But just because the iPod photo is a poor image display device doesn't mean it isn't getting use. In fact, it's a wildly popular device. And, with wild popularity comes wild and wacky "hacks" that change how the device is used. In this article, we seek out some of the weirder and wackier hacks and spotlight them for your twisted amusement.

The iPod digital stereoscope
A stereoscope was a device popular back at the turn of the 20th Century. It consisted of two eyepieces and two pictures, as shown in Figure A. Because your eyes were slightly separated, a good stereoscopic image would appear somewhat 3-D.

FIGURE A

Here's a drawing of an old stereoscope. Click picture for a larger image.

Fast forward to 2005, when an Australian stereoscope expert named Paul Bourke decided to tinker with the iPod photo. As you can see in Figure B, he's married an old stereoscope from 1868 and two iPod photos. We're particularly impressed with the craftsmanship of the styrofoam cutouts.

FIGURE B

And now, the updated stereoscope, complete with iPods. Click picture for a larger image.

For more information on this hack, visit http://astronomy.swin.edu.au/~pbourke/stereographics/ipodphoto.

What can you connect to your iPod photo?
Phillip Torrone writes for O'Reilly's very cool MAKE magazine. He seems to be enamored with an accessory for the iPod, the iPod connector. This device allows you to connect your camera to your iPod and download images off the camera to the iPod's 60GB hard drive. This is cool and an actually solid justification for getting an iPod photo.

Ah, but Mr. Torrone seems a curious sort and wanted to know just how many different things he could connect to his iPod. As shown in Figure C, he's attempting to see if he can talk between his iPod and a PlayStation Portable. He's also trying to charge the PSP from the iPod.

FIGURE C

Is there going to be iPod<->PSP love? Click picture for a larger image.

Apparently, he gets a charge out of charging his iPod with his iPod. He also connected his iPod Shuffle to his iPod photo, in a sort of incestuous iPod-on-iPod power-sharing scene. For more weirdness, visit http://www.makezine.com/blog/archive/2005/06/ipod_photo_conn.html.

Has Apple blocked iPod porn?
Yeah, you knew it was going to happen. If you can display pictures on something, someone's going to try to display those pictures. Well, apparently both Wired's Leander Kahney and Tokyo blogger Keith Finch are particularly curious about this. Finch, through Kahney, claims the iPod somehow randomly screws up how his photos are displayed, so that his "special" pictures wind up being interspersed with his regular, socially acceptable pictures during an iPod slide show.