surprised to discover that it is still on sale. Which is good news, because its just turned 20.
Apple released the first version of the iPod on 23 October, 2001. The seventh generation iPod Touch, released in 2019, is the current edition.
iPod was Apple’s entry into the mp3 player market. Steve Jobs gave the go ahead to his tech team to develop a user friendly music player to compete with the clunky and large digital music players on the market.
The first generation iPod had a capacity of either 5 or 10GB. The current version holds up to 250GB of data.
The iPod was a great success. After just three years Apple had over 90% of the digital music player market. However, new competition reduced that to a still impressive 70% market share by 2011. This was in part due to the iPhone since iOS 5 having a similar operating system to the iPod and it no longer being necessary to have both devices.
The iPod revolutionized music consumption. Suddenly a consumer could have their entire music collection in their pocket. Streaming services have become the dominant form of music consumption but the iPod is still hanging in there in 2021.
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