While factually true, I think that misses GP's point?

If you take a look at the context of their question, they are asking why no one has killed the iPod by copying it.

I suppose the answer is probably as said by rokhayakebe elsewhere in this thread, "Copying the hardware is easy. Copying the ecosystem is a different challenge."

I am asking the question about hardware, not software. if it's so easy to copy hardware, how do you explain apple's dominance with the iPod for such a long period?

Billions of dollars to put into branding.

Samsung too.

Having good software stack is invaluable isn't it? Having Shenzhen clone and crank out a similar piece of hardware which has the worst minimally functional app isn't going to help anybody? It's also hard: see Samsung's crappy attempts at replacing the Google apps that no one uses and/or is poorly coded. Also see Bixby failing at English so far.