Schmitie

Rhapsody's New e-Music Download Service Takes on iTunes

First off. Kudos to wyly: "Secondly, you sound like what the technology community refers to as a 'fanboy'". You made me laugh.

I have to say Apple iPod is a very popular product, but..... only in the U.S. You are forgetting the entire world around you. In the U.S., the only easy accessible mp3 players are iPod, Samsung, Sandisk, Zenith, and sometimes Creative. But outside
"Amurica's" (Amurica is the U.S. America is North and South America. It's sometimes considers impolite to refer to the U.S. as America. I had a Brazilian exchange student.) little box of joy there are many other brands all fighting for a place on consumers shelves. I recently went on a trip to Europe. Its very different. There when you want to buy an mp3 player you can choose from over 30 different brands not just four.

Main point I'm trying to make is Apple is not that big. They have a very strong base in the US. And many other places. But they are slowing in sales in different places.

If you want to choose an mp3 player the choice on music services will be very important (vice versa). If you want to go main stream go with Apple iPod and iTunes. If you want to be different or just like a different company go with Archos, AT&T(Cingular), Cowon, Creative Labs, Denon, Digitrex, D-Link, Ericsson, Insignia, iriver, Kyocera, Motorola, Nokia, Palm, Pioneer, Philips, Roku, RCA, Samsung, SanDisk, Sonos, Sony, and Toshiba. Use these products with the "plays for sure" combo of Rhapsody and eMusic. And if you like using your cellphone as your mp3 player use Sony Ericsson (best phones in the world, not opion, fact, jk), or Samsung's many phones watched with AT&T(Cingular) in combo with Napster (this is based off of a U.S. citizen stand point. Napster is supposedly better in Europe and hella good in Japan- a soon to be top economic powerhouse.)

Personally I love Cowon. Best shit in the world. I paid 200$ for the Cowon D2. 8 gb of internall memory. 35$ for 4gb sd card external (where are the sd card inputs on iPods). touch screen. 52 hours of battery life!!!!!!!!!!!! and very good software (a bit confusing but very good). and most important: MADE TO LAST MORE THAN ITS WARRENTY. iPods are only made to last one year. then they break.
THEY WILL BREAK. That means you'll end up spending more on your iPod nano video 8gb ($200) than i will on rhapsody music to go ($15 a month) over a 2 years time. 200 * 2 = 400 - (15 * 12*2) = $40.

That makes me want to cry. thats saying your using illegal downloads. with downloads off iTunes your broke or spoiled. :-)

With Love,
Schmitie