Apple Ends Production of iPods After Nearly 22 Years

Apple’s iPod was a model for innovation and excellence in hardware engineering, industrial design, and software development. The iPod also showed how Apple was not always the first to bring a new product to market, but frequently won.

The first digital music players appeared in the late 1990s. These early versions could store a few dozen songs. This allowed people to copy CDs onto their computers and transfer the songs to their phones. 

Steve Jobs returned to Apple in 1997, more than a decade after being expelled. He saw the new category as an opportunity to modernize Apple’s legacy business. He was a passionate music lover and ranked Bob Dylan and the Beatles among his favorites. Jobs believed tapping into people’s passion for music would encourage them to switch from Microsoft-powered personal computers to Macintoshes.

Jon Rubinstein, the man who led Apple’s engineering in that era, stated that “you didn’t need to do any market research.” “Everyone loves music.”

The product’s creation was triggered by Mr. Rubinstein, who discovered a Toshiba hard drive during a trip to Japan. The drive, measuring 1.8 inches in size, could store 1,000 songs. It was essentially a Sony Walkman-sized digital player that could store 1,000 songs.

Apple acquired a company that had MP3 software. This acquisition would be the foundation for iTunes. iTunes is a digital jukebox that organizes people’s music libraries and allows them to quickly create playlists or transfer songs. It was the engine that powered Steve Jobs’ vision of how music would be purchased in the digital age.

He stated in 2003 that people would like to purchase music online by downloading it, much as they did with LPs.

Napster, a free service that allowed people to share any song they liked with anyone in the world, was causing havoc in the music industry at the time. Jobs capitalized on the problems in the music industry by marketing new Macs’ ability to copy CDs using the slogan “Rip. Mix. Mix.

Mr. Galuten stated that the labels eventually agreed to allow Apple to sell songs on iTunes for 99cs. Gluten stated that they folded because they had no leverage. “With convenience, the easiest way to combat piracy is.” 

The $399 price tag on the first iPod slowed demand and led to a reduction of sales of less than 400,000 units within the first year. Apple’s iPod Mini was released three years later. It was a 3.6-ounce aluminum case in silver, gold, and pink. It cost $249 and contained 1,000 songs. Sales exploded. It had sold 22.5 million iPods by September 2005’s end.