I ordered an iPod shuffle withing hours of its announcement and it is most impressive.

The sound is amazing and the controls very usable, almost intuitive.

Yet, I was surprised as some of its shortcomings.

The ear buds have "R" and "L" labels. The foam padding covers the letters so you cannot tell the left ear bud from the right.

You have to pull back the foam padding.

This struck me as rather poor design.

How could they put such effort into the iPod itself and ignore the ear buds? Didn't they try them and realize you cannot tell left from right?

Maybe they didn't put the foam padding on.

My solution was to tie two knots in one lead.

Now I just hold them out and the one that hangs down further is the left ear. It even works in the dark.

I have told Apple that the should make the leads of unequal length. At least they have an iPod Shuffle feedback link. Let's see what happens.