That's gotta be one of the more informative, personal, non-confrontational 
extended threads this list has had in a long time.

And since I started the damn thing, I thought I'd chime in as well.

I keep hearing "loss of fidelity" tossed around as a reason not to have one, 
but many people have already mentioned that most of the time, the iPod is 
being used in a less-than-acoustically perfect environment. For me, it's 
while I'm hiking, or taking the train, or driving between both ends of the 
great state of CA. None of these environments can match the quiet of my 
office, which is where I listen to stuff when I want to *listen hard*. So a 
128 MP3 sounds just fine to me.

And, oddly enough, since most of the time I'm listening to music through 
speakers, when I put on the headphones, I actually get the true, strong 
stereo effect, and I can pick out small things buried in the mix that are 
easier to hear when it's being fed right into your head. But I am very 
careful not to go too loud. I want to be able to hear, but if I'm in a place 
where the outside noise drowns things out, I just turn it off. I'm not going 
to fight loud noise with louder noise.

Also, someone mentioned the benefits of shuffle, and I couldn't agree more. 
Individual songs get dredged up that I either wouldn't normally listen to, 
or I'd forgotten about. And sometimes they're unexpected treats.

One thing I *don't* do, though, is put full albums on my iPod. For me, the 
listening experience is better when it's just the songs I really, really 
like. There are a few execeptions, like Prince's "Purple Rain" and My Bloody 
Valentine's "Loveless" and Queen's "Queen II", but for the most part, I like 
cherry-picking my mobile music.

Thanks to everyone who chimed in. May the music never stop!

Don