Ingenico has developed what they claim to be the first payment system based around an iPod…They’re using an iTrip FM transmitter to send the payment information, which is embedded in an MP3, and say that in the future we might be able to download a whole airplane boarding pass on MP3.

In a small interview with Griffin Technology’s CEO, Engadget learned more about the amazing Nano iTrip Hack:

Yeah. Isn’t it sexy? You can do really crazy stuff like Preferences, More Preferences, More Preferences, information screen. Nobody has ever used an iPod screen this way. It bitmaps screens to the iPod through a serial connector from the micro-controller. It’s just crazy.

There are dozens of excellent iPod 5G reviews out there, so I’ll just chime in with some quick comments.

The Good:

1. Portable Video – I’ve watched over 20 hours of video, including Smallville season 1 (transcoded from DVD), in places I don’t usually watch TV (car repair shop, bed(without waking my wife up – yay headphones, while eating lunch, on the porch, etc).
2. The packed-in slip case is very nice. It adds nothing to the weight or dimensions of the unit, but makes it safe to carry the 5G in your pocket with your keys.
3. I can watch channel9.msdn.com videos on the go!!

The Bad:

1. Battery Life is around 2 hours of video playback – Good thing you can play it while it’s plugged in!
2. Easy to scratch screen / no official protectors available, yet.
3. 4G accessories are not worthless with the 5G.
4. No 30 second fwd/backword skip. This is actually a huge problem.
5. No way to insert bookmarks in videos.
6. If you stop a video and play another, sometimes it seems to remember where you stopped that first video and other times it doesn’t.
7. No built in speaker.
8. Almost all video content needs to be transcoded to work on the iPod.

Anyway, I love it.

Stephen Speicher analyzes the $1.99 per episode price at iTunes.

I charged the battery last night and locked it. Today, the battery is empty.