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The iPod: Not So Small After All

Today, the average American's life, which can be labeled as a spoiled consumer, revolves around the iPod. There are so many applications that are made for the iPod that can keep you busy for hours on end. Every time a new song is released, everyone scrambles to download that song onto his or her iPod. The iPod has become such a huge product that not only college students are using, everyone is using them. Starting from children who are seven or eight years old, going to adults who are in their fifties.
The iPod is such a brilliant piece of technology. It is user friendly and enables people to do almost anything they want. Not only are you able to listen to music on it, you can watch music videos and movies, download pictures, play games, and even go on the Internet. Apple has created iPods to hold so much memory that it is virtually impossible to fill all of the space up. It seems like every week Apple releases something new for the iPod. iPods have become so important in our lives that we spend hundreds of dollars just decorating and buying accessories for our iPods. Apple sells hard shell cases, leather cases, rubber cases, and sock cases that come in a variety of different colors. Accessories for the iPod include, iHome radios, headphones, remotes, and speakers just to name a few. The iPod also has over 100,000 applications available to be downloaded with new applications being created every day. These applications include almost everything imaginable. Apple has created applications that can give you recipes for cooking, you can look up words in the dictionary, it provides you with GPS for when you travel, and even an application that enables you to download full books. The iPod is truly an amazing machine.
Thinking about all of the advertisements used to sell iPods, I find it amazing how many different places you can see an iPod pop up. Apple has advertisements in all of the right places: on giant billboards, in commercials, on pop-ups on the computer, facebook, myspace, and magazines. It is ubiquitous. Producing that much advertisement is bound to make people buy their product. We are surrounded by it constantly.
Everything we do involves the iPod. Almost everyone I know has one. It is almost impossible to go a single day without seeing or hearing about this tiny machine we can fit in the palm of our hands. I notice while walking from class to class, not one person can walk alone without their iPod in their hand. There are so many accessories available for your iPod that it is almost impossible to get bored with it. But, amazingly enough, we still do. Why does our society always want the newer and better things? I have to admit; myself that I bought an iPod Touch before my "old" iPod was even broken. In fact, my "old" iPod still looked brand new. Craving the new technology helped push me into buying a newer and frankly more expensive object. The new technology that gets released is usually so superior to the prior piece of technology that was out that everyone has to get it.
Apple makes it look so easy keeping up with their consumers buying their products. As soon as there is a noticeable dip in consumption of their product, they release something new that seems to be a better product to the public. Just recently a new iPod Touch was released because it claimed to be faster than the previous model. The release of a new product sparked sales once again. One of my friends bought the new iPod Touch and gave away her old iPod Touch. I thought she was completely insane because her old iPod Touch was not even a year old. This just goes to show you that people cannot help but buy new products regardless of the condition that their other products are in.
Another product that Apple just released to the public that is keeping them ahead of their competition was the iPad. To me, this looks and acts exactly like and iPod, it is just a few inches bigger. Already people are buying this iPod/computer without knowing anything about the product. Who knows, maybe people think that having better technology than everyone else will make them seem more important in the world. We have become very materialistic within the past decade because of all the new technology that comes out in such a small amount of time. Although it is great to have all of these nice things, should it really be as important as we make it seem to own them.
According to some people, they believe that advanced technology is making us “stupid.” In Nicholas Carr’s article, “Is Google Making Us Stupid” he talks about how people have lost patience in trying to do a simple thing like reading. He states that we have become so accustomed to attaining information with the click of a button that we no longer are able to sit down and read a book without getting distracted. Carr talks about how he feels when he reads now and describes how he feels when he says, “Now my concentration often starts to drift after two or three pages. I get fidgety, lose the thread, begin looking for something else to do” (Carr 1). Having an iPod makes it even easier for people to access information now that iPods have wireless Internet built in. People don’t even need to sit down and look up information on desktop computers anymore, they just click a few buttons on their iPod and a full webpage appears. Is that really a bad thing?
Is it really a big deal that we don’t read as much anymore? Having iPods can help us look up exactly what we need to know in just a few minutes. This cuts the amount of time that would be needed to look up information if one was to do research by reading dramatically. How could anyone think that is a bad thing?
For every good side, there is a bad side as well. Since iPods have become so big, they have also become a big problem. Because our society has become so spoiled and greedy, we buy the newest product that is available as soon as it gets released and throw away our old devices. This creates a problem because we discard our “old” technology into landfills, which can be very detrimental to our environment. According to Chris Carroll in his article “High-Tech Trash,” our old technology gets dumped into landfills including places like Ghana and China. This creates a problem because the technology that is burned releases toxins that go into the air and water. In order to reduce the amount of toxins released into the environment, we need to reduce the amount of technology that we discard.
Another negative effect is that iPods can be a distraction. This can potentially be very dangerous. Many people use their iPods in their cars, which causes them to be distracted from the road. It is scary to think that people can last a half hour driving without fidgeting with their iPod. iPods have been a big cause of car accidents from people between the ages of 18 to 24. “According to the article, iPods are the Cause of Numerous Car Accidents,” by Kenneth L. Christensen, he states: “The dangers of using an iPod, or any other distracting device, are real” (1). iPods have become a big danger for drivers because people are so attached to them and always need to be listening to music or scanning through their iPod.
Another negative effect that iPods have on society is that they are damaging the hearing of people who listen to them. People who are constantly listening to music on their iPod are raising the volume each time they listen to music. This is damaging their hearing and a lot of people don’t even know it. Apple even states on their website that iPod users have to listen to their music responsibly. Drawing from personal experiences here at Hofstra, as I walk to class I can literally hear the song that students are listening to because their iPod volume is turned up so much. I can’t even imagine that they do not hear it and that is why it is turned up so loud, because the music is completely blasting. I was sitting in study hall the other day and from across the room, I was able to hear that a girl was listening to “Jesus Take the Wheel” by Carrie Underwood. This constant loud music is so damaging to the ear and people don’t even seem to care. As long as they have their iPod and their music is on, they are happy.
Over the past decade, technology has advanced and incredible amount. iPods have become such a huge success that almost every home in America contains an iPod. Because there are many accessories and applications available for the iPod, the result has been American consumers becoming greedy and spoiled.