I know about eight people who have an iPod. All of them have had unreliability issues.
I know about four people without iPods. One is an iRiver, two are Creative Zen Touch, and mine is a Zen Xtra. Only one of the Zen Touch players had a reliability issue.
I can appreciate Creative Labs players not appealing to the really keen mp3 fanatic, but they need to be available, and here's why.
I'm a student. I like things to be good value for money. Creative Labs players are a bargain. I got my Zen Xtra 30gb off eBay over a year ago for £160, and I have never looked back. Although slightly large, it does the trick, and I have shure e3c earphones and the sound is AMAZING with mp3s on 224kb. Creative Labs players are easy to use, reliable, convenient, and most of all... CHEAP.
Everything the student ever wanted.