“Apple Computer Inc.’s hot digital music players may be better associated with the Cupertino, California, company’s hip Apple Stores, but over the past few months, they’ve also started to pop up next to less exotic products in special vending machines built by Zoom Systems,” Robert McMillan reports for IDG News Service. “Since April, the San Francisco company has been selling iPods across the U.S. in ‘robotic product delivery systems’ (don’t say the words ‘vending machine’ around Zoom Systems executives; they find the term archaic). The first iPods were sold in Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport, and the players can now be found in “Zoom Shop” machines operating in malls, hotels and grocery stores across the country, the company said.”
McMillan reports, “Though Zoom Shops sell plenty of other products, including digital cameras and snacks, the iPod is the top seller, said Rick Cusick, Zoom Systems’ executive vice president of merchandising. ‘It seems to unleash an incredible impulse opportunity,’ he said. ‘You can walk up and buy and iPod in 20 seconds.’ …Having just phased out the iPod Minis, the company is now selling the iPod Shuffle and iPod nano in its machines. Next month, it plans to begin selling Apple’s latest video-enabled iPods.”
Full article here.
Advertisement: The New iPod with Video. The ultimate music + video experience on the go. Buy it now at the Apple Store. From $299. Free shipping.
Wonder what happens when your iPod gets stuck!
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So I’m in the airport, about to get on my transatlantic flight to Guam or whatever, and I decide I have just enough time before boarding to buy an iPod.
And then to my horror, I realize I have no way to (1) charge it or (2) but anything on it to listen to (unless it is the U2 iPod I suppose?)
If this was married to a iTMS kiosk system that allowed purchases and transfers of files to the iPod I could see it.
MDN word: ways
Now you can get a Nano and a Trojan condom to protect it with one purchase. Isn’t technology grand!!
Give me a minute honey I’m gonna buy me some Cheetos …
Would you get me a Nano while you are at it love?
This is actually pretty amazing.
“And then to my horror, I realize I have no way to (1) charge it or (2) but anything on it to listen to (unless it is the U2 iPod I suppose?)”
What, you travel without your laptop? Problem solved.
Better watch out for those scratches
Wow!
That’s a lot of quarters!
~M
PS- Nice not having to wait, I guess.
What are you stupid ? People get OFF planes too. Laptops ??? Hotels ??? Advice for you: Don’t become a lawyer. You’ll get people long prison terms.
“People get OFF planes too.”
Whew! Thanks! I was a little scared about boarding thinking about how crowded it would be. I’m just not ready to try the overhead bin.
But the bad news is that the machines only accept Susan B. Anthony or Sacajawea dollars.
So anyway .. didn’t Doug Adams get right quick with whipping out an Applescript which utilizes the Yahoo Video Search RSS capability to automatically search out links for .movs and .mpegs and then automatically load ’em into your iTunes as Podcast episodes? Damn straight, he did.
http://www.dougscripts.com/itunes/scripts/ss.php?sp=yahoovideosearch
And didn’t that circumstance cause me to download this here Bizzaro iPod video about an iPod Store on the very first search? Yup, again. I dunno where it actually came from on the Yahoo Video Search (that part isn’t identified once it’s downloaded), but Gizmodo has a link to it, so …
http://www.gizmodo.com/images/bizzaro_ipod.mov
Gwm
The movie was good thanks
Even without a way to charge it up and fill it with songs I would have a smile on my face just looking at the box.
Just a few links to see what this Zoom Store looks like:
http://www.zoomsystems.com/home.html
http://www.zoomsystems.com/products.html
and an interesting quote from the products page:
“The products we sell are the same types of products that you would find in a staffed shop. We are not limited to low cost items; in fact our highest sales levels have been achieved with consumer electronics in the $99 to $500 price range.”
There’s a link for a testimonial video (http://www.zoomsystems.com/home_video.html) but I I get is a page not found error.
MDN MW = property
Hmmm… I wonder how Zoom Systems secures its property in such public places.
I think they have one of these vending machines at the Metreon in San Francisco, in the retail store that used to be the Microsoft Store before it closed down due to lack of retail traffic and business. That’s irony for you.
The machine in question had iPod minis and shuffles when I saw it a few months ago, and there actually was 3 or 4 people in front of it gawking at the novelty of being able to buy an iPod through a vending machine.
“used to be the Microsoft Store”
A M$ store? Oh goodness, I had no idea there was such a monstrosity. If there was ever a justifiable excuse for terrorism, bombing an M$ store would come VERY close. If there are any more of these gateways to Hell stil open, let us hope that they will be shut down as well.