Think back to the year 2005. If you were in the market of an iPod back in those days, what, now counting the iPod minis, would you find? You’d find two  models – a 20GB, mainstream model, and a high end 60GB model for all of those music crazed enthusiasts who needed enough space to be able to drive from the east coast to the west without ever hearing the same song.

Now think a year ago. Your old, trusty, 20GB iPod you bought back in 2005 has seen better days. The screen is all scratched up, that beautiful aluminum backing’s got enough little dings and scratches to pass for a shiny brick, and maybe it’s just you, but the little thing doesn’t have the battery life that it used to. What, exactly, would you find just a year ago at an Apple store? That 20GB mainstream model’s been upped to a gigantic 80GB model, and for the same price as the old 20GB. What about those music freaks we were talking about earlier? Forget about that old 60GB, they’ve got a nice 160GB model that fits up to forty. hours. of music. That’s eight-hours short of two consecutive days of straight listening. And, unless you’re the type of person who listens to your iPod when you go to the bathroom, when you brush your teeth, and when you sleep, that’ll last far longer than two days.

Today, in 2008, things are admittedly a little different. The demand for the 160GB model, as it turned out, was ridiculously low – almost nobody, not even those enthusiasts, needed 160GB worth of music. Almost nobody. So they got rid of that model, while continuing the trend of upping the casual user’s iPod’s storage. Now, today, you could walk into the Apple Store and buy yourself a 120GB iPod for the same. exact. price. as a 20GB iPod just three years earlier. That’s a 6x storage increase with a 0 dollar price increase. That’s huge, and it really makes you think – in three years time, how many songs will you be able to fit in your pocket?