The iPod is DEAD Part 1 - Motorola

It’s a dead pod walking. The Big Body’s (I’ll explain later) are at least. Don’t believe me, go right ahead.

A few months ago we were brainwashed and swept away with the euphoric notion of Motorola and Apple coming together, creating a near orgasmic experience with a RAZR iPod hybrid.

What did we get? The ROKR E1, a phone that was practically laughed at every venue and lauded in every review.

However, still under the RAZR’s spell we believed, since it was a first run it would get better.

Now since then Sony Ericsson (SE) has begun creating the best devices in this category.

SE I believe is quietly positioning themselves to steal the thunder from both Motorola and Apple. You question my sanity? Let’s discuss.

Now before I get to the death of the iPod I’m going to chart the course and I’ll start with Motorola.

I’ll then pass along through the present state of the mobile phone industry and the building giant that is Sony Ericsson and then I’ll paint the Picasso of a finish. Oh what a bloody mess this will be.

Since the induction of the massive failure (admit it people) of the ROKR. Motorola has been playing possum with Apple yet deepening its position in mobile music. First up, the SLVR L7 a phone that almost completely made everyone forget about the ROKR E1.

The SLVR L7 from Motorola has some of the sexiness that made us get excited over the RAZR and still packed the buzzword of the past few years, iTunes. The SLVR L7 was lighter than the Motorola ROKR E1 and also thinner, significantly.

Now where the phone lacked was of course talk time, but it did have more standby so you got a bit of a trade. However, there’s the 100 song cap. Again. Hmmm Apple I smell, I smell… is that fear? Nevertheless after the ROKR E1, the Motorola SLVR L7 was considered a dynamic return to form in comparison.

Fast forward 2006. ROKR E2 not out yet but it’s giving us phonelust in comparison to what has been put out thus far. We get talk time but Moto is killing us with standby, the ROKR E2 is less than any thing reasonable, even less than the ROKR E1.

The 1.3 megapixel camera is shabby too, but that’s not the point of this. The point here is music. 2 GB potential’s worth. Now we’re cooking. Superficial iTunes music cap? Nope.

The phone as it stands today is not an iTunes phone. Hooray. I think Motorola may be listening to us after all.

Now lastly, the ROKR E3, we saw the drawings back in December 2005 and if history repeats itself as it did with the ROKR E2 it will look the same as the drawings and the photos that have popped up recently.

This phone is where Motorola let’s the cat out of the bag. As of this writing we’re talking about 512MB of memory built-in in addition to the memory slot.

I can only speculate to how big the slot will be but with each release there’s been expansion the SLVR L7 has 512 The ROKR E2 is going to have what we believe at least 2GB so for the ROKR E3 one can only imagine.

The thing that takes the cake however, is the navigation wheel that is oh so iPod, I really can’t imagine Apple’s lawyers not itching to be set free like rabid pit bulls on unsuspecting trespasser.

So the liaison between Apple and Motorola did not bear the fruit we all hoped and expected but from the relationship Motorola is introducing us to what it has learned, beauty and music unmeasured. Let us not forget Motorola has iRadio.