I ask you. Who in the HELL is going to buy a U2 iPod?
Only the most out of it music purchaser. One who doesn't download. One who
thinks KaZaA is a theme park and when he hears mention of BitTorrent gets
scared. BELIEVE ME, you wouldn't want to be caught dead with a U2 iPod. Except
maybe before Christmas. When you can show your baby boomer and Gen-X friends,
before word gets out that you were taken, and the KIDS, who know EVERYTHING
that is hip, inform you they want NOTHING TO DO WITH IT!
Look at the U2 iPod. It looks HOKEY! Like something for Halloween. What a
wannabe metal band would come up with.
And the signatures on the back? Does Mercedes-Benz engrave the name of its
race drivers on the trunk lid? NO, because a Mercedes-Benz is YOURS! You
EARNED it. You PAID for it. You don't want ANYBODY ELSE to have a piece of it.
The U2 iPod is not much different from a Beatles lunch box. Sure, they sold
a bunch, but no SELF-RESPECTING Beatle fan bought one. For THEM, it was about
the MUSIC!
Steve Jobs has gone too far. He's blurred the brand.
The iPod WAS the coolest item on the planet. And, unlike a Mercedes-Benz,
AFFORDABLE! Even a schoolkid could save up the money for one, if he didn't nag
his parents to buy him one first.
The iPod was a MUSEUM piece. Existing in a rarefied air unto itself. Its
only mission to be the best portable music player extant. Not only that, it
essentially INVENTED the category!
Now it's fine to extend the brand. To add uncompromising features, like a
color screen for showing photos. That's COOL!
But the U2 iPod isn't cool.
Talk to the kingpins of design. It's about the sheer power of the
item/edifice. The logo is BARELY DISPLAYED! It's the CORPORATIONS that insist their
logos adorn skyscrapers, the designers HATE THIS, fight AGAINST IT! Think about
it, if a record company made the iPod, they'd put the name on the FRONT! In
BIG LETTERS! Saying that kids WANT the logo. That they're IMMUNIZED to
overhype. That they're STUPID!
But the logo on an iPod is just a small engraving on the back.
When you log on to OS X you only get a gray Apple, no lettering whatsoever.
So why have an iPod that SCREAMS brand?
When really, the iPod is a PERSONAL brand! It's a device to hold YOUR music.
Hell, there's not even enough U2 music to FILL IT!
The iPod is a TOOL! That fulfills a MISSION! It's industrial design
PERFECTION! Why drag it into the world of ******** American commerce?
Really. How many of these U2 iPods do you think Apple will sell?
As for U2. Hell, the Beatles authorized lunch boxes back in the SIXTIES!
SINCE then, acts have garnered so much POWER! To make sure they don't look
CHEESY!
But make no mistake, U2 looks cheesy.
They just want to make sure they're the biggest band in the world. That they
sell out stadiums.
Hate to tell you Bono, et al. That's purely about the MUSIC!
Even Vanilla Ice sold records. But no one's going to see him now.
Have you no dignity? Can't you stand on your work alone? Or do you HAVE to
have the free advertising of the iPod TV spots? Do you have to endorse a
bogus product like the U2 iPod?
And, as referenced above, ALL OF THIS just turns the younger generation off.
The generation that could truly keep U2 in business.
But U2 isn't thinking about their long term career, they can only see THIS
record. How can we hype THIS record. FORGET if our antics backlash against us
in the future, like all those people who can't believe they once wore leisure
suits.
U2 ain't Ashlee Simpson, but they're not far behind. They'll do almost
ANYTHING to stay famous, to earn a buck.
As for Steve Jobs...I expected more.
Then again, if you think we'll be downloading from the iTunes Music Store a
decade in the future, to a little hard-drive based device, then maybe the U2
iPod was made FOR YOU!
The iPod IS ALREADY MATURE as a music playback device. In the future,
delivery systems will be essentially instant, and you won't even WANT to store all
your tracks.
Then again, your photos are yours alone. To extend the brand/product there
is a good idea. THIS is the kind of insurance for the future one can applaud,
the kind U2 should employ, focusing on the CORE PRODUCT instead of the
penumbra, the hype.
"Gonna save all my money and buy a GTO
Get a helmet and a roll bar and I'll be ready to go
Take it out to Pomona and let 'em know
That I'm the coolest thing around
Little buddy, gonna shut you down
When I turn it on, wind it up, blow it out GTO"
Gonna save all my money, and buy an iPod.
Then I'm gonna rip all my CDs, and download P2P.
And then I'm gonna put on the white headphones and go to school, the mall,
I'm gonna be COOL!
Why do they WEAR the white headphones, when they SUCK! Because they want to
be identified with the brand.
But kids don't want to be identified with the U2/iPod brand. That's just the
old folks in a circle jerk trying to make money. Their PARENTS might fall
for this, but they won't.
Too, bad you couldn't get a U2 iPod for your birthday 
