New iPod Shuffles, That Talk!

Jeffrey Kabbe — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 16:12:57 +0000

Apple released new iPod Shuffles today. They’re tiny. And they also talk. I admit that I was wrong about whether Apple would implement such a feature.

Apple sidestepped the need to add hardware (other than a button) to the shuffle by generating the voiceover on your Mac (one of those, *smack head*, “I should have thought of that” moments). I still can’t see the benefit of speaking the song name. Maybe other people just aren’t as into their music as I am. On the other hand, if you’re going to add playlists and speak the playlist name, you might as well go all the way.

I can name that tune in…

Jeffrey Kabbe — Sun, 01 Mar 2009 03:51:41 +0000

John Gruber over at Daring Fireball wrote a piece today asking for text-to-speech capability on the iPod Shuffle. John’s usually pretty insightful, but I have to disagree with him today. For most avid music listeners, I think this would work better in theory than in practice. Reading the artist and song name would take at least 3 or 4 seconds. In that time, I could have been listening to the song and probably have identified which song it was. Text-to speech is needed on the Nano because the Nano has text menus. The Shuffle is an entirely different animal. And Apple isn’t likely to “improve” that animal with a feature that adds cost and which most people will want to turn off anyway.

ps. I tried desperately to find a way to make this law-related, but I just couldn’t. I’m sorry, and I apologize for the distraction!

Apple Briefs » Media

New iPod Shuffles, That Talk!

I can name that tune in…