The report said that those who listened for five hours a week at high-volume settings exposed themselves to more noise than permitted in the noisiest factory or work place. Maximum volume on some devices can generate as much noise as an airplane taking off nearby...

“Regularly listening to personal music players at high-volume settings when young,” the report said, “often has no immediate effect on hearing but is likely to result in hearing loss later in life...”
But older people may also be vulnerable. In the 27 countries in the European Union, an estimated 50 million to 100 million people out of about 500 million may be listening to portable music players daily, the report said.

Users listening at high volumes for more than an hour a day each week risk permanent hearing loss after five years. This is equivalent to 5 percent to 10 percent of the listeners, which may be 2.5 million to 10 million people in the European Union, the study concluded...

The report refers to a 2004 study that recommends limiting listening time to one hour per day and setting the volume to no more than 60 percent of maximum sound output when using headphones that are placed over the ears — and even less when using ear buds.

It said another study suggested restricting the maximum output level of personal music players to 90 decibels.

Ah, there's nothing like science confirming something you instinctively know (or reconfirming something you've already read about repeatedly) to shame you into changing your unhealthy ways. Looks like I need to once again add "stop playing your music so loud, dummy" to my list of New Year's resolutions. For recovering headphone junkies (or recidivists like myself), I recommend reading David Toop's essential Haunted Weather: Music, Silence, and Memory, a key book in making me rethink my relationship with the ambient sound level (and ambient sounds) of the 21st-century. Who knows, soon you might be once again be able to marvel at the natural/industrial soundscape of your neighborhood rather than burying your head in hip-hop singles played at inappropriate volume.

Study Warns of Hearing Loss From Music Players [NYT]
Haunted Weather [Amazon]

Here is the photo in its full-size glory:

James Blunt? Someone at Apple couldn't think of a better album with a blue cover than the debut by James Blunt? In an effort to help out whoever's designing Apple's next presentation, here are my selections for album covers that match the iPod Nano's new color line. (I decided to leave out black and silver, because those should be gimmes.)

Blue: The Avalanches, Since I Left You

Green: Belle & Sebastian, The Boy With The Arab Strap

Yellow: De La Soul, 3 Feet High and Rising

Orange: Broadcast, Work And Non Work

Pink: Sunny Day Real Estate, LP2

Red: Gang of Four, Entertainment!

I give up on purple. The first Smiths album? I have no idea.

Here's the video for "That's Not My Name," which appears in the aforementioned ad.

Are you feeling this? Fannypack-style jumping jack hook aside, it's not doing much for me. I'm sure I'll have plenty of opportunities to change my mind before May 20, when their album We Started Nothing comes out

The Ting Tings - That's Not My Name [YouTube]

That's partly because the song in question comes from Benson's album The Alternative To Love, which was released nearly three years ago. The Detroit singer-songwriter is no stranger to TV ad money, having already placed several songs in national spots ("Tiny Spark" for Saturn, "Cold Hands (Warm Heart)" for Ford, and even "What I'm Looking For" already once before for Sears). Nearly a week after the iPod ad started running, the song is nowhere to be found on the iTunes Store's Top 100 chart. But given that Benson's previous biggest claims to fame include filling more cutout bins with his major-label debut, 1996's excellent One Mississippi, than Carly Hennessy has—not to mention playing in a band with Jack White that even most White Stripes fans seem to hate—I'm happy to see a little extra exposure for "Looking," which was my favorite song off Alternative.

Brendan Benson - What I'm Looking For [YouTube]

mauraidolator: read this.
xshredheadx: oh man. that's so sad
mauraidolator: sad how?
xshredheadx: well i mean, to say that the ipod is killing the dj—i wouldn't want the one described in the article either.
mauraidolator: that's what i was thinking!
xshredheadx: there is a balance
xshredheadx: one that i was hoping they'd get to in the article
mauraidolator: i just feel like the trend toward ipods (or cd-rs! which i used to dj a friend's wedding a few years ago, and which i think was really the start of this trend) is part of a rebellion against paying up the nose for a one-size-fits-all solution
mauraidolator: what do you think?
xshredheadx: i say the actual dj is still very necessary
xshredheadx: one of the things i try and get across to couples is that they can't really dictate the PERFECT PLAYLIST
xshredheadx: it's impossible, no matter how smart they think they are
xshredheadx: a lot of couples i've talked to have tried to micromanage their playlist beyond any level of cheese
xshredheadx: i think they invite these people to their wedding and don't want them to have a good time
xshredheadx: it's like...
xshredheadx: i think that couples are so focused on THIS BEING THEIR BIG DAY
xshredheadx: and that everything will be their way or the highway
xshredheadx: i had a bride tell me straight out i wasn't allowed to play anything her mother requested. just to spite her ... you know, like no bob seger or whatever
xshredheadx: but is that mother of the bride coughing up some dough for this BIG DAY? you bet.
xshredheadx: i think modern brides and grooms can be pretty self centered in that respect
xshredheadx: when i sense this vibe from people i don't take the gig
xshredheadx: that being said, i've seen the most fucked up shit work in ways i never though it would
xshredheadx: for example: one couple wanted their cocktail hour to be strictly smiths and morrissey...
xshredheadx: and it wasn't terrible. it actually worked nicely ...
xshredheadx: because it wasn't at this high-focus time. it was just the cocktail hour
xshredheadx: that's when i try to get people to highly specialize their night
mauraidolator: but if it had been an all-smiths dance party ...
xshredheadx: oh man. terrible
xshredheadx: one other thing—the specialty thing only works when the family is 100% behind it
xshredheadx: i had a couple who wanted nothing but hard rock early on—sabbath, pentagram, that stuff.
mauraidolator: whoa
mauraidolator: sabbath??
xshredheadx: yeah
xshredheadx: it ruled, and the family loved it
mauraidolator: wow. that is awesome
xshredheadx: they were totally cool with it because they knew their daughter and son
xshredheadx: a lot of couples don't want to do anything traditional anymore
xshredheadx: it's like they want to get "married" but they don't want to get MARRIED
xshredheadx: they don't want the garter belt thing (understandable, kinda weird)
xshredheadx: they don't want the dollar dance (tacky. i don't think anyone does this anymore)
xshredheadx: they don't want the hokey pokey, chicken dance, electric slide (this is totally fine by me, i don't play these songs.)
xshredheadx: no achy breaky, fine fine fine
xshredheadx: but now, i've had people start to say things like,
xshredheadx: i don't want to dance with my mom.
xshredheadx: i don't want to dance with my dad.
xshredheadx: i don't want to announce the cake cutting.
xshredheadx: i don't want to be announced.
xshredheadx: it's like—jesus, do you still want people to show up?
xshredheadx: do you still want gifts?
xshredheadx: do you still want to party your ass off?
mauraidolator: right.
xshredheadx: i mean COME ON
xshredheadx: it's ok to get all freaky with the music
xshredheadx: to be honest, most families won't even notice
xshredheadx: but the one thing your grandma wants more than anything is
xshredheadx: to see you dance with your husband/wife
xshredheadx: to see you cut the fucking cake
xshredheadx: and so, you should plan those things.you should do those things because to be honest, they aren't cheesy
xshredheadx: they're sentimental and PART OF THE WHOLE DEAL
xshredheadx: those are the photo ops, those are the things people stick around for
mauraidolator: so do you think that the personalization craze is just getting out of control, and that everyone basically wants to be a delicate fucking snowflake?
xshredheadx: sometimes.
xshredheadx: people get so wrapped round the axle about their event, they forget what makes weddings fun
mauraidolator: any final thoughts?
xshredheadx: here goes: an ipod doesn't see your grandma and grandpa sneak away during dinner and dance out on the patio to the strains of some dorsey brothers hit.
xshredheadx: oh man. this sounds so cheesy
xshredheadx: but you know what i mean. all the perfect planning doesn't make up for someone being there to interpret a mood or to help make a mood happen
xshredheadx: and i also think people take their cues from the person spinning music
xshredheadx: nobody wants to look at a piece of plastic and dance with it
xshredheadx: (unless it's a jonathan richman record. but that's a whole other story)
xshredheadx: they want to see a person up there, selecting songs for them. at least, that's the response that i've gotten.

Digital kills the wedding DJ... you'll be sorry [Times Online, via TDS]
[Photo via Manamanah]

[Photo: Getty Images]

ICarta Stereo Dock for iPod with Bath Tissue Holder [Amazon]
[Pic via Gizmodo]

Fifth-generation iPods have come with a Music Quiz game for a couple of years now. If you've ever been bored enough to click on it, you were treated to a clever, low-tech game that played samples of songs from your 'Pod and threw up multiple choices of song titles, also from your collection. iQuiz isn't much higher-tech than that, and the obvious difference is an improvement in the graphics (including some ill-advised game-show music that, mercifully, you can turn off). Here's the clever part: Apple made iQuiz customizable, and gave it the power to track lifetime scores.

The game comes with a few hundred music-trivia questions, which, if you're reading this site, you'll run through in a fraction of a day. (They're actually fairly smart questions, but I kept getting the one asking me to name the Minutemen's Double Nickels on the Dime over and over.) But once you get bored, you can write your own quizzes and send them to friends for uploading into their iPods. Below, your Guest Idolator offers a 10-question sample quiz he threw together over the weekend, when he should've been out enjoying New York's summerlike weather.

Apple clearly wants this thing to take off—they've priced iQuiz at 99 cents, five bucks cheaper than all the other iPod games. We give it about a month before someone on the series of tubes creates a site to start trading custom iQuizzes, complete with people bragging about their SAT-like iQuiz prowess (three wrong answers kills a 10-question round, so one bad round of trivia will drag your lifetime average down). The quizzes you create don't have to be about music, of course, and iQuiz actually comes with sets of trivia about movies and TV. It'll be interesting to see who ends up dominating the iQuiz geekery: 24 obsessives, or Fall Out Boy fans.

Chris Molanphy's iQuiz Pack [link expired]
iQuiz [Apple]

Call it iSilly, a growing number of products in which fun is emphasized over function, and cute or irreverent often trumps wow. All of these items, some costing as little as $10, have been created to plug into an iPod — or, in many cases, any audio source that has a standard 3.5-millimeter headphone jack. ...

The first iPal, released last year, was a shaggy, plush creature resembling a teardrop-shaped extraterrestrial with stereo speakers for eyes positioned on long, flexible stalks. The shaggy iPal plugs into any audio player with a standard headphone jack, avoiding the need for an Apple license.

Mr. Schneider said the original iPal, which cost about $25, was intended for "tween girls who want to have something cool and fun in their room."

Then came the Movin' and Groovin' line of potted plants, also $25, "probably the best introduction in the history of my company," Mr. Schneider said. The plants, some wearing sunglasses and others a pink purse over a leafy limb, gyrate to music played through a speaker hidden in the plant's pot.

The Times article has info on other items that will be clogging up dollar-store shelves and landfills within the next 18 months, including the i-Bratz i-Petz Piggy, which, amazingly, mushes together glammed-up ditz dolls Bratz, iPods, and the notion of pigs flying. Congratulations to whoever came up with that idea: It's only February, but you've already created the piece of junk that pretty much defines everything about 2007.

iPod's Groovy Factor [NYT]

A state senator from Brooklyn said on Tuesday he plans to introduce legislation that would ban people from using an MP3 player, cell phone, Blackberry or any other electronic device while crossing the street in either New York City or Buffalo.

NewsChannel 4 reported that Sen. Carl Kruger is proposing the ban in response to two recent pedestrian deaths in his district, including a 23-year-old man who was struck and killed last month while listening to his iPod on Avenue T and East 71st Street In Bergen Beach.

"While people are tuning into their iPods and cell phones, they're tuning out the world around them," Kruger said. The proposed law would make talking on cell phones while crossing the street a comparable offense to jaywalking.

We don't think Kruger will get too far with this: After all, it's easy enough to introduce legislation (we do it every few days or so, on a lark), but it's much harder to get to push it through the famously combative New York State Legislature—especially when residents start whining about how they have the right to jaywalk with their Jayhawks. That said, we're willing to get behind the ban if it's extended into movie theaters, clubs, restaurants, libraries, small-scale armories, adults-only aquariums, and petting zoos. Anything to get a few more assholes off the streets.

Ban Proposed On Walking While Talking, Listening To iPod [wnbc.com]
Carl Kruger [27th District site]

UPDATE: Okay, okay, it was a joke.

Gizmodo's coverage of MacWorld2007 [gizmodo.com]
Earlier: iPod-Worshipping Music Fans Prepare To Hand Jobs More Handjobs
[Image via Gizmodo]

...most Apple watchers are waiting for an announcement on an Apple smartphone, which could play music, make calls and perform other functions.

Wall Street analysts, including Charlie Wolf of Needham & Co., Chris Whitmore of Deutsche Bank and American Technology Research's Shaw Wu, have mentioned the widely anticipated iPhone in notes to clients. "The veil of secrecy and anticipation around the iPhone's release is already generating tremendous buzz without a single iPhone advertising dollar being spent," Whitmore wrote in an January 2 note.

Personally, we were hoping that Apple was finally going ahead with the iZod, a new device in which Jobs doppelganger Terence Stamp implores the "Planet Houston!" to "kneel!" between tracks. But we'll probably have to settle for iPhone, which will convert the entire population into insular (yet chatty) noise machines, therefore making movegoing an even bigger annoyance than before.

Many Expect iPod Phone At Macworld [Reuters]

Fortune is reporting that the Beatles may hitch their wagon to the iTunes Store, allowing iTunes to enjoy a window of exclusivity with the Fab Four's catalog, which hasn't been officially available in digital form. While details of the deal—which may, according to Fortune's report, include a Beatles-branded iPod—are still being hammered out, this could be huge for the Beatles' label, EMI, which had a lackluster 2006. No word on whether or not another batch of trend stories looking at boomers' digital-music tastes has been assigned as a result of this development, but we're sure those will be on the way as soon as this deal's ink dries.

Beatles: only on iPod? [money.cnn.com]

As loathe as we are to report on the 3,000 new iPod-enhancing iTems that are introduced everyday (it's a damn music player, people—stop trying to dress it up like it's a doll), we are intrigued by the Fatman iTube Valve Amp, which claims to convert the iPod's evil-robot digital sound into a "luscious warm analogue sound." By the looks of it, we're also pretty sure that it steams milk, too.

Anyway, before we hunker down 300 pounds for this sucker, has anyone tried this sort of digital-analogue conversion before? And does anyone under the age of 30 even care what "analogue sound" even is (or was)?

Fatman iTube

The first step is to smash it against the floor in an attempt to bust it open and turn it into art.

Steve Jobs would quibble with the whole idea of turning the iPod into art, no? But really, we just want to know what Bruchman's going to do with the flaming bowl of rum.

How to fix an iPod, by Bryan Bruchman [subinev]

Though these figures have been rumored for a while, Microsoft has officially set a price and a release date for Zune, its late-to-the-game media-player: A 30GB model will be out Nov. 14th, with a price tag of $249.99. The Zune store will sell songs for 99 cents, and there's also a subscription-service option for $14.99 a month. And for approximately $1, you can buy a pack of ALF puffy stickers on eBay, which will allow you to cover up the device's hideous color scheme.

Microsoft to Charge $249.99 for Zune Player, Due Out in November [AP]

It seems like a lose-lose situation for Apple: If they're victorious in getting full rights to the already widespread name, they'll spend the next ten years reminding copy-desk editors that Podcast is a proper noun, like Xerox or Dumpster; if they lose, they'll look like dicks. Or at least, bigger dicks than usual.
So before this thing gets out of hands, maybe we use this as an opportunity to come up with our own ideas for what to call the damn things. Any ideas?

Apple Hits Podcast Ready With Nastygram [Wired]
Apple to go to war over 'pod' [Daily Mail]

(Also: Can they figure out a slightly less phallic way to photograph this thing? Or is it just us?)

Miles Davis iPod [Advertisement]

Of course, this is like catnip to the geeky hackers of the world, who relish the opportunity to stick it to the man, especially if that man is Steve Jobs. Uncompatible Systems has a step-by-step guide to stripping your iTunes songs from all the add-ons (it even works with iTunes 7). The best part? You can do it using Apple's own products, meaning Jobs will now cry himself to sleep on his giant pillow stuffed with money.

"Using Apple Products To Remove Apple's DRM"

It's been a gloriously self-indulgent week for the music-device manufacturers of the world—or, as we call them, our overlords. First, Apple introduced its new iPod, and now Microsoft has unveiled its yet-to-be-released Zune. As you can tell by this picture, Microsoft head Bill Gates—seen here throwing down some old Humpty Hump verses—is clearly "down" with the "street." But how do his Zune and the iPod match up? Our side-by-side comparison after the jump. Much like the iPod itself, expect our maybe-funny asides to work just fine at first, and then quickly run out of juice.

TYPICAL CUSTOMER
IPOD Music fans who remember the days of faddish, easily breakable playback devices—and who wish to recreate them at ten times the cost.
ZUNE Time travelers, sleepy trolls, and various other off-the-grid miscreants who have yet to purchase an iPod.

COMMUNITY-BUILDING INTERACTIVITY
IPOD Unless you count trying to meet girls while in line at the Genius Bar, none.
ZUNE Built-in wifi allows users to share thousands of songs they will never, ever listen to.

EXTRAS
IPOD Fun, challenging games like mah-jongg and mini golf and Texas Hold 'Em.
ZUNE Fun, challenging games like trying to get your friends why you bought a portable-music device that kind of looks like a whittled-down turd.

BRAND-BUILDING STAR POWER
IPOD U2, Eminem
ZUNE 30 Seconds To Mars

MOST COMMONLY HEARD USER QUESTION
IPOD "Why do the batteries die early?"
ZUNE "What the hell is a 30 Seconds To Mars?"

"Microsoft Zune Gets Officially Announced" [Gizmodo]

Meanwhile, there's an official site that's scored by Regina Spektor's piano ditty "Us." No free IPods for her!

"Zune: what we know, think we know, and don't yet know" [Engadget]
Comingzune.com [Official site]

- Having already succeeding at crapping up the music of the Beatles, Cirque Du Soleil now plans to open an Elvis Presley-inspired show in Las Vegas in 2009. [Billboard]

- The Chinese are working hard to ensure that you'll be able to play your copy of Back to Basics on shuffle. [BBC News]