Wired’s Leander Kahney offers an inside look at the development of the original iPod through an interview with Ben Knauss, a former senior manager at PortalPlayer, the company Apple approached to help develop the device. “The interesting thing about the iPod, is that since it started, it had 100 percent of Steve Jobs’ time,” said Knauss. “Not many projects get that. He was heavily involved in every single aspect of the project.” Knauss said Jobs’ influence was sometimes “idiosyncratic.” For example, the iPod is louder than most MP3 players because Jobs is partly deaf, he said. “They drove the sound up so he could hear it,” Knauss said.
