The S.MP3 by French designer Nicolas Cinguion is an ultra-mobile portable media player, allowing its earbud’s cable to be wrapped inside of its own circular design. It looks sort of like a yo-yo, but sadly, doesn’t offer yo-yo functionality.
When will they learn??! What men really want is an MP3/yo-yo hybrid, not some impostor disguised as one.
Say what you will but some people, myself included, happen to like Coldplay. If it weren’t for us fans, why else would the band decide to give away its new live CD “Left Right Left Right Left.” You can get a CD version for free at their concerts or you can download the entire album on Coldplay’s official website. Music is great but it’s even better when it’s free.
Some of us at Gearfuse enjoy the jam band Phish. Others hate them, but no one can deny their almost cult-like status as musicians. Considering their reunion shows for 2009 sold out in minutes, Phish didn’t want to leave the rest of their fans hanging around with no jam to groove on. The band has announced plans to make digital downloads of each show available on their website for a limited time. They say the best things in life are free and this is no exception my friends. Get the MP3s while they’re still drenched in sweat and acid.
Ars Technica has a great writeup on the subject of reselling MP3s. CDs are on the way out and I can’t remember the last time I bought one (probably Vampire Weekend). The thing is, you could easily resell a CD. Take the physical media to your local CD shop, trade it in for a few bucks and that’s it.
So what about MP3s? There’s no physical disc or anything to pick up and if you resell it, what’s to stop you from copying it to an external hard drive and then unplugging it? Answer: There isn’t. Reselling MP3s is an idea that just cannot work, no matter the execution. Don’t blame me, though. Blame the DMCA.
Get ready for some news that will blow your fucking mind. Ready? CD sales are down. I know! Down? How could this be? The execs at Atlantic Records feel the same way. Seems during Q4, Atlantic Records had 51% of all sales come from non-physical sources like iTunes sales and ringtones. The New York Times found it “shocking,” so what does this mean for us? It means more and more people are transitioning to iPods and MP3s over Walkman and CDs.
NBC Universal’s Jeff Zucker sums it up nicely, calling the transition “trading analog dollars for digital pennies.” Touche.
This is about as cheap as it gets when it comes to DIYin’ your own speakers for an iPod. Designer Dmitry Zagga fashioned these together after having his credit card declined at the Apple Store. Look who’s laughing now. They’re just like the clubhouse telephones of days past, where simply attaching a string to two ends of a can fashions together a communication device unlike any other.
These speakers are just as simple to make, too. Get four paper cups. Punch holes in the back of two of them. Place them on top of the other two, linking them together with two tooth picks. Then, stick your earbuds through the holes. It’s ghetto magic!
Pacemakers are turning out to be more problematic than their original conception intended. The electronic device that runs the arterial show can not only be controlled wirelessly, but can also be deactivated by nearby MP3 headphones. Research teams are suggesting that patients wearing a pacemaker should stay more than three centimeters away from such devices as the interference from the headphones could prove fatal by temporarily deactivating the pacemaker.
Scientists are now completely re-thinking the pacemaker. The cloaking device was the first step to pacemaker-hacking prevention. Unfortunately, someone must now come up with a pacemaker not affected by the headphones. Remember to never walk through a retirement home with your new iPod.
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Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak has recently admitted that the iPod’s popularity is dwindling. It’s the nature of the beast. Just like the Sony Walkman, at first, everyone wants one. This leads to successful sales and then, they end up on display everywhere at a discounted price, which leads to no one purchasing them. The question on everyone’s mind is: what’s next for Apple?
The higher-ups at Apple leaked just a tidbit of what to possibly expect in the future. Enter the iWatch, a possible investment and future gadget from Apple that will probably act like a cellphone and MP3 player. I guess we’ll just have to wait and see what really is up Apple’s sleeve for next year.
The rumor that Amazon will be launching a music and movie store for Android-based cellphones has been confirmed by Vince. Like Vince mentions, this will make Amazon a direct competitor to Apple’s iTunes Music Store. The Apple advertisement team is probably hard at work making up some nice bashes they can throw in Amazon’s direction. I guess we’ll just have to wait and see how this one plays out.
Oh snap! Today will mostly consist of news about Google’s Android platform and the T-Mobile G1 smartphone. The latest rumor to hit our inbox involves the almighty Amazon.com and content distribution. Apparently, Amazon could be releasing a music and movie store just for Android-based cellphones. That would instantly make Amazon a direct competitor to Apple’s iTunes Music Store and we’re not talking sibling rivalry here. Right now it’s too early to tell if there’s truth to this but hopefully, come the end of the day, we’ll really know what’s up.
