By: Tye Richmond
After 20 years, Apple announced that the company will be discontinuing the iPod Touch, the last remaining model in its lineup of portable music players. In a news post on Tuesday, the company says that it will sell the current Touch “while supplies last.”
The iPod Touch going away marks the end of an era. As Apple notes, it introduced the first iPod “over 20 years ago.” The original FireWire-equipped model acted as just a portable music player, and Apple made models that were pretty much exclusively for listening to audio up until 2017, when it discontinued the iPod Nano and Shuffle. While the iPod Touch has been embraced by some iPod enthusiasts as the new classic music player, it also found a following for those who wanted an iPhone-like experience but didn’t actually need a phone.
I still remember when I received my first iPod growing up, I had the iPod Nano. I was in love with my iPod Nano, I took it everywhere. It was small and compact unlike some of the iPhones that cannot even fit in your pocket.
I had all the late 2000s and early 2010s hit music on my Nano. I was using LimeWire to get all my music back then but who wasn’t. Then I started using the iTunes store, and now Apple Music so I’m doing it “legally” now. Since Apple is discontinuing the iPod, I know for sure some people will probably dig through their drawers to find their iPod and get it running. I know for sure I probably will.
I have so many memories of my iPod. Back then, you had to use your phone and then use your iPod to listen to music. Now it is all on one device which is very convenient, but I still kind of miss having two devices, one your actual phone and the other your music device or iPod.
In a New York Times article it says, “Since introducing the iPod in 2001, Apple has sold an estimated 450 million of them, according to Loup Ventures, a venture capital firm specializing in tech research. Last year it sold an estimated three million iPods, a fraction of the estimated 250 million iPhones it sold.”
The history and legacy of the iPod will live on forever, and it’s one of the greatest inventions of the 21st century.
