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Sunday, March 05, 2006
The iCult
I've always been a music-whore, but the iPod has immensely changed the way I listen to music. In my lifetime I've gone from buying records, to buying tapes, to CDs, and now I have over 4000 songs on my 20 gig iPod. From the moment I got my iPod, it changed so much. I stopped listening to radio. I used to listen to a mix of CDs and talk radio, but I don't even bother listening to NPR for the most part. I can listen to podcasts of NPR at my leisure. And it's all commercial-free.
Now you might think, well we could do that with CDs. But even with CDs there's the loss of variety simply from the way we censor ourselves when it comes to what we pick to listen to. I own over 300 CDs collected from the 90's through the present day. Sure, I had a big collection, but how often did I pull out a Muppet CD? How often did I listen to something cheesy like the Spice Girls? Enter random. I love the way iTunes randomly selects songs for me to listen to. Once I'd imported my entire collection, I suddenly rediscovered old bands I'd forgotten about, childhood songs where maybe I want to hear one or two Animaniac tunes, but I sure don't feel like listening to a whole CD of them in one sitting.
Then I discovered playlists. Feeling girlie? I organized one playlist called Chicks Rock full of Tori Amos, Bjork, PJ Harvey and Madonna. Want to explore the male persuasion? I have another playlist called Dicks Rock that's got a ton of the Police, Linkin Park, The Beatles and Nirvana. iTunes even has automatic playlists like Highest Rated Songs. How do you rate a song? Click a button and spin the wheel to denote how many stars you give to an individual song. Totally sweet! Curious about undiscovered treasures in your library? I made another playlist called Unheard Of and it plays songs that either I've never listened to, or haven't listened to in over a month. And unlike the radio, when I don't feel like listening to a song, I just skip to the next song.
The only bad thing about iPods is the inevitable feeling of loss and confusion when you run out of space. Sadly enough, I've almost filled my 20 gig. Please, Apple, come out with a 100 gig!
Now you might think, well we could do that with CDs. But even with CDs there's the loss of variety simply from the way we censor ourselves when it comes to what we pick to listen to. I own over 300 CDs collected from the 90's through the present day. Sure, I had a big collection, but how often did I pull out a Muppet CD? How often did I listen to something cheesy like the Spice Girls? Enter random. I love the way iTunes randomly selects songs for me to listen to. Once I'd imported my entire collection, I suddenly rediscovered old bands I'd forgotten about, childhood songs where maybe I want to hear one or two Animaniac tunes, but I sure don't feel like listening to a whole CD of them in one sitting.
Then I discovered playlists. Feeling girlie? I organized one playlist called Chicks Rock full of Tori Amos, Bjork, PJ Harvey and Madonna. Want to explore the male persuasion? I have another playlist called Dicks Rock that's got a ton of the Police, Linkin Park, The Beatles and Nirvana. iTunes even has automatic playlists like Highest Rated Songs. How do you rate a song? Click a button and spin the wheel to denote how many stars you give to an individual song. Totally sweet! Curious about undiscovered treasures in your library? I made another playlist called Unheard Of and it plays songs that either I've never listened to, or haven't listened to in over a month. And unlike the radio, when I don't feel like listening to a song, I just skip to the next song.
The only bad thing about iPods is the inevitable feeling of loss and confusion when you run out of space. Sadly enough, I've almost filled my 20 gig. Please, Apple, come out with a 100 gig!
