Tuesday, June 28, 2005

iPod GPS video radio camera phone with wireless HMD earbud with mic

It's not exactly the most elegant name, but the device it would be would kick ass.

Everybody is getting all excited about whether the next iPod is gonna be video or phone. I, however, would like to take a moment to jump a half a dozen or so steps ahead and give you where I wanna see the iPod heading.

iPod phone
Starting with the obvious... pretty much everyone who has an iPod also has a phone nearby. Let's combine these two things into one and reduce our carried gadgets by one.

iPod video
And of course here's what Apple seems to also be gearing up for with the support of video in iTunes. What this needs is a bigger screen - perhaps the entire side of an iPod doubling as a touch-sensitive control - to make viewing things on an iPod anything useful.

iPod wireless HMD
However, I think any such screen would largely be too small for anything good, so a head-mounted display would be much more useful. However, such a display would have to be less bulky than those currently available as of this writing. Ideally, something as light as sunglasses would rock. Wireless, of course.

iPod radio
This seems like such a no-brainer. Stick AM/FM in there and make it possible to use XM or Sirius too. Then we'd really be rolling.

iPod camera
With all the video capability, it only seems natural. Together with the phone (and the corresponding internet connection), this would lead to video chat and its use as a video camera. Oh, and it would work as a regular old camera too (as well as a cosmetic mirror).

iPod GPS
With GPS support, your iPod will keep track of where you're going and where you've been. Each photo and video you take will be linked to its geographic coordinates. And naturally with the wireless HMD you'll be able to easily check maps and such.

Wireless earbuds
This should just be standard. Don't forget the mic for phone use.

Voice navigation and recording
As wonderful as the click wheel is, I hate it. The only thing I don't like about my iPod is that I'm always winding through lists. I just wanna be able to say: "Play, artist, Caetano Veloso" to start listening to Caetano. Digging through menus just sucks. Naturally you should be able to record with this as well.

iPod Blackberry
Blackberries suck. Crappy navigation, way too much clicking, annoying scroll wheels. Stick all the functionality into my iPod with voice navigation, voice dictation, and a virtual keyboard for when noise is inappropriate and we'd be talking.

So how would all this work? You'd just stick the iPod in the bag and put your earbuds and the HMD glasses on. Then you'd just tell the iPod what you wanted to do. This would truly be a great device. I think the only way to improve on this would be to implant it right into my head.

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