iPod Giggles

iPod Giggles

» Paul Bourke, of the Astronomy department at Swinburne University of Technology, has developed an iPod stereoscope. His system uses a pair of iPods in an old-style stereoscope viewer to display stereo-matched photos.

» Somebody at Iaxb has come up with some renderings of a giant iPod shuffle sitting around the house like he or she owns the place.

» More enlighteningly, Canadian Broadcasting Corp. has a story on the the evolution of portable audio. I’m particularly interested in this observation:

Before 1954 and the pocket transistor, music was mainstream or bust, eager to please every listener from teenaged Tony to his grandmother when they gathered around the family radio or phonograph. Walking the streets meant enduring the sound of silence (or worse, traffic), riding in elevators was a death sentence soundtracked by… elevator music. Ugh.

So, was the success of rock ‘n roll dependent on the coincident development of portable radios that allowed kids to listen to explore music on their own, without disapproving looks from their parents?