My Shuffle is an earbud killer... Why?

OK, my Shuffle just killed another set of earbuds; actually, only the right earbud. That's its M.O.
The victims: first, a pair of Apple In-Ear Headphones, and now, a pair of Philips SHN2500 noise cancelling earbuds. All is fine for a couple of months, then the right earbud starts going quiet with significant high-end rolloff, and then one day it dies completely. And it's hosed: plugging the phones into a CD player or computer shows that the right earbud is dead. Wrapped in plastic.
I've found I'm not alone in this, and it's always the right earbud. And now I know it kills Apple-branded buds and third-party buds. So now I've got $100 of useless earbuds and I'm afraid to buy new ones. How (technically) can this happen?
G4 AGP graphics Mac OS X (10.4.4) iPod Shuffle 1GB

OK, my Shuffle just killed another set of earbuds;
actually, only the right earbud. That's its M.O.
The victims: first, a pair of Apple In-Ear
Headphones, and now, a pair of Philips SHN2500 noise
cancelling earbuds. All is fine for a couple of
months, then the right earbud starts going quiet with
significant high-end rolloff, and then one day it
dies completely. And it's hosed: plugging the phones
into a CD player or computer shows that the right
earbud is dead. Wrapped in plastic.
I've found I'm not alone in this, and it's always the
right earbud. And now I know it kills Apple-branded
buds and third-party buds. So now I've got $100 of
useless earbuds and I'm afraid to buy new ones. How
(technically) can this happen?
G4 AGP graphics Mac
OS X (10.4.4) iPod Shuffle 1GB
Hey,
The same thing happened to me. I had to turn my earbuds around in the hole, and then I applied pressure to the hole area. (I squeezed it.) It's a physical thing, don't try to download links. The iPod must have gotten squished or hit really hard. (Did you leave it in your backpack?)
Good luck!

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