I think the most of the current SqueezeBox owners fall in either of the following categories: - Computer geek - Audiophile
Both these categories needs a computer at home and thus also likes to setup a local SlimServer. The audiophiles because the internet radio sound quality is't good enough and the computer geeks because a SlimServer will results in an extra computer or a cool NAS box. I think a probable future is that Logitech likes to target a third category of users, those that like music but really doesn't care as much about the sound quality as the audiophiles. The optimal solution for these users would probably be a setup with no local SlimServer. If/when the internet radio services get good enough you will be able to stream your choice of music and there are already sites like mp3tunes.com that allows you to play your own music through SqueezeNetwork. It won't work for the audiophiles because the quality when streaming over internet isn't good enough, it won't work for the computer geeks because they want their precious extra computer/NAS, but I think it will work for the third user category. This will of course simplify the setup a lot, because all you have to do is plugin your SqueezeBox and connect to your router and register att SqueezeNetwork and your are done. This third category of people are also not represented in any polls in the forum, which also results in that these polls that indicates that most SqueezeBox owners runs Linux and have a local SlimServer might not be representative of the future. My guess is that SlimServer/SqueezeCenter will probably still be supported in the future for the audiophiles and computer geeks crowd. Especially since SqueezeNetwork as I understand basically is just a customized version of SlimServer running on a central place. The thing that is going to make the really cool stuff happen is the Jive remote, if developed correctly. When the Jive remote will be able to play music directly to your ears, we won't even be needing the SqueezeBox. A Jive remote in the format of a portable device would mean that you will have access to all your music anywhere where you have wireless access. Of course, this would mean that the Jive remote needs to take the logical step from being a remote control to be a portable internet streaming device. I think we will probably see a intermediate step to reach this goal, where the Jive device is just a remote control to control your local SqueezeBox. When getting into the portable device area colors will also start to matter. For a SqueezeBox standing in the living room you want it to fit the style/color of the other equipment in the room, so a blue or pink SqueezeBox doesn't make much sense to me. But for a portable Jive internet streaming device is certainly does, because then it's starting to be a "life style product" and Logitech is going to be in the competition with the iPod. Even though I personally doesn't listen to internet radio at all, I think internet services will be the future. The number of people that feels it is important to have a nice record collection visible in the living room is probably going to decrease in the future. The strange thing is that the current main obstacle for internet services is the music industry itself. But it is probably just a matter of time until they will open their eyes and adapt their business models to streaming based solutions. -- erland Erland Isaksson 'My homepage' (http://erland.homeip.net) 'My download page' (http://erland.homeip.net/download) (Developer of 'TrackStat, SQLPlayList, DynamicPlayList, Custom Browse, Custom Scan, Custom Skip, Multi Library and Database Query plugins' (http://wiki.erland.homeip.net/index.php/Category:SlimServer)) ------------------------------------------------------------------------ erland's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=3124 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=40309 _______________________________________________ discuss mailing list [email protected] http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/discuss
