Putting the brakes on discs?

In the two years I’ve had my car, I’ve loaded a CD into the stereo player maybe twice. It’s not that I don’t listen to music. I do — a lot. Rather, it’s because I can plug my iPod into the player and use the player’s controls to select songs or use the iPod’s “Shuffle” feature.

So, I’m definitely in the demographic car-stereo maker Blaupunkt is targeting with its new player — featured in this New York Times item — that has no CD slot.

While I much prefer the ease and safety of having all my tunes accessible — no more flipping through the CD case at the stoplight — a USAToday story on the same player (in April) had some words of caution, if automakers are considering completely dropping CD players from dashboards.