“Hindered by its headline feature”

On his channel about new and old hi-fi equipment, Techmoan profiles a modern Fosi Audio Neo player (the relevant segment starts at 17:36): Fosi Audio Neo apes the iPod. At first glance, it looks exactly the same – a deck-of-cards-sized device with a wheel, and above it a screen showing either the currently playing track, or a hierarchical, textual menu: But the reviewer quickly discovers that the iPod copycat is a disaster in use, its creators accidentally highlighting two important rules: “simple” does not mean “fewer things,” simplicity cannot happen without a lot of small details done well. To the first point: iPod actually had five main buttons, not just one. This is most visible in the third generation, which put most of the commands above the wheel: In all the other ones, the buttons were integrated around, or even within the wheel: But the modern product only has one button, and that’s too few for all the necessary functionality. Now “going back” means a long press, and that’s…