The Rise & Fall Of The iPodIn October 2001 Apple released the iPod. Its iconic scroll wheel and the slogan "1,000 songs in your pocket" were an instant hit, and within few years the world of music was changed forever.
The iPod, and other MP3 players, offered an alternative to the mostly-linear way that albums used to be listened to on CD or vinyl — and they were just so much more convenient. "1,000 songs in your pocket" was a powerful slogan that quickly became 2,000, then 4,000 and 16,000 as storage capacity expanded. The fact that most people only had a few hundred songs to fill their iPods with was irrelevant.
Nothing lasts forever in tech and this week Apple announced it was going to discontinue the product line, marking the official end of the iPod era — which at its peak saw Apple shift more than 50 million iPods every year. Indeed, before the rise of the iPhone the iPod was the company's crown jewel alongside the Mac — in 2006 the iPod was roughly 40% of Apple's revenue.
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