iPod line experiences major decline year-over-year

They also fail to mention that the iPod classic has remained at the same price point without innovation and hasn't been updated in YEARS. I'd drop $250 on an iPod classic with a 320gb hard drive, but not on a 3-year-old 160gb iPod.

I have an iphone 4, ipod classic 160g, and an ipad.

I use my ipod daily for music since my iphone's battery life can barely make it through the day.

This makes sense. The iPod Touch and iPod Classic are pretty much irrelevant now. Anything an iPod Touch can do, you can get an iPhone to do and have it in one device, or get an iPad to do it on a bigger screen. The iPod Classic is irrelevant since, again, you can watch video on an iPhone or an iPad, and if you just want a dedicated device to listen to music, you can do that on an iPod Nano. As for the iPod Nano, since you can listen to music on an iPhone or an iPad, the iPod Nano would just be a nice extra if you wanted to keep your music on an iPod and save space on your iPhone or iPad (not to mention getting a wrist strap and replacing your watch. ;-) ) And the iPod Shuffle? I never understood the appeal of that. Then again, I like to choose whether I shuffle or not, not have it chosen for me.

I have not seen any breakdown for iPod sales but imagine that if the iPod Touch was excluded from the figures, the decline would be greater than the quoted 21%.

In the meantime, I still have a 10GB Classic and an upgraded iPod mini (removed 4GB HD, installed 8GB CF), both of which can be charged and sync'd using firewire (I even bought additional brand new chargers at £0.99). These can be re-formatted and OS installed to startup either a PPC or Intel Mac.

I had an iPod touch, two of them over the past 4 years or so, but this last year my company finally broke down and we now all have iPhones.

So I use my iPhone as my iPod, but I also have a 160GB Classic for when I want to listen to music I can't stream or play off my phone.

Isn't this simply inevitable? As more people move to iPhones, the iPod gives way? It would be of much greater concern if another MP3 player was taking market share, but I honestly don't believe that is the case.

This does not surprise me in the least. With iPhones becoming more affordable for a majority of the population that may want an iPod, it doesn't take rocket science to figure out that the iPod will start to slow to a halt.

Not particularly surprised. As mentioned in the article, every iPhone is a fully functional iPod touch with more features. More than anything, I see the iPod line (and stand alone MP3/MP4 players) becoming a niche market. The Nano/Shuffle seem to appeal to athletes who want to have the smallest possible devices without the need for many advanced features. The Classic is targeted towards those who want to have their entire iTunes library available in lossless at all times. The Touch is more or less an iPhones for those who don't want the phone features or don't want to sign a contract.

All that said, I don't expect Apple to make any drastic changes to the iPods any time soon. And when you look at their profits, they don't need to.

Never forget that every iPhone and every iPad contains a fully functional iPod.

Have to say, I do love my nano. Fantastic for running and I forgot how much I liked crossfading between songs. Why doesn't the phone do that already?