More power to Apple and its legion of accessory makers. Asking people to pay $20 to use your own headphones with an $80 MP3 player is ballsy — brass ballsy. Such is the story of the new iPod shuffle, though, and I’m willing to bet that people will indeed pay for an inline headphone adapter.
If so, Belkin’s now got one for $19.99. Called, very simply, the Headphone Adapter for iPod Shuffle, it’s a 3.5mm plug that sits between your headphones and your iPod shuffle, and features the requisite controls for playing, pausing, skipping forwards and backwards, and invoking VoiceOver to hear the song title and artist read aloud.
Can’t fault Belkin for capitalizing on this gaping void that Apple’s created, although the $20 price tag might be a lot easier to stomach if it were, say, $10. Time will tell, though.
Belkin : Headphone Adapter for iPod® Shuffle [Product Page]
Use Any Headset with Your iPod shuffle with Belkin’s New Headphone Adapter [Press Release]
Apple will continue benefiting for the accessory business. We love the products and also I guess you get what you pay for. If you can afford it of course.
Screw Belkin. I was about to order one from their site, but they’re charging a minimum $7.50 shipping for this little doohicky. So price is $27.50, not $20. Scoche’s adapter, although not released just yet, is available on Amazon pre-order for $18. With free supersaver shipping no less (if you’re Optimus Prime or Amazon Prime). Heck, it would be worthwhile to buy something else on Amazon to get up to the $25 mark to get free super-saver shipping….
hopefully the belkin will at least work. there are 30,000 posts on the apple support boards from people whose original apple headphones shorted out as soon as a drop of sweat got in the controls