CHaN_316 writes "Wired is running an article entitled, "Can Open Source Outdo the IPod?" Asking the open source community to help them compete with the iPod. From the article: 'Consumer electronics manufacturer Neuros Audio is tapping the open-source community to convert its upcoming portable media player from iPod road kill into a contender [...] To get the ball rolling, Neuros recently opened up the firmware code for its Neuros 442 portable media player, which is set to launch in January [...] Neuros' hardware design is complete, comprising a Texas Instruments dual-core digital signal processor, a 3.6-inch, 65,000-color TFT display and a 40-GB hard drive for recording video from a TV or home entertainment system. But the company has left a little something -- mostly user interface tweaks -- for the volunteers.' Is this a good idea or a mere publicity stunt?" Can Open Source Outdo the IPod? Log in/Create an Account | Top | 407 comments (Spill at 50!) | Index Only | Search Discussion Display Options Threshold: -1: 407 comments 0: 401 comments 1: 325 comments 2: 197 comments 3: 49 comments 4: 29 comments 5: 17 comments Flat Nested No Comments Threaded Oldest First Newest First Highest Scores First Oldest First (Ignore Threads) Newest First (Ignore Threads) The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way. Yes (Score:5, Informative) by Phroggy (441) * <slashdot1NO@SPAMphroggy.com> on Wednesday November 02, @05:18PM (#13936052) (http://phroggy.com/) Is this a good idea or a mere publicity stunt?Why can't it be both? [ Reply to This Dupe! (Score:5, Informative) by prof_peabody (741865) on Wednesday November 02, @05:23PM (#13936106) Was reported a couple of weeks ago:http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/10/ 19/012249&tid=100 [slashdot.org]More useful links not included in summary:http://www.theneuros.com/index.php/Category_Roadma p:Neuros_III [theneuros.com] [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Yes by Anonymous Coward (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @05:25PM Column A, Column B (Score:5, Insightful) by Alaren (682568) on Wednesday November 02, @05:26PM (#13936149) (http://www.kennethpike.com/) "Is this a good idea or a mere publicity stunt?"I concur with parent--this is probably both. The "publicity" you get from a stunt targeted largely at the open source community is probably going to be worth less than the overall benefits you will reap by open-sourcing your product, though.That said, as nice a gesture as this is, the iPod is a lot more than just its firmware. That clickwheel interface is pretty amazing--I haven't used such an intuitive device interface in a long time. The other challenge they will face is getting content to their player. We've seen how frightenend the RI/MPAA is about letting users control (gasp!) their own devices.But I guess if you're just selling a player, pirates are valuable as customers just like anyone else. I don't know, in the end I'm going to say this is a good thing, but more good in the "that's pretty cool" sense rather than the "this will change the industry!" sense. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Column A, Column B by chmod u+s (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @06:15PMRe:Column A, Column B by Fareq (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @07:00PMRe:Column A, Column B by idlake (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @07:57PMRe:Column A, Column B by spongeboy (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @10:13PMRe:Column A, Column B by calibanDNS (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @07:56PMRe:Column A, Column B by jcr (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @08:55PMRe:Column A, Column B by ecloud (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @11:07PM2 replies beneath your current threshold.Re:Column A, Column B by Wesley Felter (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @06:48PMRe:Column A, Column B by Halfbaked Plan (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @07:41PMRe:Column A, Column B by ecloud (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @10:41PMRe:Column A, Column B by idlake (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @07:52PMRe:Column A, Column B by Feyr (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @08:37PMRe:Column A, Column B by idlake (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @10:09PMRe:Column A, Column B by mclaincausey (Score:1) Thursday November 03, @12:24AMRe:Column A, Column B by idlake (Score:2) Thursday November 03, @12:45AMRe:Column A, Column B by the0ther (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @08:04PMRe:Column A, Column B by hey! (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @08:29PMRe:Column A, Column B by the0ther (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @09:52PMRe:Column A, Column B by Moofie (Score:1) Thursday November 03, @12:57AMRe:Column A, Column B by mr_monkie (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @08:06PMRe:Column A, Column B by iamacat (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @09:26PM3 replies beneath your current threshold.Re:Yes by op12 (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @05:41PM Re:Yes (Score:4, Insightful) by nihilogos (87025) on Wednesday November 02, @06:46PM (#13936840) Why can't it be both?I think one of the first rules of journalism is to introduce false dilemmas whereever possible. I think the reasoning goes as follows1. Introduce false dilemma.2. Polarize the public, creating tension and anxiety.3. ???4. Profit.It is also used widely by politicians, e.g. "You're either with us or against us", who I think employ identical reasoning. [ Reply to This | Parent Re:Yes (Score:4, Informative) by Jonny_eh (765306) on Wednesday November 02, @07:46PM (#13937297) What you refer to, is known in the philosophical community as a False Dichotomy [wikipedia.org]. Snip: "The logical fallacy of false dilemma, which is also known as fallacy of the excluded middle, false dichotomy, either/or dilemma or bifurcation, involves a situation in which two alternative points of view are held to be the only options, when in reality there exist one or more alternate options which have not been considered." [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Yes by sco08y (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @08:11PMHas anyone... by Auraiken (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @08:08PMRe:Yes by samkass (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @08:20PMOpen Source Design by Jambon (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @08:43PMWrong by sigloiv (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @06:44PM3 replies beneath your current threshold. Synergy (Score:5, Insightful) by Space cowboy (13680) * on Wednesday November 02, @05:19PM (#13936058) (Last Journal: Thursday July 07, @07:37PM) Why is it that people don't "get" this - it's not sufficient now to simply make an MP3 player that "does more", or even is as easy to use as an Ipod. You need the whole shebang - the store, the presence on the desktop, the device itself, the ease of transfer between computer and device, the chic design, and good marketing/PR. Hell, there's probably loads more too.Apple have a history (and therefore a lot of expertise) in "doing it all". They design their own hardware, write their own OS (*), develop their own apps, do their own marketing (the 'reality distortion field' effect :-). They do it all, just to make the whole experience as unified and simple for the end-user as possible. They grok synergy.Coming up with an ipod-killer that could make *coffee* (+) wouldn't break the grip of Apple on this market now - it'll take a multi-vectored attack to shake their dominance, and no open-source project has the resources that Apple have in the focus areas that are needed. Open-source has manpower and skill, not billions of dollars in the bank. Apple have a fair amount of manpower and skill too...I think Neuros will gain *some* benefit from this - it's a positive move for some people, but they're still fighting over the scraps in the remaining 10-20 percent of the market that *haven't* converted to Apple yet. Also it's cool to have legitimate access to something like this - I'm sure the OS community will come up with more uses for the Neuros device than Neuros ever thought of. I'm not *against* Neuros, I just don't think it's a disruptive idea.Simon.(*) Yes, I'm aware that they didn't completely design the OS, but they have contributed a good portion of it, and most of that in the user-visible areas.(+) Yes, I'm aware that making coffee wouldn't be a useful ipod feature - think of the leakage - but I'm making the point that features alone aren't as valuable as they were when the market was nascent. [ Reply to This Re:Synergy (Score:5, Insightful) by DrEldarion (114072) on Wednesday November 02, @05:24PM (#13936115) (http://www.dealmein.net/) More than anything, I think it's about the marketing. Apple did what nobody else was able to do - they made having an MP3 player cool. Once the iPod came out, MP3 players went from strictly being geek toys to being something that EVERYONE wanted. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Synergy by Scruffeh (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @05:32PM Re:Synergy (Score:4, Funny) by op12 (830015) on Wednesday November 02, @05:46PM (#13936372) (http://zuchinis.net/niraj/) Who doesn't want to turn into one of those dancing shadows? Seriously, it was a powerful part of defining the iPod as "cool" [ Reply to This | Parent1 reply beneath your current threshold. Re:Synergy (Score:5, Insightful) by Otter (3800) on Wednesday November 02, @05:55PM (#13936462) (Last Journal: Wednesday November 02, @10:48PM) Apple did what nobody else was able to do - they made having an MP3 player cool. Neuros players are "cool", too -- for people who think tinkering with your MP3 player is fun. For the market of people who want to be following message boards and constantly updating their firmware, it's the best thing there is. It's silly to think, though, that that market has much room for growth.For my part, I've been moving away from Linux and more and more onto OS X because I'm tired of needing to treat having a working computer as a hobby. The last thing I needed from an MP3 player is a *new* hobby. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Synergy by espressojim (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @06:02PMRe:Synergy by croddy (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @10:13PMRe:Synergy by drinkypoo (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @06:11PMRe:Synergy by John Whitley (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @07:16PMRe:Synergy by Senjutsu (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @11:18PMRe:Synergy by bogie (Score:3) Wednesday November 02, @06:28PM Re:Synergy (Score:4, Informative) by another_mr_lizard (608713) on Wednesday November 02, @06:41PM (#13936806) (http://www.gbpvr.com/) Uhh have you ever been to an Ipod message board? The thing is, most iPod users have never been on an iPod message board.... [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Synergy by clifyt (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @07:38PMRe:Synergy by Otter (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @07:39PMRe:Synergy by sco08y (Score:3) Wednesday November 02, @08:23PMRe:Synergy by KanSer (Score:2) Thursday November 03, @12:13AMRe:Synergy by GeoffP (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @11:11PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Er... by Darius Jedburgh (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @06:38PMRe:Synergy by Lost+Found (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @07:17PMRe:Synergy by croddy (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @10:25PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:Synergy by westlake (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @06:06PMRe:Synergy by drinkypoo (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @06:13PMRe:Synergy by dfjunior (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @07:43PMRe:Synergy by drinkypoo (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @07:52PMRe:Synergy by dr.badass (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @10:06PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Apple consistently underwhelms but markets a lot. by jbn-o (Score:3) Wednesday November 02, @06:13PMRe:Apple consistently underwhelms but markets a lo by alienw (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @06:44PMRe:Apple consistently underwhelms but markets a lo by Halfbaked Plan (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @07:52PMRe:Apple consistently underwhelms but markets a lo by geekoid (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @09:24PMRe:Apple consistently underwhelms but markets a lo by TheRaven64 (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @09:22PMRe:Apple consistently underwhelms but markets a lo by dr.badass (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @10:41PMRe:Apple consistently underwhelms but markets a lo by Iguanaphobic (Score:3) Wednesday November 02, @06:56PMRe:Website Crashes Firefox? by geminidomino (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @09:09PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:Synergy by Have Blue (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @06:25PMIf by marketing you mean word of mouth... by SuperKendall (Score:3) Wednesday November 02, @06:34PMRe:If by marketing you mean word of mouth... by sco08y (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @08:14PMRe:If by marketing you mean word of mouth... by mkiwi (Score:1) Thursday November 03, @12:17AMRe:Synergy by hhawk (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @06:44PMRe: Marketing by ducman (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @07:11PM3 replies beneath your current threshold.offtopic- by conJunk (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @05:24PMRe:Synergy by daviddennis (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @05:25PMRe:Synergy by OreoCookie (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @05:27PMRe:Synergy by Randall Shane (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @05:36PMRe:Synergy by nofx_3 (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @06:56PMRe:Synergy by dirkx (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @07:38PMSo OS cannot compete versus a good Company? by Shivetya (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @05:35PMRe:So OS cannot compete versus a good Company? by Space cowboy (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @05:49PMRe:So OS cannot compete versus a good Company? by JabberWokky (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @07:30PMRe:So OS cannot compete versus a good Company? by Halfbaked Plan (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @07:57PMRe:So OS cannot compete versus a good Company? by Space cowboy (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @10:24PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:Synergy by andy jenkins (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @05:50PMRe:Propriatory by RingDev (Score:3) Wednesday November 02, @05:53PMRe:Propriatory by Moofie (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @06:21PMRe:Propriatory by mmkkbb (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @06:43PMiPod's dirty little secret by John.P.Jones (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @05:56PMRe:iPod's dirty little secret by derflammenhund (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @07:16PMApple's Incentive by John.P.Jones (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @07:42PMRe:Synergy by Anonymous Cowpat (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @06:26PMRe:Synergy by another_mr_lizard (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @06:48PMRe:Synergy by Anonymous Cowpat (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @07:36PMRe:Synergy by btobin (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @07:12PMRe:Synergy by Van Halen (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @07:54PMRe:Synergy by spongeboy (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @10:38PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.iRiver interface sucks by Aexia (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @10:30PMRe:Synergy by crabpeople (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @06:32PMRe:Synergy by mickwd (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @06:38PMRe:Synergy by bkessels (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @06:38PMRe:Synergy by FST777 (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @07:01PMRe:Synergy by kermitthefrog917 (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @07:45PMRe:Synergy by Dachannien (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @08:17PMRe:Synergy by FLEB (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @10:28PMRe:Synergy by jdwest (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @08:51PMIf you don't build a cute package, by crovira (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @09:59PMTo contend with the iPod: make it RECORD by aphor (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @10:33PM4 replies beneath your current threshold. Can Open Source Outdo the IPod? by Chocolate Teapot (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @05:19PMRe: Can Open Source Outdo the IPod? by varmittang (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @05:21PMRe: Can Open Source Outdo the IPod? by varmittang (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @05:30PMRe: Can Open Source Outdo the IPod? by SomeGuyTyping (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @05:34PM2 replies beneath your current threshold.1 reply beneath your current threshold. Translation (Score:5, Funny) by conner_bw (120497) on Wednesday November 02, @05:19PM (#13936061) (http://www.trotch.com/ | Last Journal: Thursday March 24, @12:46PM) iPod makes millions of dollars and we'd like to make millions of dollars too? Can you help us? We promise not to pay you. [ Reply to ThisRe:Translation by Tiger4 (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @05:30PM Re:Translation (Score:5, Funny) by Overly Critical Guy (663429) on Wednesday November 02, @05:32PM (#13936221) In an office somewhere in Cupertino, Steve Jobs read about this in one of his many memos, laughed, farted, and went to go have lunch with Yo-Yo Ma.Short answer to article question: NO. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Translation by krosk (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @08:20PMRe:Translation by SpinJaunt (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @10:40PM Re:Translation (Score:5, Insightful) by guitaristx (791223) on Wednesday November 02, @05:39PM (#13936301) (Last Journal: Friday June 10, @04:46PM) As funny as the parent is, it's a sad truth. Most people who look at the open source community don't understand that open-source programming pays the bills for some people. If Neuros wants open-source components for their media player, and want it under a specific timeline, they have a few choices (notice that their current behavior is not listed):Write it themselves, and open-source it.Pay someone to write it, and open-source it.Hope that someone in the software community writes a near-enough piece of software that can be made to work with their media player inside the time frame that they're looking for....(wait for it)and open-sources it.For some reason, some people still seem to have the idea that open-source development is free.Everyone, repeat after me:Open-Source Software does not cost money.Open-Source Software development does cost money. [ Reply to This | Parent Re:Translation (Score:5, Informative) by Vaevictis666 (680137) on Wednesday November 02, @06:12PM (#13936596) This mostly applies to the Neuros 3 (their next-gen MP3 player) than the 442 (video player).The plan from what I know as someone waiting for the Neuros3 to come out so I can purchase it, is that they're doing in-house development on it to a fully functional point and open-sourcing it and any libraries/middleware they can contractually release.The "community" effort they're relying on to drive further adoption is for the extensions. It doesn't ship with Ogg or FLAC support natively, but someone out there is going to add it because they know how, and then it will become a selling feature. The developers who add this kind of thing will gravitate to it because it means they *can* get a portable Ogg player if they put the effort into it.And yet, after all of this, Neuros (the company) isn't doing anything explicit for Ogg support or whatever. They're just creating a shell and letting people tinker with it. They do apply to your first criteria (Write it themselves, and open-source it.) for the basics, and then let the community push it and see how far they want to take the hardware. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Translation by uhoreg (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @07:41PMRe:Translation by Vaevictis666 (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @07:51PMRe:Translation by uhoreg (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @08:49PMRe:Translation by HairyCanary (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @06:12PMRe:Translation by TheRaven64 (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @09:49PM1 reply beneath your current threshold."It's crazy, but it just might work!" by hey! (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @08:47PMApple treats users like babies by Anonymous Coward (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @05:19PMRe:Apple treats users like babies by P3NIS_CLEAVER (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @05:28PMRe:Apple treats users like babies by AcidPenguin9873 (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @05:52PMRe:Apple treats users like babies by martinX (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @06:16PMRe:Apple treats users like babies by NM156 (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @06:46PMRe:Apple treats users like babies by Van Halen (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @07:34PMRe:Apple treats users like babies by martinX (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @10:18PMRe:Apple treats users like babies by Jesselnz (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @06:17PMRe:Apple treats users like babies by Goldarn (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @06:51PM*GASP* by PayPaI (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @06:22PMRe:Apple treats users like babies by Quiet_Desperation (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @06:24PMRe:Apple treats users like babies by nbert (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @06:29PMRe:Apple treats users like babies by mmkkbb (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @06:49PMRe:Apple treats users like babies by nbert (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @06:57PMRe:Apple treats users like babies by MKalus (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @07:04PM1 reply beneath your current threshold. More "Skins" (Score:5, Insightful) by MLopat (848735) on Wednesday November 02, @05:20PM (#13936068) (http://www.lunadevelopment.com/) Oh great, just what we all needed more skins for a media player. That's essentially what this project amounts to. [ Reply to ThisRe:More "Skins" by Anonymous Coward (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @05:22PMRe:More "Skins" by chreekat (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @05:41PMRe:More "Skins" by hackstraw (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @06:14PMRe:More "Skins" by chris_eineke (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @06:48PM1 reply beneath your current threshold. PR (Score:4, Interesting) by gtrubetskoy (734033) * on Wednesday November 02, @05:20PM (#13936072) (http://www.openhosting.com/) From TFA "Most open-source projects do fail because they typicallydon't have full-time employees, but only a few volunteers who a lot oftimes are kids," Born [the CEO] said. ... and some CEO's need to grow up, I'll be off to buy a nano, which works without the "help from the open source community" (who are mostly kids, mind you). My guess is this article is just some paid (and poor quality) PR. Read this [paulgraham.com] to learn moreabout how these articles end up published. [ Reply to ThisRe:PR by Valafar (Score:3) Wednesday November 02, @05:38PMRe:PR by Digital11 (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @05:49PMFlamebait: all ur innovation belong to us. by twitter (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @06:03PM3 replies beneath your current threshold.2 replies beneath your current threshold. Damn good idea (Score:5, Interesting) by COMON$ (806135) on Wednesday November 02, @05:22PM (#13936095) While I do own an IPod, I would drop it in an instant if I could have a nice open source digital music player that I wouldnt be forced to use one program for itunes.Perhaps if sucessfull this will start a new trend in digital phones, blackberries, PDAs, or any other portable device. [ Reply to ThisRe:Damn good idea by NaruVonWilkins (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @05:27PMRe:Damn good idea by COMON$ (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @05:31PMRe:Damn good idea by The Ancients (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @05:33PMRe:Damn good idea by courtarro (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @05:47PMRe:Damn good idea by COMON$ (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @05:53PMRe:Damn good idea by PGC (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @06:03PMRe:Damn good idea by The Vulture (Score:3) Wednesday November 02, @06:49PMRe:Damn good idea by Fear the Clam (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @06:58PMRe:Damn good idea by The Vulture (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @07:25PMRe:Damn good idea by geekoid (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @09:09PMRe:Damn good idea by dangitman (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @08:15PMRe:Damn good idea by The Vulture (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @09:30PMRe:Damn good idea by Colonel Angus (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @07:03PMRockbox + iRiver by meehawl (Score:2) Thursday November 03, @12:09AM2 replies beneath your current threshold. Even if... (Score:4, Insightful) by CupBeEmpty (720791) on Wednesday November 02, @05:24PM (#13936118) (http://vdov.net/) ...it is a publicity stunt I don't mind. We could use more publicity stunts like this. [ Reply to This Open source UIs (Score:5, Interesting) by jfengel (409917) on Wednesday November 02, @05:24PM (#13936120) (http://slashdot.org/ | Last Journal: Monday November 03, @03:59PM) Most of the time, open source UIs are worse than their commercial brethren because they lack a cogent, coherent tack. You can't win just by adding features. An iPod does exactly, precisely what it should do and not a single thing more.I can think of a few examples of really brilliant open-source UIs: Firefox and Eclipse come to mind. So it's not impossible. But in those cases the amazingly solid core UI was developed by key players, and other developers contributed functionality.So I'm gonna guess that the answer in this case is "almost certainly not". [ Reply to ThisRe:Open source UIs by gpw213 (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @06:07PMRe:Open source UIs by Halfbaked Plan (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @08:21PMRe:Yes it does. by Infernal Device (Score:1) Wednesday November 02, @05:47PMRe:Open source UIs by jfengel (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @06:09PMRe:Open source UIs by kalidasa (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @09:41PM3 replies beneath your current threshold. Not likely (Score:5, Insightful) by phpm0nkey (768038) on Wednesday November 02, @05:25PM (#13936136) (http://www.namefuse.com/) Two features make the iPod a killer app for me: the scroll wheel, and smart playlists.Simple as it may seem, the scroll wheel is possibly the most ingenious user interface mechanism of the past 10 years. I can pull up a list of 500 artists on my iPod and navigate to any one in a matter of seconds. Apple's patent on this design virtually ensures that every "iPod killer" will end up as "roadkill".iTunes, on the other hand, can be copied. Apple's player is great at managing very large music libraries (10,000+ songs). Apple's Smart Playlists are as close as any software gets to letting me run SQL queries on my music library to generate playlists. I form playlists based on the play count and rating. So far, I haven't found any other music library manager that lets me get this specific, this granular with my collection. [ Reply to This Re:Not likely (Score:4, Interesting) by DrEldarion (114072) on Wednesday November 02, @05:34PM (#13936252) (http://www.dealmein.net/) What? I have a Dell DJ that came with a scroll wheel and also has intelligent playlists. I can pull up by artist, album, genre, etc.The black/silver/blue glow is also sexier than an iPod, IMO, but that's just a matter of taste. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Not likely by starling (Score:2) Wednesday November 02, @05:42PM Re:Not likely (Score:4, Insightful)