Panic blog:

The iPod was one of the first times Apple showed up and did what we now think of as their standard move — they made The Apple Version®.

Great point. There were lots of other MP3 players out there. Apple took the concept, modernized and improved on the traditional components, then ran it through the Jony Ive design process. They Apple-ized it.

Now, there are a lot of mysteries in the Panic Archives (it’s a closet) but by far one of the most mysterious is what you’re seeing for the first time today: an original early iPod prototype.

We don’t know much about where it came from. But we’ve been waiting 20 years to share it with you.

Fantastic set of images. In that first pic, the tiny screen in the upper right corner of the giant box is the screen of the iPod prototype.

The prototype itself is shown in the third image. It has a date of September 3rd, 2001. That’s about 6 weeks before Steve’s iPod town hall keynote, and 8 days before 9/11.