Looks like the Karma is doomed!

Yes.... it holds too much(!)

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/3652487.stm

Yes I saw this page also, albeit it seems to be a rip-off of a news page from a USA site.

It goes to prove that the big money is in the smaller 4Gb players.

Good thing Nitrus and Eigen exist....

-Zeke

Whew. Was scared for a moment, there..
Me.

While I am a huge fan of the Beeb in general, I think that one of their tech writers or editors is taking backhanders from Apple. Search news.bbc.co.uk for iPod and you'll find a 'news' story nearly every week since last December (as opposed to once every 5-12 weeks before). Very rarely do they seem to contain any real news - they appear to exist mainly to keep the iPod and iPod Mini in the news. It seems that every time Apple iterates their product line or states their quaterly earnings another story appears. Yet not a whisper about the Karma.

If my experience is any indication, this "survey" is flawed. I had very few, if any, songs on my PC before I bought a Karma. I just never had occasion to listen to music on my PC. Once I got the Karma, I encoded all of my CDs and since have started buying CDs and online music, and have quickly blown past the point where 4GB would be "enough". In other words, I think just asking people how many songs they have on their PC and then asking them what they think is important BEFORE they buy a DAP does not even begin to address how these things are actually used...

Good point. I had the same experience, as long as you replace "Karma" with "empeg". IMO, dealing with music on the PC is an annoying experience whereas it isn't on a player specifically designed for it.

That article says their survey revealed 49% of the people asked care about "he ability to connect it up to a PC." I've got to ask how the other people are planning on getting music onto their portables.

The music industry probably want MP3 players to have the content permanently stored inside. You want new content then you need to buy a new player

That's right! You'll go into Wherehouse/Best Buy/Tower Records and buy a memory card instead of a CD!

I've seen articles that say that digital players have actually brought the "return of the adult music listener." Lots of people, like me, who don't want to go to a music store and wade through Britney Spears CDs/posters/DVDs, but who do like music and have money to spend.

Or how about, "if you want to download music, you have to have your player connected because it will be saved directly to the player and never on the PC"? For some reason, I could see them trying to do this. The player would have copy protection built in of course.

Absolutely. Yet another recent article about MP3 players in general refers to the iPod as if nothing else exists. Makes me wonder if the news team are all using Macs and/or Apple lovers (or the backhander theory).

In my experience, newsrooms have almost as great a percentage of Macs as graphic artists have. So there may be something to that.

Absolutely. Yet another recent article about MP3 players in general refers to the iPod as if nothing else exists. Makes me wonder if the news team are all using Macs and/or Apple lovers (or the backhander theory).

Yes, you'd think that the ubiquitous Rio Karma advertising, as compared to the comparatively scarce and low-key Apple Ipod advertising, would have had some effect on relative public awareness of the two products. Not.

Peter

But in terms of market share iPod is something around 20-30% (IIRC). I'm talking more in terms of a public sponsored newsbody reporting the news correctly, rather than further acting to amplify Apple sales (in what is IMO a far technically inferor player anyway).

If you read any news article talking about a subject you have good knowledge of, I'm sure you'll find wild inaccuracies simply because these people are journalists, not experts at whatever field they're talking about. I would expect nothing different in the MP3 player articles.

Hell, iPod might even become a generic term like Coke, if it hasn't already, to recall another thread.

It doesn't mean it should be accepted though. I gave feedback to the Beeb about it, as this isn't just the odd article.

Perhaps the more that complain the more chance of it being rectified.

I've heard a friend say "I got an iPod for my birthday. It's not an Apple one though'.

It was actually a Creative flash player.

Wow. Not even a hard drive. I suppose that the non-computer masses really never heard of MP3 until the iPod.

Amongst my circle of friends, acquaintances and colleagues, only one has an iPod, a fair few have solid state usbkey type players, and they all want an empeg/riocar, so I am pushing them to go for a Karma if they want an iPod type device or to pick up an empeg if they want their car audio to be as cool as mine
The techies love it, 'cos it's very techy. The pop lovers like the fact it has everything on it. The family folks love the wendy filters.

Empeg should be the generic term for the standard-setting mp3 player. (like Hoover was, but Dyson is becoming)

like Hoover was, but Dyson is becoming

Or as the BBC website put it, every sort of hoover is a hoover, except a Dyson which is a Dyson.

Peter

I still think we are some way from people saying "I'm going to do some Dysoning tomorrow".

In reply to:

---

I still think we are some way from people saying "I'm going to do some Dysoning tomorrow".

---

Yep. One hoovers with a vacuum and vacuums with a Dyson!

Nick.

One hoovers with a vacuum and vacuums with a Dyson!

Unless one's Dyson is a washing machine

Unless one's Dyson is a washing machine

In which case one has very deep pockets and an interesting taste in interior decor



$2000...

Ah, man! I wish I didn't already have a plain, white, front-loading Whirlpool ($535 on sale); I'd be all over that purple monstrosity!

I don't think they sell 'em in the US, unfortunately.

They do sell paint, though. Who said your appliances had to stay white...

But if I painted a Whirlpool purple, wouldn't that be like putting a "Flying Lady" on the front of a Cadillac Eldorado?

I have the perfect reply, but it is (oh my!) almost 14 years old! Scary!!!

---------

Go ahead, dominate your pristine PC. (humor) (Micro Mephisto) (column)
Jillette, Penn
PC-Computing Pagination: v3 n11 p372(1)
Publication date: Nov, 1990
===> Copyright Notice: COPYRIGHT Ziff-Davis Publishing Co. 1990

FULL TEXT OF ARTICLE:

Still sitting there with your bland, beige box? Trash the sucker and make it your own. By Penn Jillette

I DON'T KNOW how you got your computer. Maybe YOU went to some Store and bought retail like a fool. You might have sent away to some mail-order-we-don't-charge-you-tax-and-we-never-want-to-hear-from-you-again P.O. box. Maybe your crazy roommate vanished in the night, leaving behind a Tracy Chapman CD, a rented Police Academy 3 video and a hot computer.

No matter. You'll never sell it. Why the heck would you? Six month. after you bought it, it wasn't worth spit. You'd have an easier time unloading your used 8-track and beta tapes.

So tell me, why the hell is that thing still beige? And if it's sleek, high-tech black ... well, they saw you coming.

I'll tell you why. You're a coward. You're afraid if you mess with it, someone is going to yell at you. That's just wrong thinking, because no one gives a damn. Other people have their own problems. You could erase your entire hard disk while showing off for a cute babe, and no one would even blink. Now that gives you a great deal of freedom.

So make that computer yours. Make it belong to you. Make it look right to you. Dominate it. Rule it. Violate it. Possess it. Trash the sucker.

I'm not going to tell you exactly how to do that. I've already stuck my nose too far into your business. I don't care if you put backstage Stickers to Lou Reed and the Red Hot Chili Peppers on your PC. You could peel the warning sticker off your 2 Live Crew CD, decoupage it right above the screen and change your prompt to (C:) Oh, me so horny>." Or be Practical. Take a Sharpie and write "Just Kidding" right above the F3 key and "where the Hell Am I?" above F1.

When you think about personalizing Your PC, think about motorcycles. That's right. Motorcycles.

Sure, your computer has its risky side. It's going to ruin your eyes or give you that disease in your wrists you thought hypochondriacal Californians just made up. But listen: You screw up on a computer, you end up using a Panasonic word processor for the rest of your life. Screw up on a motorcycle, and you become part of America's highway system.

Still, motorcycles are cooler than PCs not just because they're dangerous (removing asbestos is dangerous, but considered cool only in limited circles), What have motorcycles got that computers haven't got? Airbrush. That's right, airbrush, You've seen motorcycle gas tanks. They have skulls, breasts and bulging biceps (sometimes on the Same creature). They also have lots of bright colors that attract the kind of people you want to meet, like a broken mirror attracts mynah birds.

Rationalize all you want. Tell me you can't have naked people airbrushed on your computer because the paint fumes will seep into the disk drive and screw up its innards. Do you really think for a moment that your computer is more delicate than a motorcycle?

I'll tell you this: If you can dominate the way the thing looks, you can dominate the way it behaves. And if you can dominate the way it behaves ... well, that's when things really get fun. How fun? Stay tuned to this page.

But if you paint your computer like the back of one of those jeans jackets that say "New York", "Memphis" or "Los Angeles" with little shiny pieces of mirror glued on and lots of happy blue, I'll find you and kill you.

Penn "Born to Word Process " Jillette is the taller half of the comedy-magic duo, Penn & Teller.

But what they DO now sell in the US is the Dyson DC11! Finally a non-upright from Dyson in North America. I've held off for almost two years from buying a real vacuum cleaner, much to my girlfriend's dismay (I have a nice dustbuster and a very nice shop vac). But now's the time for the Dyson. I can stop thinking about having someone convert a Japanese model, etc.

Woohoo. I wouldn't have found this out yesterday if I hadn't been reading this thread and decided to peek over at the Dyson US site.

Ok, thread hijacking over.

Bruno

I want to buy this!!!

I want to buy this!!!

Nah, I'm waiting for this model.