Apple in a recent announcment have laid down a new patent regarding their next generation IPods, a new technology which is to implemeted will detect when a users IPod is being connected to a machine other than its owners and refuse to charge, Its uncertain if the unit will still be able to sync or exchange files with the host machine, or how it will deal with a stand alone charger (lets say the potential thief likes your music, he wont nessararily need to plug it into his comp) but it effectivly renders the unit useless to the new owner, especially if he takes a liking to the new Killers album !
Awsom idea on apples behalf, but i get the feeling that much like many of apples recent revelations, someone else had already made this and apple tagged it as a good idea. Much like Spaces (aka VirtueDesktop) & new versions of spotlight (AKA Quicksilver), but lets face facts and say that although apple to seem to be running a collection agency for other peoples apple ideas at the moment, they are making a dam good job of improving them and seemlessly intergrating them into the new Operating system.

Lets chalk this new security feature up as a Wait-and-See idea, i can somehow see a few people thinking its gonna be more of a pain in the ass.