The new iPod is great. It’s nice to see Apple at least trying out video, but allow me to explain why portable video devices, and video in general, will never be as great as audio.
It comes down to theory
Media studies theory, that is.
When we watch things on the telly, listen to the radio, walk around with our iPod, we’re consuming media.
When you watch telly, video, whatever, you’re giving it your full attention. That’s known as primary consumption.
When you listen to music, you tend to be doing other things. For example, you could me on the computer, blogging. That’s secondary consumption; when you don’t give it your full attention.
Finally you have tertiary consumption, which might include the music or television sound being in the background in a room, with you not focused on it at all.
Primary, secondary, tertiary.
Comparing media
Essentially, video is limited because you can’t consume it like audio.
Really, video can only be properly consumed by watching it fully. Of course, you can have it on in the background and zone in and out of it, but you aren’t receiving the full effect there. To get everything from video, you must be looking at it.
The case is quite different for audio. You don’t have to look at it, you don’t have to focus on it to enjoy it fully, and even if you have it on the background of a noisy room, you’re still more-or-less properly consuming it.
This is why video isn’t as great as audio when it comes to portable media. Less opportunities to consume it mean less demand for it. It doesn’t mean video is a lesser format, just that it requires more input, meaning it’s slightly crippled in this portable arena.
Although I could be wrong. What do you think?
I think that there is, at least, some merit in portable video. I think that although it does need your full attention to consume it properly, there is still a market from portable video players and buying content for it.
I can think of many occasions where it would come in handy, using it on your mate’s TV, watching the latest episode of your favourite series on the train, etc…
I do agree that there is less of market for video, but I think there is still enough for it to be profitable, and keep Apple at the forefront of technology.
There may still be thing we don’t know about the vPod…
That’s why it’s called iPod WITH video, not the iPod Video.
With the size of ipods I can’t imagine watching much video with them. A small mp3 player can produce a big sound but can’t really do more than make us squint more when it comes to video.
Video is more limited than audio.
Like Don said, iPod is still primarily a music player. Apple just added a video capability to it. Which I think was a smart move. The segment is small right now but it is important that Apple gets it’s foot in the door and eliminate the choice, for some consumers, between a dedicated portable video player and an iPod. The market will certainly grow in the future; then Apple can “spin off” a dedicated video iPod with audio capabilities, of course.
When the rumors of a video iPod first started circulating I dismissed the idea as heresy. They only people interested in portable video would be business frequent fliers, who carry a laptop most of the time. That said, the idea grew on me as I started to use my PSP to carry movies and TV shows to watch wherever I please. PSP’s wide screen although small is sufficient and can deliver good quality video (for a portable player). Actually, I think Newton will make a comeback in a few years when the market for PDA like devices (lets call them PMDs [Personal Media Device] will take off). iPod is just the beginning.
PDAs were doomed from the beginning and will eventually get squeezed out by the mobile phones that can do more and more every day (soon enough they will do your laundry). They never had a killer app. iPod is not the killer app either, it is just the natural evolution of Walkman (killer app of the 80s), Sony was just too late to get on the bandwagon and their early implementations were rather miserable. All these devices will eventually converge.
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