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Poll: Could open source produce an iPod killer?

3 points by wensing ↗ HN
The release of the first Android phone has me thinking about this in terms of product design. Independent of Android--if the open source community were charged with making an iPod killer, could it be done?

I'm asking about the iPod (and not the iPhone) because I think there's general agreement that it is the best designed portable music player in the world. A poll asking this about the iPhone would no doubt lead to all kinds of tangents.

6 comments

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kwamenum86
iPod users are fiercely loyal. Let's pretend for a moment that the open-source community produces something better than the iPod using whatever metric. Would it really matter? There are mp3 players out there that technically give you more value for your dollar that aren't selling well. Non-Apple mp3 players just aren't "sexy". I think the HN audience may find such an mp3 player more appealing (the cool factor) but the average consumer?...not a chance.
mechanical_fish
Open-source software works because any of us can download, revise, build, and test the product in our own homes. You can execute your own design revisions.

Hardware doesn't work like that, unless it's made of a handful of hand-soldered parts, and even then the results tend to be more functional than beautiful, and they suffer from lots of quality-control variation.

So, no. The best you can realistically hope for is for something like the Chumby: Designed by a core team, who sells it to defray the manufacturing and development costs but gives you all the schematics and software and encourages you to hack it.

Meanwhile, large companies have spent millions of dollars to compete with iPod and failed, so you're not exactly setting your sights low.

qhoxie
It kind of depends what constitutes the "open source community." If by that you mean anyone who wants to thrown in, then the community could design a better audio player. Googling 'ipod concept' turns up some pretty neat ideas. As for actually being able to produce it: probably not. Companies like Canonical do great work pushing open software forward, but an undertaking like competing with the ipod is a bit much for anyone to venture in to. This is especially true because Apple would not lose any share without a fight, and when it comes to sexiness - they win.
czcar
I don't believe a traditional 'Open-source' item could beat the ipod. (I think The Iphone and G1 will kill the ipod). The market has started to become modular, and us such 'good-enough' products will slowly eat away at the ipod, for a firm (opensource or otherwise) there needs to be a design-led core team to make decisions, to get working capital to manufacture, distribute, market etc (like mechanical_fish suggested). Regarding the average consumer arguement, to an average consumer an ipod has become synonymous to a mp3 player, and as more and more generic 'ipods' flood the market apple will probably leave the market.
kwamenum86
I'm not so sure Apple would want to leave the market just because there are a lot of other companies in that space. There is still room for growth, which is key.

Steve Jobs often refers to iPod/iTunes as one of Apple's three "legs": http://www.macpredictions.com/2008/06/since-when-did-four-le...

They rely on producing a superior product/user experience/brand to dominate the market and as long as they stay good at that there is no reason to leave cash on the table.

Zev
I don't think so. The only open source project dealing with hardware that I can think of is the OpenMoko. And thats not exactly a shining example of the best thing to come out of OSS imo.