Apple will do a video iPod
It has been one of those urban myths, that is actually true. Despite fervent denials by Steve Jobs (nobody will take him for his word!) Apple is working on a video iPod, as per the WSJ. My Business 2.0 colleague, Paul Sloan had the complete lowdown, and had been working on this scoop ever since he wrote the big piece pondering what next for Apple, in the April 2005 issue of the magazine. WSJ hints that the video iPod is all about music videos, Sloan has more gory and exclusive details than just that.
> Steve Jobs has spoken with Disney President and soon-to-be CEO Bob Iger about ways to license various Disney content for a video iPod, according to an internal Disney email I have obtained. That could include anything from clips from ESPN and ABC News to short cartoons. (Sloan’s Scoop!)
The video iPod developments has Bill Gates doing a Charlton Heston impersonation: from my cold dead fingers.
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This is sweet – any idea on the timeframe?
Om, I love the scoops you get but I think you are really jumping the gun here. Sure, Apple is in talks to license music videos. Music videos does not begat feature films just yet. Also, if that was to be the case Apple would need to be negotiating these rights with the big studios in parallel otherwise they would have to unduely delay delivery of the for-pay content. However this still does not address the issue at hand of why even have a video iPod? It makes no sense for the form factor currently in use. The iPod has been all about size, convience, and user expereience. These are goals that congruently follow the needs of a portable audio player. They are not the needs of a portable video player! I mean, seriously, who is going to pay $XXX money for a video iPod so they can watch video on a screen the size of a small smartphone? When people watch video it happens in static environments: In a class, at the theaters, in the living room, at the ballgame. You don’t see people carrying portable Sony TV Watchmans around do you? They had 2.2″ screens on them and could watch OTA TV channels just fine and these existed back in the mid eighties. Yet the market for them is so small as to be insignificant.
Now if Apple makes a CE device for the home that could tie into a iTunes Movie Store or something of the like I’m willing to listen. But I just dont seem portable video as a real market. Every CE device trying to do it just has too many compromises to make the video experience worth the customers money and time I feel.
docwho
first of all this is not my scoop. repeat not my scoop. i am pointing to a scoop from Business 2.0 editor at large Paul Sloan. If you read the comment, it is clear they are going for short form videos. Music videos, sports clips and all. If they can make it easy and fun and simple, there is a good chance they can be successful. i agree.. watching full length movies on the small screens is pointless, but there is some form of video which can make a lot of sense on this. it is not telvision either. just shorts. that is the key difference. well we shall have to wait and watch how it evolves
Why is’t Jobs talking to his own company Pixar rather than to his rival Disney?
A little screen/little player sucks.
When the ipod photo came out I thought “gay” why would I ever really want to view photo’s on a tiny screen unless I was forced to. Much less pay extra money for a larger device. I haven’t seen a compelling reason to go get one yet.
After much thought, I think the real draw is the ability to put any of my pictures on the device and connect it to a larger TV or monitor for viewing. If the ipod video did that you could put movies, video’s, and even video pod casts! Sweet as long as the content is there.
If they launch with a bunch of free content and some pay it could catch on. If the unit is much larger and price is over $50 more than the comparable size regular unit I wont buy it, but someone will.
Size is king. I bought my first ipod based 90% on the size.
This thing will be nifty and all, from a geek tech fetish sort of standpoint, but I have to wonder…
…what the hell use will it be for anyone old enough to have a life outside of watching music videos? As noted above, it’ll be useless to watch films on, too small and underpowered to be useful for any sort of in-the-field DV watching/storing/editing, and now that broadcast is dead, won’t even be as useful as the (never very useful) Sony Watchman back in the day.
Oh, he’ll sell a bunch initially to the kind of people who bought the 1st-gen iPod Photo, but unless it has some other MAJOR selling point besides watching short form video (telephone? PDA?), it’ll fly like a (beautifully-designed) lead brick.
MSNBC reported yesterday that the itunes music store will in fact be selling music videos, keeping the itunes/hard drive/ipod transition as easy as it is now. They mentioned the videos would sell for $1.99 each, with a discount if a song is purchased at the same time.
MSNBC article:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8614723/
Sorry to post twice in a row, but i didn’t realize someone had asked about a timescale for the video ipod/video itunes, the MSNBC article speculates that this will be happening in September.
Who would buy one of these things?
That’d be me. I travel constantly and having a Video ipod would truly be a killer app for that environment.
Also do not discount the Apple/iPod effect on changing culture. Podcasting, mp3 etc, all were brought mainstream by Apple. What shifts would a video ipod bring? I don’t think we can say..
What if you have a video ipod and a digicam, how do they interact? What does this mean to the network? Would a video ipod make the Vlog a reality?
We just don’t know yet but don’t underestimate these things.
Think of it as videocasting… podcasting for video. that would work…
Think of the possibilites. Want viral marketing? Revive the concept of the original adcritic.com website that had all the funny commercials, bundle in movie trailers and give it the podcast/ITMS interface.
The success of that alone should get the industries attention….