I can understand your sentiment. I designed the product and can tell you that the casing isn't bulky, it's 1.5mm thick all around which is less than some iPhone cases. I also made it super quick and easy to open the door to get to your iPhone's touch screen and the iPhone app we are working on will allow you a lot of flexibility in what the buttons trigger. The buttons allow for fast forwarding, skipping and album/artist skipping, basically how long you hold down the button takes you up levels in the music directory and of course it works with other apps such as Pandora as well. I can also tell you that people that were at first skeptical tried it out and commented that the UI for most music/podcast listening was a bit superior in that everything was just a thumb press away. Granted, this product isn't for everyone, but I don't think it should be so quickly dismissed as we've spent a lot of time on the UI, electronics and firmware and app to make a great experience. Don't be fooled by the retro-styling aspect as that was simply a design decision. Also, do you know of any other accessories that combine a battery to charge your iPhone with portable speakers in such a small package?