Pods Unite 381
burgburgburg writes "Apple has released the QuickTime video of the new commercial they made in conjunction with Volkswagen. The connection between the two? Buy a New Beetle. Get a new iPod. Take a look at video.
It's the 15 GB iPod and all the accessories needed to hook it up to the new Volkswagen." It uses a casette adapter, which is really lame. Of course, I use a casette adapter with my iPod, but I am not a German engineer.
Cassette Adapters (Score:5, Insightful)
You'd think that designing and implementing such a thing would cost a fraction of what it costs to make and run this advertisent.
I would like to see some kind of poll of which is more useful to people.. a tape player or a 1/8th inch stereo input jack. After all, you can plug an external tape player into a jack easier, with more elegance, and for about the same cost as you can plug an external mp3 player into the tape player.. and I don't have any tapes anymore...
Is it really an incentive? (Score:3, Insightful)
Its a good idea... (Score:1, Insightful)
Now... I think Apple is winning here... They get to expose even more people to there products. Remember... The people who buy these cars are your teeny bopper 16 year old girls... It is afterall a fashion statement.
Way to go Apple... What would of been nicer would of been a "matching" iPOD for the car. While we are at it... lets get an iPOD with every car we buy!
What's with the gay comments? (Score:0, Insightful)
Re:calling clueful car manufacturers (Score:5, Insightful)
There are also the FM senders that you can attach to the iPod, which then are received by the car's FM stereo -- a wireless connection -- but I have heard mixed reviews of the sound quality.
Speaking of sound quality, the song that plays in this commercial is horrible.
Re:calling clueful car manufacturers (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:calling clueful car manufacturers (Score:4, Insightful)
1. Analogue freq dial thingies. Those radioshack 20$ FM transmitters are useless to get on an odd frequency [recall FM is on odd freqs, e.g 93.9, 94.1, etc...].
2. Most populated cities have one useless station after another throughout the bands. All either discussing the rhetoric of the day [newsradio] or playing the teeny-bopper-I-wish-upon-a-pair-of-nice-melons musak. Oh yeah,and don't forget that even if you find a relatively unused band the thing only has a 2 foot range so you better tape it to the hood of your car beside the attenna!
As another poster asked it "would it hurt to put a aux jack 1/8" in the front?". It makes sense and would allow people to plug in new shit much easier than via casettes [which can jam] and FM transmitters [which suck ass anyways].
Or just better yet, build mp3 pod players into cars all together. E.g. like a removable harddrive tray. Just remove it, take it inside, program it, boom.
Tom
Re:Cassette Adapters (Score:2, Insightful)
Is there something inherently wrong with coaxial optical outputs? A lot of people seem to get a chubby about using optical, yet in this case, and even for multi-channel high-sample rate sound, a simple RCA coaxial cable is more than sufficient, and the quality is 100% (i.e. 100% of the bits make it through unscathed). Somehow thousands of suckers are out spending $40 for a 12" optical cable...must be right after they put the orange marker around their CDs.
Fish, meet Bait.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Oh, I know, maybe you thought they were giving away the ipods.
For a group that does a lot of whining about generic music a la britney spears every time the music debates come up, slashdot sure has a nice way of playing the marionette whenever some new pseudo-kitsch gadget or anime box set comes out..
Think of the buying experience (Score:3, Insightful)
Awesome commercial (Score:3, Insightful)
I can't be the only slashdot poster to see past the technical aspects of hooking up an iPod in a car and see one very very beautifull add. Without looking it up my guess would be that the Volkswagen people put the add together, it's in their style.
With its style & music I put it on the same level as the recent technically cool Honda [slashdot.org] add.
Re:VW *used* to provide a 1/8" input jack (Score:3, Insightful)
Just confusing (Score:3, Insightful)
"It was inevitable, really. When two groups of people have so much in common, eventually they find each other. Volkswagen and Apple. Buy a New Beetle. Get a new iPod. And the kit that brings them together (plus a lot of other cool stuff like free music and a $100 Apple Store coupon). Learn more about this special deal."
I noticed that if you want to generate a feeling in the reader's mind, lots of short sentence fragments really prevent that from happening.
Re:Is it really an incentive? (Score:3, Insightful)
It's a tie in deal. VW has done this in the past with Trek cycles (you buy a Jetta, you get a $200 Trek 800), K2 Snowboards (you buy a Jetta, you get this snowboard and no damn boots or bindings), and if i'm not mistaken they had an e-edition golf with a MS PocketPC.
A tie-in doesn't really save anybody any money, but it does associate your vehicle in a very unique way with an activity. Any car can transport a bike, but VW's got a car "built" for it. Any car can have a little handheld pc holder glued in it, but VW's got one "designed" for it. It's little things like this that get people curious enough to go and check it out at their local lot. And then chances are more likely that they'll buy something.
They're not the only ones to do this -- i'm thinking of Orvis, Eddie Bauer and LL Bean edition SUVs, which are the same with slightly altered upholstery or a slightly altered storage compartment.
I've always hoped VW would team up with Apple. They're marketted to the same people with pretty much the same tactics -- us pretentious liberal arts assholes with our buddy holly glasses and square toed shoes YEARNING to think different and be a wanted driver.
Re:two overpriced underperforming technologies (Score:5, Insightful)
You see, there are many different directions engineering goes in. Making faster engines or bigger SUVs is one direction. Making efficient engines and safer small cars is another. Making a high capacity hard drive is one. Making a regular capacity hard drive light enough to carry around is another.
But maybe you're right. Maybe there are some things we just shouldn't bother engineering. So, you know, all of these "feed the world" biotech kooks and "reduce the depletion of our natural resources" solar energy kooks should just give up.
Oh, and as for the "50% too high" comment: fuck you. You don't know what the margin is, know less about business than you do about engineering and Apple shouldn't drop the prices that are keeping them alive just to appease people who don't want an iPod anyway. My 30 gb iPod was the easiest $538.92 I ever spent (after selling four shitty mp3 players that were too big, bulky, poorly designer or low capacity, I found myself with over $600...enough to buy a couple CDs, too).
Re:Not only aux in, but what about cell phones? (Score:3, Insightful)
And here's where the Bluetooth phone could shine, as the simple act of bringing the phone into or out of the car could magically set up forwarding for you.
And for that matter, if the car had Bluetooth to work with your phone, and your hypothetical third-generation iPod had Bluetooth support as well, then the need for the AUX jack would be very much diminished for you.
Someday, maybe...
Comment removed (Score:2, Insightful)