Reflections on the iPod

I’ve been listening to Stephen Levy’s book The Perfect Thing about the history of the iPod and how it has changed our culture (Amazon link). It startled me to realize I can barely remember NOT having an iPod. I mean, I can, but until I listened to this book I had forgotten what an impact it had and has on my life. I’m truly momentarily surprised when I learn of people who happily exist without one. I feel that I should supply the lacking person with at least a Shuffle, just as a charitable act.

My friend M has always had a Mac and bought her first iPod as retail therapy in 2002. I was unimpressed. I had a PC, and anyway I had a couple of mp3 players gathering dust in my junk drawer. They held about 20 songs and were a big pain in the rear. I didn’t know anyone else who had an iPod. But in about 2004 you could use an iPod with a PC, plus my stereo system had just bit the dust so I didn’t have any decent way to listen to music. I decided to buy an iPod instead of a new stereo system: I bought a pink 8-GB Mini, which I absolutely adored. It was soooooo cute.

I got back in touch with my old dusty CDs and discovered the joys of finding new music online. I joined eMusic and also found new music by using Pandora. I listened to the iPod at the gym, while I was cooking, while I was falling asleep, while I was waking up, when I was sad, when I was happy, when I was working…you get the idea. I was already an Audible fan, so the iPod to me was like having an audiobook player that had suddenly also sprouted a zillion songs and looked wicked cool.

The Mini filled up pretty fast and I got a 30-GB Video. I gave the Mini to a friend, who was afraid of it for a few years. Talk about a technophobe. She recently told me she overcame her gadget phobia and plugged the Mini into her laptop. She loves it and can’t understand how she could have feared the adorable Mini! (I think Apple messed up when they quit making those Minis, BTW.)

Anyway, right now I have an 80-GB Classic. I had a 1-GB Shuffle that I gave to my friend L for her birthday (see above under charitable contributions and being appalled at lives lived sans iPods), and I replaced it with a super cheap one that I couldn’t pass up. Currently the boyfriend has taken over it to listen to podcasts. He hides it in his pocket, saying he doesn’t want anyone to steal it, but I think he is just embarrassed because the Shuffle is purple.

I just didn’t listen to music that much before I had an iPod. It was too much of a pain. Portable CD players were a bummer to drag around, plus with most CDs I like an average of three songs off each album, so the album method doesn’t fit my fickle personality very well. It was a shame, because music is a fairly important part of my life and I’d left it by the wayside. The iPod brought all that back to me.

The iPod is the ultimate example of the spoiled lifestyle so many of us live. In some parts of the world, people are occupied with unclean water and no food, so it is truly bizarre that I dare to say truthfully that my quality of life would be severely diminished without my iPod. Nevertheless, it’s the case. I am so lazy that without a dead simple way (also including FAST) to get music on a small device and access it on that device, I will just suffer without the music.

It’s difficult to believe that I started my lifetime of music collection and listening with RECORDS. The black vinyl things that you put a needle on and tried not to scratch up. The first one I ever owned was Michael Jackson’s Thriller album. Zoiks!