Since its introduction almost two years ago, the fashionable and expensive iPod gadget has earned a reputation as a music hoard for selfish yuppies. But perhaps not for very much longer. Thanks to some ingenious Romanian entrepreneurs, it might actually start to be really useful. Here's how.

Since the whole point of music is to share it, portable music devices such as the Walkman and the iPod have been fairly useless until now: as the audience was firmly fixed at 1: the owner.

Now, at last, technology is able to catch up with society. At least in theory: cheap hard disks, wireless chips and decent batteries can be built into a small portable box, and the distribution systems successfully pioneered by the phone companies (that bring $500 computers to the mass market at $99 a shot) are all in place.

So you should be able to walk past your local coffee store or laundromat and collect music as you go - giving them a new social function as a radio station - or simply be able to share your tune of the day with the bus passenger next to you. And you should be able to do so knowing the artist gets paid.

Just as the Good Lord intended.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/07/10/wireless_ipod/