Oh man! I totally feel your pain. I did almost the same exact thing when I first started using iTunes a few years ago. Just reading your journal brings back the anger I felt that night.
If you are looking for any songs that you can't find feel free to ask me, not that I will have them, but I might.
it corrupted all the original files? or just the ones it was transfering? it seems the originals should be in tact. where are the original files, only on the ipod, or do you still have your old computer? this might be a question for the mac group, there may be hope yet!
The original files on the old Mac are gone. I just had the files on the the actual Ipod. Somehow during the transfer process the files on the Ipod got corrupted & I have tried everything I can to restore for hours upon hours
hah, when i transferred my stuff from my pc to mac, i didn't transfer ANY of my itunes [ cause i wasn't sure of the best/easiest way to do it ]. i'm still working on getting everything back, and it was well over 3k as well.
it's no fun losing music. almost as bad as losing pix.
<33
ps. thanks for the comment on my blog about my pix
pps. i've decided you should smile more in your pix. kaythanks.
Fuck that is horrible. I would cry if I lost all of my music. 
If you are looking for any songs that you can't find feel free to ask me, not that I will have them, but I might.
Good luck!