[computator]

This trend story about wired headphones is possibly a "submarine" story as Paul Graham calls it[1], like a headline that "Suits make a corporate comeback":

"The suit is back," it begins. Trend articles like this are almost always the work of PR firms. Once you know how to read them, it's straightforward to figure out who the client is. With trend stories, PR firms usually line up one or more "experts" to talk about the industry generally. In this case we get three: the NPD Group, the creative director of GQ, and a research director at Smith Barney. When you get to the end of the experts, look for the client. And bingo, there it is: The Men's Wearhouse.

[1] https://paulgraham.com/submarine.html

[nvarsj]

Possibly it's a paid for ad. But the trend is real, at least among Gen Z/Alphas. I recently modded an iPod Mini 2nd gen for my daughter and put Rockbox on it. The thing is amazing, and I am thinking about buying an iPod classic myself. The touch wheel interface is one of my favourite interfaces ever.

[t0mas88]

Cool! I wrote a significant part of the graphical UI for rockbox about 20 years ago. It was text based before that. Needed it for my back then very fancy harddisk based mp3 player.

The project was great to work with, Daniel Stenberg (also the curl maintainer) was really good at helping newcomers like me participate. That may be a big part of why the project is still around 20 years later.

[graypegg]

First off, you're a kickass parent, that's an awesome thing to do for your daughter. How easy is it to sync with music she wants to listen to? I haven't touched Rockbox in quite a while, but I imagine it's still expecting DRM-free audio files of some sort right? Other than bandcamp I can't think of any good source for finding some beyond ripping audio streams and organizing it yourself.

[prepend]

A lot of my drm-free mp3s come from friends. I probably have 2000+ cds that I’ve ripped, or downloads from buying vinyl. I’ll make a copy for friends to load onto devices and it’s the equivalent of loaning a disc to a friend.

I suppose there’s probably music torrent sites out there, but haven’t heard of anyone pirating music in many years as I’m too old now.

[iamdamian]

Apple’s music has mostly been DRM-free since 2009!

I love this about Apple and give them as much of my business I can to show that there is still a healthy market outside streaming. (7digital is another good source, although more expensive than Apple. They offer FLAC and 320kbps.)

Makes me wish e-book stores would get onboard…

[nine_k]

Amazon Music sells DRM-free MP3 files.

[ted537]

Qobuz too!

[SubmarineClub]

I’ve been thinking about doing this too! Would love to get back to maintaining a personal music collection on a dedicated mp3 player.

[rienbdj]

Do the old iPods still hold battery well?

[nvarsj]

You can buy good quality replacement batteries. I got Cameron Sino "CS-EC003XL". It lasts at least a week before needing a charge, depending how much you use it.

[furyofantares]

I agree. At the very least it's vastly overstating a real trend.

> Sales are through the roof in recent months.

OK, I'll follow the link here. It goes to an article titled "Wired Headphones Growth Is a Throwback to 2016"[1], already a far cry from "through the roof".

From that article we have this:

> After 5 years of sales declines, which culminated in a $42M drop in 2024, wired headphones rebounded in 2025, growing 3% (about $15M).

OK, great. So wired headphones are a little bit trendy after years of decline. And of course they have some real advantages as many people here are testifying.

But c'mon, "sales are exploding", "sales are through the roof". They're not through the roof, they did a little bounce when they hit the floor. OK, to be fair it also says "the trend really gained momentum in the second half of 2025, with sales surging 10% between July and December", so maybe it's getting some momentum, but let's not get so far ahead of ourselves.

[1] https://www.circana.com/post/wired-headphones-growth-is-a-th...

[PlanksVariable]

So who is the client? In all of the article’s photos of celebrities, they’re wearing Apple EarPods. Is Apple trying to convince people to buy their $19 EarPods instead of their $250 AirPods?

[y0eswddl]

Actually, yeah. It's better than the customer spending that $20 elsewhere.

And there's potential for upsell in-store and on the website.

If people are defecting to wired from EarPods, it makes sense to try and position themselves in thought next to wired ones as will

[PlanksVariable]

“If people are defecting to wired from EarPods”

This assumes that people are switching from wireless to wired headphones organically, and the main assertion of the article (wired headphones are popular again) isn’t actually manufactured.

Although it’s possible Apple influenced the article, it makes no sense for them to push the “wired over wireless” narrative. AirPods are a $25B/year business with very high profit margins. EarPods are a tiny fraction of that, and it’s not worth manufacturing a narrative that undermines their successful AirPods business even for the chance of upselling.

[kevin_thibedeau]

I saw one yesterday pointing out how phone cases are passé and "unnecessary" because of replacement plans.