Ever-Evolving: iPod October 08, 2007 Apple's new iPods seem likely to score
By Alex Palmer
It was hard not to notice the flurry of announcements made by Apple Inc.'s CEO Steve Jobs on September 5th. Yet again the company dominated the headlines with the unveiling of three new versions of the iPod, just in time for the holidays. There is the "iPod classic," which comes with as much as 160 GB of memory, and the improved iPod nano with a larger screen and video capabilities.
But upstaging these is the "iPod touch," which features the smooth, flip-of-a-finger user interface familiar to anyone who has checked out a friend's iPhone. The new iPod also includes Wi-Fi wireless networking, so users can check their e-mail, surf the Net and of course, download music from iTunes. Much thinner than the iPhone, at 8 millimeters, the iPod touch begins at $299.
The expanded features of the new nano and iPod classic will now offer incentive winners a little more if they receive one as a reward, and at around the same price point. But the iPod touch is of particular interest to incentive planners, chiefly because of the iPhone. As highly in-demand as the iPhone is, the two-year AT&T contract Apple requires of its customers makes it a gift with some serious strings attached. The iPod touch presents a solution to this, giving winners all they love about the iPhone's non-phone technology.
"The touch, having the new technologies and all the other assets, will become a very 'want it' item," says Vince McDonald, vice president of sales and marketing for Maryland Heights, Mo.–based Incentive Concepts. "People have already started placing orders."
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