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Friday, May 05, 2006

The iPod is the remote

Granted, the little IR Apple remote is small and fun and magnetic. But instead of docking your ipod in a speaker system and then using said remote, why not use Apple's existing wireless speaker system, give the iPod wireless connectivity to those speakers, and have the iPod itself be the remote? It's not as if carrying around an nano or 5G ipod is some laborious task. You would have all your info with you at all times, and not have to get up, walk to the dock, pick your playlist or album and then go sit back down again (which defeats the whole purpose of the remote in the first place).

So you buy speakers for numerous rooms in your home. As you walk through your home, carrying your iPod with you, it automatically syncs wit the nearest speakers, so the music follows you. When you leave a room (are out of range of the bluetooth connection) the music (obviously) stops.

So that's my prediction. The iPod will go wireless, and when it does the need for that sexy little remote and all those docking speaker setups will be obsolete. They'll have to figure out a way to get the bluetooth audio quality up to par, but the nice thing is that, I believe, the wireless airport speakers plug directly into the wall, eliminating the need to recharge them as you would a bluetooth headset and the iPod already has, what, a 10-12 hour battery life? Even if you cut that in half due to a constant bluetooth connection that still gives you at least five hours of strolling around the house that you can do before you have to recharge.