I have an iPod, a very generous gift from my wife and children last year (shortly after my illness took a turn for the worse and I was spending a lot of time in bed.) At the time it was the top-of-the-line model, a 5th generation video model with 30 gig of storage. Totally awesome - it still is. I use it all the time.
But now Apple has the iPod touch and the iPhone. Which is all well and good, I'm all for new technology and bigger better brighter toys. I have no intention of trading in my iPod for one, but they are cool.
The problem is the software. Both old iPods and new ones, including the iPhone, depend on Apple's proprietary program known as iTunes. iTunes is what puts all the goodies on your iThingy, movies, music, games, podcasts, etc. The latest and greatest version of iTunes (which updates automatically and you really have no control over it) was built with the iPod Touch and iPhone in mind. Older iPods just kind of have to deal. They still work, but functions that older iPod adoptors found useful suddenly don't work.
The best example I've seen is regarding podcasts. I love podcasts, news, funny videos, lectures, sermons, all kinds of good stuff. Some podcasts I have subscribed to I can't keep up with and there are many back episodes. The issue is that I used to be able to tell iTunes to only put the 5 or 10 oldest episodes on my iPod so it doesn't fill up with stuff I won't get to right away. That worked great. However, the newest verion of iTunes, without warning, disabled that function and suddenly all the space on my iPod was taken up - to the point that it crashed the poor little thing and I had to restore it- manually picking and choosing which episodes of which podcasts to put back on it.
Frustrating.
Mr. Jobs. You suck. Quit building your technology for the fanboy base and remember that those who can't or don't want to upgrade still use your toys and deserve your attention too.
Peace.
