To Pod or Not to Pod… that is the question.

Are IPods really the way to go? I was in Best Buy last weekend looking for a set of replacement headphones for Brandon’s IPod Shuffle. The only ones (that were Apple certified and that matched the original ones) were sold with a useless remote control and were priced at $45. I was highly annoyed that I couldn’t find the replacement headphones sold by themselves. It was at this moment when I realized that I had become a victim of marketing. It never even occured to me that there may be other options out there for MP3 players. So, I began to look around. I noticed several on the market and all at significantly lower prices than IPod. So what’s so special about these fruity little devices anyway? Why should I give them my money?