CUPERTINO, Calif., March 18 (UPI) -- As Apple's iPod, which changed the way people listen to and buy music, celebrates its 10th anniversary, industry experts say it may not be long for this world.
"The iPod's essentially finished, give or take," Alice Enders, who reports on global music markets for media consultancy Enders Analysis, told Britain's The Guardian newspaper.
"Sales have been in decline for some time," she said. "The converged media device is the way forward," she said, referring to the iPhone, the iPod Touch and the iPad -- all devices for which the original scroll-wheel iPod paved the way.
With no previous experience in music, Apple launched the iPod in 2001.
"Why music?" Apple head Steve jobs said at the time. "Well, we love music, and it's always good to do something you love."
Within five years, via its iTunes Store, Apple with its iPod would go on to become the number one music provider in the world.
"It was the first cultural icon of the 21st century," Michael Bull, a lecturer in media and film at the University Of Sussex, said. "And it became symbolic of the way people like to move around in cities. It fitted the desire for a technological freedom, whereby you moved to your own soundscape."
