The Irony of Calling iPod Users "Sheep" - Page 2

i am personally more discusted with people who default to a specfic product than any other part of this whole mp3 player "deal." i have personally had both of my mp3 players insulted by ipodders who say "its not an ipod, its not the best"

i initally went into the "game" openminded, but biased aganst the i-have-one-too-pod but came out after comparing features, and finding gear that fit my neads better than the default answer.

i am quite happy infact that i did this. my sisters ipod has broken 2 times in the past 9 months. my archos &creative players just chug on and on.

So, by that logic, if you own a non-iPod portable player and happen to think that iPoddies are trend-followers, then you're a sheep? And if you upgrade your player regularly you're also a sheep? Ridiculous. You're dismissing the idea that there are consumers who buy a player largely on practical reasons while still agreeing with the fact that many iPod buyers are trend followers.

Why did I buy the X5 and not an ipod? Because of FLAC and ogg support, when I have a lot of flacs and ogg's. Also because of the iPod's bass rolloff issue, which isn't quite as present on the X5, though according to some, still there. I also happen to know a lot of people who have bought an iPod even though they don't have much digital media or care much about digital music - their friends had one, so they had to buy one themselves to be "cool."

Guess I'm a sheep then. Baaa. Baaaa.

What he means is that buying a non-iPod player simply because you want to AVOID the iPod image is no better than buying one to be PART of it.

Well summarized. I see similar illogical processes with music. I have friends and acquaintances that can love a band, but if it starts to get any mainstream recognition suddenly they have no interest in them in all. Hello, it's the same music from the same people. Hipster elitism.

On the DAP front there is definitely a dual elitism at work. The anti-iPod group feels superior for not following the herd and making informed decisions, etc. The rabid ipod users feel elite in that they have the status symbol of the iPod.

In reality we'd all be best off if we made purchasing decisions based on what's best for us and withheld condemning others for doing the same, whether we agree with their decision or not. iPods have been the best choice for me, but I recognize how iRiver, Creative, iAudio or Rio might be the best choice for others. Diversity is a beautiful thing.

Of course none of this applies to people dumb enough to buy triports. Sheesh!

I have no problems with people owning an iPod but the thing that really grinds my gears is the people who use their iPods with their white eaphones. I just can't stand them, the way they look, the way they sound. I guess I suffer from headphone elitism, sue me.

There's always going to be the Anti-Ipod people, the Pro-Ipod people, or the middleman, the uninformed due to marketing winds up buying an Ipod in the end. Saying the Pro-Ipod people and Anti-Ipod people are all sheep is like calling youself a sheep in a sense that you're against people who pose elitist views (I'm sure there's a group for that too.) It's just something we have to live with. No point in hatin', just listen to the music and enjoy!!

I would make a comparison between iPod and Bose (for the record, I think the iPods are much better products than the Bose headphones). For example, a friend claimed to me about 2 weeks ago, the exact phrase which I had heard satirized on this forum - "Bose is the best if you have money" while we were discussing speakers for his laptop. I was unable to get from him the information of exactly where he had picked up that idea from, which leads me to think he came to that conclusion due entirely to marketing or incorrect "general knowledge" (which is a result of marketing).

The problem is that there are just too many people who own an iPod and then denigrate others because they aren't using an iPod, since their mp3 player must be inferior. Even though they have absolutely no idea of the relative qualities of mp3 players, of whether it's significant that the iPod doesn't support OGG, relative % rates of hard drive crashes, the ability of the iPod to have a line out etc. They just automatically assume that they're awesome and everyone else's mp3 player sucks.

On the other hand non-iPod users don't seem to have the same "I'm awesome you suck" mentality. I have an iAudio U2 1GB flash player, but if someone else tells me that it's a bad mp3 player because it has a built in battery that will die in 2 years, I can accept that. Similarly, if someone else has a different flash player, like Creative's, I can accept their choice as being their opinion too, instead of automatically going "it's not iaudio, its not the best".

Ummmmm....... No

I could give you multiple quotes from this forum such as "dump the overpriced overhyped ipod", or "anything but an ipod"

Actually ipods get more bashing than other DAPs and ipod owners do less bashing then other DAP owners. BUT the reasons are simple. Ipod leads the market and that is probably reflected here. People that choose something else feel compelled to defend their choice, and often resort to bashing the leader to do so. Also it is an American thing to attack the dominant player in the market period. Anybody heard of Microsoft?

Like what was perfectly summarized, if you buy an ipod just to be "cool" or you buy something else "just because it's not an ipod" you are part of the same "tribe" mentality

Plus the bashing is just counter productive and angers people when there is good discussion to be had about pros and cons of the players that are real and not based on a brand.

I own players, by Apple, Creative, Rio, Philips and others. I just want the best player(s) period.

PS> Ironically i'd be willing to bet that the "Microsoft Sucks" mentality is what drove some people early on to look at the ipod to begin with.

I understand other dap users frustration at mainstream ipod users ignorance and arrogance, BUT none of the ipod owning members here exhibit that behavior. On the other hand there are tons of other dap owners who constantly bash Ipods and the reasons they give are soooooo stupid.

I agree that it's understandable to be repulsed by marketing messages that try to tell you how to be "cool" and "hip."

I suspect many of the members who are vehemently anti-iPod are teenagers or relatively young. Unlike myself, they're at an age where being perceived as cool and part of the popular crowd is important and products such as DAPs and cell phones are part of the peer pressure defined by consumer culture.

A backlash against Apple's traditional message "Think Different" is understandable when a majority are iPod users.

So what am I, then?

What about those who buy a different player than an iPod in order to play lossless and OGG Vorbis files, which the iPod cannot play? I think that I had a very justifiable reason to buy a Rio Karma, for example, over an iPod. It also cost cheaper than an iPod of the same storage capacity, but had features I liked better. I liked the interface of the Rio Karma better. I liked the sound quality a LOT better. I needed a DAP that could be easily used on Linux. I also loved the RCA outputs on the player's dock, which I was able to hook up to my buddy's stereo at a dorm party.

If the iPod had these things, the companies would try to beat the iPod in other departments. However, since those departments were some primary things I NEEDED in my player, which the iPod didn't have strength in (if they had anything comparable AT ALL), I simply had to get another player. And frankly, this had features that were much better for me, and for a cheaper price. How did I go wrong?

I'm no "lemming" or "sheep". Don't even try to label my actions. We all buy players for different reasons, some of which are more justifiable than others.

I vote this the funniest gag on Head-Fi I've ever seen!!

Take a visit to various player forums. iPodlounge is the only place where I've seen such player bigotry that threads about other manufacturer's players have to regularly be closed.

baaaa baaaaa

Don't want to be called "sheep"? Use MD! Go MD!

As hardware, iPods are fine. Problem is, many people and reviewers give them perfect ratings just because it's an iPod. Great example is CNet, which frequently penalizes DAPs for not being able to play WMA, not having FM tuner, etc. Other review sites frequently criticized non-iPod DAPs for not being gapless, no removable battery, short battery life, etc. Yet, when it comes to the iPod, voila, perfect score.

I think that we basically act driven by aesthetic judgments. However the nature of an aesthetic judgement is very complex. Some examples:
- if I judge the Michelangelo's Pietà my judgement can only be based on what I see
- if I judge the Shumann's Piano Concerto my judgement can only be based on what I hear
but if I judge a DAP on what should I base my judgement?
- I may base on what I see (Hey it looks gooood!)
- I may base on what I hear (Hey it sounds gooood!)
- I may base on what I can do with that (FLAC support, battery life, etc.)
Now, if I claim to be a true audiophile I will judge expecially basing on the sound quality (what I hear), and eventually taking other aspects into account.
But I may reserve to judge even basing on the other aspects...

Now we now that iPod has not the best sound quality and has not all the feature we can desire, but... I may give to the iPod an overall judgement which is superior to the judgement I give to the others DAP basing on the fact that the iPod looks good... I am a sheep? No, simply I am not a true audiophile...

Surely we are conditioned on our judgement by marketing strategies, but... hear at head-fi we are informed buyers, so... if one buys an iPod, he KNOWS it has not the best SQ etc... but its aesthetic (overall) judgement leads him to buy it...

Sincerly I would not call him sheep...

actually as a member of this community I would consider you a sheep if you owned anything other than an ipod. how many people bought the x5 only on the basis it wasnt an ipod? how many people own the iriver hxxx series only because it's not an ipod? you can knock apple all day long at lack of features, but how many of you actually use on-the-go USB, on-the-fly encoding, fm radio, video playback (which is coming for apple), etc found on your superior players. you proclaim the superiority of drag-and-drop over iTunes, yet what takes more work... plugging in your iPod, iTunes starts automatically, and syncs your music... or plugging in your dap of choice, opening a file explorer, finding the music you want, dragging it to a new window where your players hard drive is located, and waiting for it to "build database" after your done?

all i know is ill be buying the new 80gb ipod. simply because itunes syncing is easy, podcasts rule, apple lossless is decent, and there are 102395335 accessories for it... instead of buying cheap slave-labor made fake pleather cases on ebay for $0.79 for some non-sheep dap.