The Mighty player is an $85 iPod Shuffle for Spotify

A new age of music consumption demands a new type of music device. There have been challenges getting such devices off the ground, however. With this in line, the Mighty player for Spotify playlists has finally finished shipping to supporters of the company's crowdfunding campaigns, and is now on sale for $85.

Mighty looks similar to the original iPod Shuffle. It has no screen, opting instead for a few physical buttons for playback and volume control. After a few delays, some people feared that this would be another dud Kickstarter project that failed to materialize. The real issue was coordinating with Spotify, which had to get the rights from record labels to allow this use for the music on its service. Despite all this, it all worked out in the end.

Though the device doesn't do anything besides shuffle through playlist songs, Mighty has generated a surprising amount of excitement. It turns out that people really want a light music player for working out so they don't have to carry their smartphones around.

Pebble was another company to realize this and sought to capitalize on this with its Pebble Core. The concept was very similar to the Mighty, but it also included GPS and 3G connectivity. It was eventually canceled when Pebble announced its intellectual property was being acquired by Fitbit.

Mighty shows that the portable music player isn't dead yet. There's room for innovation to adapt to modern music consumption habits. The problem so far has been that most companies were content to ignore the market. Most people are content to use their phones for music, but many people just want to grab a tiny clip-on and headphones on their way out the door, no armband required.