iPod: Happy Anniversary, You Little Devil

Can somebody please tell us what the hell Firewire is?

Nine years ago today - November 10, 2001 - Apple unveiled a new kind of MP3 player known as an iPod. About the size of a deck of cards, the device contained five gigabytes of memory, enough for about 1,000 songs, and cost $400. Four. Hundred. Dollars.

Initial reaction was somewhat skeptical. One technology analyst told CNET, "I question the company's ability to sell into a tight consumer market right now at the iPod's current price."

Riiiiiight. Today, most of the known world has an iPod of some kind. Rocks Off did a quick eBay search just now and found an original (or "classic") iPod for $20. iTunes, the primary software used to download music and load it onto an iPod, is the world's leading music retailer, and digital-music sales account for about 25 percent of all music sales.

To mark this momentous occasion, Rocks Off asked a few of our friends, both around the office and on Facebook, to share their thoughts on Apple's boon. Join us, won't you?

Chris Gray: I have had a somewhat bizarre relationship with the iPod. I did not get one until a friend gave me a Nano for my birthday in 2008. Then I left it in the plastic box for about three months until I decided I might need it at SXSW.

It took a day or two to figure out how to sync it up with my iTunes at work - I can be slow, especially when it comes to anything technology-related - and then another few days of hauling CDs into the office to load into iTunes, but I fell in love.

I did not go anywhere without that thing, and almost got run over a few times downtown because of it. Our affair lasted a year or so, maybe a little longer, and then ended when I switched computers at work to a laptop that does not have iTunes on it. Now there is no way for me to charge the battery.

I thought every PC came pre-loaded with iTunes these days. Guess not. Sniff.