Wednesday, January 31,2007 @ 7:45pm
iPod used in MLB, as jazz substitute
The success of Apple's iPod is evident in many walks of life, from Major League Baseball to smokey Japanese Jazz coffee shops. The Colorado Rockies in mid-June of 2006 adopted Apple's video iPod as a means for players to cram information and review plays before games, bringing the portable media player beyond the personal entertainment realm. "It's a good way to refresh yourself on how you got guys out," said pitcher Jason Jennings. "It's an amazing concept." In addition to spreading into the Major League as well as major educational institutions as a learning aid, the iPod is affecting the entire music industry on a global scale by influencing the prices of physical album sales, according to one report.
The iPod has largely contributed to the closure of cafe Chigusa -- a smokey jazz coffee shop in the Japanese port city of Yokohama -- because "these days, kids don't listen to jazz, and they walk down the street with iPods, which makes the whole idea of 'place' irrelevant," according to Michael Molasky, author of "The Jazz Culture of Postwar Japan." Reuters reports that 73 years after first opening its doors, Chigusa has fallen victim to the electronic revolution.