IPods

IPods are sweeping the nation. When I was a youngster growing up in Texas, the Walkman was the big thing. People no longer had to tote around their huge "boom boxes" filled with $20 worth of batteries. You could now strap your music to your belt and drown out the incessant noise pollution. Although in truth, much of the music that came out in the 1980s could be considered noise pollution. I'm only kidding. I love 80s music.

Anyway, the new advancement quickly taking the place of the Walkman and products like it is the iPod. On January 9, 2001, Apple introduced iTunes for Macintosh computers, a program that converts CDs into compressed digital audio files, organizes digital music collected works, and plays Internet radio. A few months later, Apple started developing one of the most successful products in the last ten years--the iPod.

The History of iPods

In October of 2001, Apple surprisingly announced its intention to roll out the iPod at a reasonable price of $399. Apple wasn't the first company to make digital audio players, but they were among the first to use hard disks for storage. People who owned iPods could store up to 1,000 songs. Keep in mind, this was the first of the iPods. With the newer models, owners can stores much more than that.

Few people will disagree that iPods are the best digital audio players on the market. The higher end iPods have upwards of 40GB of memory, roughly enough memory to store 8,000 songs. Music enthusiasts are literally able to store their entire music libraries on their iPods. They have access to every song they've ever enjoyed at the touch of a couple of buttons. Technology rocks!