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It was a bit of a gimmick when it came out. It was expensive and required you to already own a late model Mac computer (iTunes was Mac only). Macs weren't as po
by eli 10y ago
It was a bit of a gimmick when it came out. It was expensive and required you to already own a late model Mac computer (iTunes was Mac only). Macs weren't as popular then so, at first, it was an expensive accessory for existing Apple fans.
- rconti 10y agoWhich, in hindsight, was probably a good way to test a market, and ensure demand didn't outstrip supply too badly at the outset.
- eli 10y agoI suppose that depends whether you believe that was part of an intentional strategy at all. In any event, it certainly wasn't apparent at the time.
- FabHK 10y agoNot sure what you mean by "gimmick". Sure, potential market was limited, as you said, in the first iterations. But for those people that had a Mac with FireWire and a solid music collection in iTunes, it was awesome.
- MagnumOpus 10y agoWhich was just about nobody outside Cupertino. It was just as lame as CmdrTaco said it was, and it didn't take off until Gen4 (mid 2004?) when it got USB syncing and charging.
- qubex 10y agoIt was Gen 3 that introduced the 30-pin Dock Connector and Windows compatibility by means of USB in April 2003. My sister still has a working unit she uses almost every day.
- hellofunk 10y agoHowever, part of its success was that Apple realized that by selling more iPods they would also, by extension, sell more Macs. This is why the iPod was advertised with one of the largest and most successful campaigns in history: Apple convinced itself that it could use the Mac's advertising budget for the iPod, because of this connection. So the iPod was really competing with an industry well beyond the iPod, and any other mp3-only technologies could not compete with this. The bet paid off big for Apple.