I’m Still Convinced the iPod Was the Perfect Gadget

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I’m Still Convinced the iPod Was the Perfect Gadget

我依然坚信 iPod 是完美的电子产品。

I remember the birth of the iPod, 25 years ago this month. I was working at Newsweek. It was October 23, little more than a month after the attacks on the twin towers of the World Trade Center, and everybody was focused on the aftermath. I didn’t go to Cupertino for the launch, where Steve Jobs pulled the gadget from his jeans pocket and boasted that it contained a whole music library. Apple couriers hand-delivered the device to me in New York, and Jobs got on the phone with me. “iPod,” he told me, “will be a landmark product.”

我记得 25 年前的这个月，iPod 诞生了。当时我在《新闻周刊》工作。那是 10 月 23 日，距离世界贸易中心双子塔遇袭仅过去一个多月，所有人的注意力都集中在灾后重建上。我没有去库比蒂诺参加发布会，在那里，史蒂夫·乔布斯从牛仔裤口袋里掏出这个小玩意儿，吹嘘它能装下整个音乐库。苹果公司的快递员将设备送到我在纽约的住处，乔布斯还亲自给我打了电话。他告诉我：“iPod 将是一款里程碑式的产品。”

He was right. By 2004, I was writing a cover story called “iPod Nation,” and later I published a book about the iPod called The Perfect Thing.

他是对的。到 2004 年，我写了一篇名为《iPod 国度》的封面故事，后来我还出版了一本关于 iPod 的书，名为《完美之物》。

The death of the iPod wasn’t as memorable. It’s not even clear when it happened. Officially, one might date the time of death as occurring on May 10, 2022, when Apple discontinued the iPod Touch, the last product to use that name. But I never considered the Touch a real iPod; it was simply an iPhone without cellular connectivity. Maybe the appropriate death call might have been July 27, 2017, when Apple killed the Nano—the last traditional iPod with a screen—and the iPod Shuffle, a postage-stamp-sized player that clipped to your shirt. (Apple had quietly discontinued the classic iPod, with a hard drive and click wheel, in 2014.)

iPod 的消亡并没有那么令人难忘。甚至连它具体是何时发生的都不清楚。从官方角度看，其死亡时间可以追溯到 2022 年 5 月 10 日，当时苹果停产了最后一款使用该名称的产品——iPod Touch。但我从未认为 Touch 是真正的 iPod；它不过是一部没有蜂窝网络连接功能的 iPhone。或许更合适的“死亡日期”应该是 2017 年 7 月 27 日，当时苹果砍掉了 Nano（最后一款带屏幕的传统 iPod）和 Shuffle（一款像邮票大小、可以夹在衬衫上的播放器）。（苹果早在 2014 年就悄悄停产了带有硬盘和点击轮的经典款 iPod。）

All these final dates were an inevitable consequence of what Steve Jobs put in motion on January 11, 2007. That’s when he announced three new products—a phone, an internet device, and “the best iPod ever,” all integrated into a new thing called the iPhone. From that moment on, the iPod as a separate device was living on borrowed time.

所有这些终结日期，都是史蒂夫·乔布斯在 2007 年 1 月 11 日所作所为的必然结果。那天，他发布了三款新产品——一部手机、一台互联网设备，以及“有史以来最好的 iPod”，并将它们整合进了一个名为 iPhone 的新事物中。从那一刻起，作为独立设备的 iPod 就进入了倒计时。

Still, for years, Apple sold millions more of the beloved devices before the iPod went silent. But even as we love our smartphones, the iPod scratched an itch that still lingers, and I’m sticking to my claim that the iPod was The Perfect Thing. It was a one-function device that superbly executed its function. It made people unconditionally happy. In contrast, our relationships with our iPhones (and Android phones) are more complicated. Yes, the device that superseded the iPod is galaxies more impactful than its predecessor. Financially, of course, it is the engine of a $4 trillion company. I can’t imagine any other contender for the mantle of best product of the century.

尽管如此，在 iPod 彻底沉寂之前，苹果又卖出了数百万台这种备受喜爱的设备。但即便我们热爱智能手机，iPod 依然满足了一种至今仍挥之不去的需求，我坚持认为 iPod 就是“完美之物”。它是一款功能单一但执行得极其出色的设备。它能让人感到纯粹的快乐。相比之下，我们与 iPhone（以及安卓手机）的关系则复杂得多。诚然，取代 iPod 的设备在影响力上远超其前辈。从财务角度看，它无疑是一家 4 万亿美元公司的引擎。我无法想象还有什么产品能竞争“世纪最佳产品”的称号。

But I would not call the iPhone perfect. It gobbles our attention, sometimes with toxic social media apps. Countless cars have been totaled because drivers were more interested in its touch screen than what was happening on the other side of the windshield. iPhone doomscrolling can result in depression. Whereas that perky iPod brought nothing but joy.

但我不会称 iPhone 为完美。它吞噬了我们的注意力，有时还伴随着有毒的社交媒体应用。无数汽车因驾驶员更关注触摸屏而非挡风玻璃外的情况而报废。在 iPhone 上无休止地刷屏会导致抑郁。而那个活泼的 iPod 除了快乐什么都没带来。

Adding to the excitement was Steve Jobs’ willingness to redesign the iPod every year. Apple could have maintained its original iPod for a long spell, but almost immediately the company began a series of significant reinventions. Every cycle yielded an iPod with a different size and shape. With each iteration, the iPod seemed to grow smaller and cooler. First came the mini, then came multiple variations of nanos and shuffles in crazy colors and configurations. iPhone updates have kept people buying, but without the fun of a total reshaping of the product.

史蒂夫·乔布斯每年都愿意重新设计 iPod，这更增添了人们的兴奋感。苹果本可以让最初的 iPod 维持很长一段时间，但公司几乎立即就开始了一系列重大的重塑。每一个周期都会产生不同尺寸和形状的 iPod。随着每一次迭代，iPod 似乎变得越来越小、越来越酷。先是 mini，然后是各种颜色和配置疯狂的 nano 和 shuffle。iPhone 的更新虽然让人们持续购买，但却失去了彻底重塑产品所带来的乐趣。

Is there an alternate universe where Apple continued making the iPod as a dedicated digital music player? I called Tony Fadell to discuss. Fadell is often referred to as the father of the iPod; he headed its hardware team and delivered the product in an amazing sprint of less than a year. He later was deeply involved in developing the iPhone, and his post-Apple career includes cofounding Nest, becoming a successful tech investor, and writing a well-received book.

是否存在一个平行宇宙，苹果继续将 iPod 作为专用的数字音乐播放器生产？我打电话给托尼·法德尔讨论这个问题。法德尔常被称为“iPod 之父”；他领导了硬件团队，并在不到一年的惊人冲刺中交付了产品。后来他深度参与了 iPhone 的开发，离开苹果后的职业生涯包括联合创立 Nest、成为成功的科技投资者，并撰写了一本广受好评的书。

Fadell resigned from Apple in 2008 and consulted for two years after that, when Apple was still supporting the iPod. But he recalls Jobs and other execs agreeing that the device was on a course to oblivion, despite being a great product with an enthusiastic user base. With the iPhone proving to be a monster success that also helped boost the Macintosh, and Apple pursuing potentially mass-market innovations like the iPad, iPod sales were becoming less relevant to the company’s bottom line. Jobs was a relentless prioritizer, and his successor Tim Cook felt the same way.

法德尔于 2008 年从苹果辞职，并在之后担任了两年顾问，当时苹果仍在支持 iPod。但他回忆说，乔布斯和其他高管都认为该设备注定会被遗忘，尽管它是一款拥有热心用户群的伟大产品。随着 iPhone 取得巨大成功并带动了 Macintosh 的销量，加之苹果正在追求 iPad 等具有大众市场潜力的创新，iPod 的销量对公司利润的影响变得越来越小。乔布斯是一个无情的优先事项制定者，他的继任者蒂姆·库克也有同感。

Fadell says that there was very little hand-wringing about the iPod’s fate. “The discussion was about Apple [not] doing lower-value things,” he says. Yet he agrees with me that the iPod’s disappearance created a hole that hasn’t been filled.

法德尔说，关于 iPod 的命运，几乎没有什么纠结。“讨论的重点是苹果（不）去做价值较低的事情，”他说。但他同意我的观点，即 iPod 的消失留下了一个至今未被填补的空白。

In retrospect, he says, what made the iPod invaluable is what it didn’t do—connect with the internet. “Because the iPod wasn’t connected, you didn’t have all these other things going on to distract you. Today, you get all the annoyance of being connected without being able to get the same listening experience. You can always be distracted and go somewhere else.” “This thing should still exist,” he says.

回想起来，他说，iPod 的无价之处在于它“不做什么”——即不连接互联网。“因为 iPod 没有联网，你不会被其他所有事情分散注意力。今天，你承受着联网带来的所有烦恼，却无法获得同样的聆听体验。你总是会被干扰，转而去处理别的事情。”“这个东西本应该继续存在，”他说。

A lot of people seem to agree. There are multiple active communities on Facebook and Reddit of refuseniks who go to great lengths to mod old iPods—putting in large flash drives, installing Bluetooth. There’s even an app that makes your iPhone look and play like an iPod Classic. It works great, but you’re still one swipe away from your feeds, your mail, and everything else in your life that isn’t as fun as music.

很多人似乎都同意这一点。在 Facebook 和 Reddit 上有多个活跃的社区，聚集着那些拒绝妥协的人，他们不遗余力地改装旧 iPod——装入大容量闪存盘、安装蓝牙。甚至还有一款应用能让你的 iPhone 看起来和用起来都像 iPod Classic。它运行得很好，但你依然只需轻轻一滑，就会回到你的信息流、邮件以及生活中所有不如音乐有趣的事情中去。

I ask Fadell how he regards the iPod’s legacy. Tellingly, his answer speaks to Apple’s history more than exhilaration for the product itself. “The iPhone never would have existed without it,” he says. “That means that the Apple we know of would never have existed without the iPod.” It helped turn a computer company with a limited user base into a consumer electronics giant. “And the crazy thing is that it was exactly 25 years ago—which is half the years that Apple has existed. There was the Apple II, and then the Mac, and then, boom,” he adds.

我问法德尔如何看待 iPod 的遗产。耐人寻味的是，他的回答更多是关于苹果的历史，而非对产品本身的兴奋。“没有它，就不会有 iPhone，”他说。“这意味着没有 iPod，就不会有我们今天所知的苹果。”它帮助一家用户群有限的电脑公司转型为消费电子巨头。“疯狂的是，那正好是 25 年前——也就是苹果存在时间的一半。先是 Apple II，然后是 Mac，然后，砰，”他补充道。

I prefer to remember the iPod for what it was, not what it led to. Not long ago,

我更愿意记住 iPod 本身的样子，而不是它所带来的结果。不久前，