Video iPod

Well, Apple has finally gone and done it. After literally years of speculation, there is now a video iPod on the market.

I wrote about this over a year ago, when I suggested that Microsoft's Portable Media Center would probably be a bust. Score one for me!

But there are two very interesting things about today's announcements from Apple.

The first is the video iPod. Not that it exists so much, but the fact that Apple is marketing it as a music player enhanced with video capabilities, not as a video player. I think Apple rightly recognizes that iPod-like devices will forever be music players first and foremost. People consume music very differently than they consume video.

But just as interesting is the news about the upgraded iMac G5 and iTunes. The iMac G5 now comes with (among other things) a remote control.

And the iTunes Music Store sells individual episodes of TV shows for $1.99 a pop.

Add an external big screen, and you have (ta dah!) a home video-on-demand system. Add an external TV tuner, and you have a complete PVR. Plus an iMac. With integration into iMovie for showing off home videos.

Interestingly, Apple isn't marketing the updated iMac as a home entertainment system. But I'm sure they're watching very closely to see if people use it that way.

As for myself....as it happens, our old graphite iMac died this week, so I just might become one of the first owners of the shiny new version.