But fast-forward to 2019 and, somehow, the £159-a-pair little pods have transformed into a bona fide status symbol.
I’m not so sure AirPods are a status symbol, and definitely not a millennial one (The word millennial isn’t even mentioned in this article except the headline). But the AirPods are a great example of Apple’s product strategy: Enter a market with crappy products with a better designed, easy-to-use product, and reap the rewards.
Check It Out: The Success of AirPods and Apple’s Product Strategy
I disagree they are a crappy product! No, they are not audiophile quality, but a lot of earbuds, headphones, and speakers not also not audiophile quality but they do the job someone wants.
For me, the AirPods are a wonderful product that has worked better than every other earbud I’ve tried. Over the ear headphones do not work when I’m bicycling and all the corded earbuds keep pulling out as I turn my head to check traffic. Noise-canceling would endanger me as I would not hear events around me.
As mentioned above, if you allow a high collar or a cap brush against the tails, they will fall out, but that is not too much of a problem for me.
I like mine a lot. The only big downside I found is when I want to talk to someone on the phone and I am wearing them with watch cap pulled down over my ears; that interferes with the microphone.
I am wanting to get a new pair as the battery life is way down and I may only get 30-40 minutes. They do recharge quite quickly. Anyway, I think that I will wait and see of new model is released within the next few months.
Yeah, watch caps are a not a good combination in more than one way. I forget I even have my AirPods on and when I take my cap off the AirPods go flying. I use my Trex Titanium bone conduction headphones on those occasions but otherwise prefer the AirPods. The battery life seems to be holding up well on mine (purchased the week after they were introduced).