October 22, 2006
THE PERFECT THING....Tomorrow is the 5th anniversary of the iPod, and Steven Levy has celebrated the occasion by writing a paean to the iPod called The Perfect Thing. In the LA Times today, he gives us a preview, including this:
To me, the iPod's biggest legacy will be the shift it symbolizes by its signature feature, the shuffle. In the simplest sense, this refers to the way iPod users can randomly reorder the contents of their music libraries to create instant radio stations stocked with music they chose. So although you don't know what song will come next, you know it's one you'll almost certainly like.
Remember a few months ago I asked all of you whether you mostly used the shuffle mode on your iPods or mostly picked songs yourself? Now you know why: I was reviewing Levy's book and was curious to test his belief that the iPod has made shuffle mode the "techna franca of the digital era." My conclusion was that Levy went a little overboard on this:
But guess what? It turns out that it doesnt really matter whether Levy is right or wrong about this. It doesnt even matter that shuffle play has been a commonplace practically since the invention of the CD player. Like much of the book, the chapter on shuffling is just a springboard that allows him to riff on the iPod subculture.
The riffs are pretty good too. Over and over I thought he was about to drift into some kind of banal point about technology or music or whatever, but he invariably surprised me. His observations are consistently intriguing and even a bit addictive, which makes reading the book sort of like eating potato chips. You just can't stop. It's not a comprehensive history of everything iPod, but if you're interested in both the device and the culture it's spawned, it's a fun introduction. Recommended.
—Kevin Drum 5:33 PM
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My own two posts regarding the ipod:
Oct 2004:
http://koreyel.blogspot.com/2004/10/podcasting.html
Oct 2005:
http://koreyel.blogspot.com/2005/10/revisting-my-first-post-i-told-you-so.html
Thanks for the reminder Kevin...
It is indeed time to revisit the issue.
Posted by: koreyel on October 22, 2006 at 5:55 PM | PERMALINK
While I haven't read the new book, I've read previous Levy writing, and he's definitely a clever writer.
Posted by: Petey on October 22, 2006 at 5:57 PM | PERMALINK
Um ... boomers ... hate to be the one to break it to you, but there has been a random mode on every CD player I've seen since 1995.
My dad is as obsessed with the shuffle mode as you all are. Was it something in the water? Can you get it from reading 'Doonesbury'?
Posted by: Adam on October 22, 2006 at 6:04 PM | PERMALINK
Great concept. I could, for example, put in a copy of an audio book, La Forza De Destino or Hayden's 73 plus string quartets with each track as a separate MP3 and hit shuffle play. Finally, one has freedom from these composer idiots who think their stuff should be in a special order for musical or plot development. We'll show 'em who's smarter. Now everyone can be a John Cage or William S. Burroughs.
Posted by: Mike on October 22, 2006 at 6:05 PM | PERMALINK
I always start with Teenage Kicks by the undertones then shuffle after that.
But yeah, I agree with Adam. I had a CD player that held a hundred discs and had a random song feature.
Posted by: Global Citizen on October 22, 2006 at 6:18 PM | PERMALINK
Um...Adam...hate to be the one to break it to you.
I not a boomer (I'm an Xer), but I have to point out that there is a huge difference between shuffling the tracks on one cd (or maybe six, if you have a changer) and shuffling the 16,000+ songs I have on my iTunes based jukebox.
Posted by: Samba00 on October 22, 2006 at 6:18 PM | PERMALINK
Operas, in particular, sound great in shuffle mode.
Posted by: matt on October 22, 2006 at 6:26 PM | PERMALINK
This just came out the other day, but it lets you organize your iTunes library by beats per minute or beat intensity which GREATLY improves your ability to "shuffle" similar styles of music.
http://www.potionfactory.com/blog/2006/10/18/introducing-tangerine/
I rarely shuffle just because I have over 500 albums (okay, cd's whatever) in my library and the music style changes too much from song to song. I've found this tangerine program to be a rather nifty limiting factor so I can create a playlist with a few dozen songs in it that essentially fit my mood (slow, fast, etc.).
Posted by: Fred F. on October 22, 2006 at 6:29 PM | PERMALINK
Shuffle doesn't seem all that new (as many have commented), but I do think the I-Pod has really been the deathknell of albums and record stores. I don't want to extrapolate much from my own experience, but I rarely buy a full album anymore. An album is now just the group of songs that an artist releases at one time.
One of our greatest local record stores (Cactus Records) closed this summer, and I walked into another pretty good record store this weekend--for the first time in ages--and was struck by how few CDs they carried. Most of their floorspace had been given over to skate and surf equipment.
For people my age, the decline of the record store is a powerful change. Certain record stores brought together people who belonged to a particular subculture (or several subcultures. Now those people hook up on line.
(I also miss the end of the repertory theater. The video killed off that institution...)
I don't mourn the passing of the album or the record store. Things evolve. What is amazing to me is the longevity of the 2 to 3 minute pop song. That seems like it's natural, but it wholly derives from the length of a side of a 78-rpm record. Despite that fact that the 78 died out 50 years ago, we still listen to pop songs as if they were limited by 78s' physical limitations... Amazing.
Posted by: RWB on October 22, 2006 at 6:33 PM | PERMALINK
I was thinking about my cell phone and my i-Pod the other day on the way to school, wondering what the hell I ever did without them?
Now when I lose my husband in the BX, I just call him, rather than spend a half hour looking all over the store. This has decreased screaming-fights by fully one-half.
Posted by: Global Citizen on October 22, 2006 at 6:41 PM | PERMALINK
My iPod has mostly the Beatles on it. My favorite is Helter Skelter.
Posted by: American Hawk on October 22, 2006 at 6:43 PM | PERMALINK
Oh man, I followed one of the links and found this from Kevin:
It played the MP3s I I had illegally downloaded from Napster, it really did hold an astonishing amount of music.
A liberal stealing, denying others the reward for their hard work. I should have expected this from somebody who supports unions (a method of shifting wealth from the most productive to the least productive).
I can't believe Kevin posted confirmation that he's a federal criminal.
Posted by: American Hawk on October 22, 2006 at 6:45 PM | PERMALINK
The thing about an ipod is you can hold it in your hand, like a magic talisman.
Tonight on 60 minutes: Coalition forces steal $500,000,000 from Iraq's Ministry of Defense.
Posted by: cld on October 22, 2006 at 6:50 PM | PERMALINK
American Hawk is lucky, the Horst Wesel Lied is in the public domain.
Posted by: Davis X. Machina on October 22, 2006 at 7:05 PM | PERMALINK
Fred F. wrote: "I rarely shuffle just because I have over 500 albums (okay, cd's whatever) in my library and the music style changes too much from song to song. I've found this tangerine program to be a rather nifty limiting factor so I can create a playlist with a few dozen songs in it that essentially fit my mood (slow, fast, etc.)."
I always shuffle and I also have more than 500 albums-I think it has more to do with your state of mind than how much and how varied your music collection is. AC/DC after Steve Reich is wonderful. I suspect that the issue is more one of how much you like all the music you own as I've discovered that my iPod has led to minor culling of my collection so that anything that comes up is welcome.
Cheers,
Alan Tomlinson
Posted by: Alan Tomlinson on October 22, 2006 at 7:15 PM | PERMALINK
I read his entire LA Times piece. The kind of stupidity we've come to expect from US journalists, very big on grandiose claims, very small on any actual data to back up these claims.
if you're as good a storyteller as Malcolm Gladwell, you can get away with this; if you're not, the results aren't pretty.
I especially loved the way the only recognition he gave of the fact that iPod can also play spoken word material is a few snarky remarks on podcasts.
Look, I understand that if you are a member of the idiocracy you want to write about what you know. But it would be nice, just once, for the same people that spend so much time in print bemoaning American's lack of interest in education to point out that this is, for those who want to learn, a truly golden age as every major US university from Berkeley through Stanford to Princeton makes available through podcast both course lectures and one-time speeches.
While Levy is telling us that podcasting means you can download softcore porn to your iPod, I'm listening to a lecture series on _Archeology of the Mind_ by Colin Renfrew (a name you should recognize if you know anything about archeology), free courtesy of the good folks at UCLA. Nice going dude. I, BTW, look forward to your obligatory rant next week or so in Newsweek about the media dumbing down of America and how, of course, you have nothing to do with it.
Posted by: Maynard Handley on October 22, 2006 at 7:21 PM | PERMALINK
I'm puzzled by the first paragraph of the LA Times article:
"Go into any subway car or fitness center or airplane cabin or school lounge and you will see something you did not see five years ago. Snaking out of people's ears are white cords attached to tiny boxes that sometimes you will see them fiddling with, twirling their fingers on a circle on the surface of the device."
Other than the fact that the cords weren't white and the boxes weren't quite as tiny, this has been a common sight on subways and in fitness centers, etc., since the 1980s. At least in terms of the outward manifestations, there's virtually no difference between the sight of a person listening to an iPod and the sight of a person listening to a Walkman.
And I'm quite sure I remember reading articles in the '80s that opined how the Walkman had "changed us in a lot of ways" and that "its insular nature protects us in public spaces with a happy bubble of our favorite songs," or words very much to that effect.
For my birthday one year, my then-boyfriend made me a whole set of audiotapes containing my favorite numbers from his and my libraries of LPs. I made some of my own as well.
I love my Shuttle (although I don't shuffle), but as far as I'm concerned it's just a more sophisticated Walkman.
Posted by: Swift Loris on October 22, 2006 at 7:31 PM | PERMALINK
A liberal stealing, denying others the reward for their hard work. I should have expected this from somebody who supports unions (a method of shifting wealth from the most productive to the least productive).
I can't believe Kevin posted confirmation that he's a federal criminal.
Posted by: American Hawk
As usual American Hawk is a moron, the United States is a debtor nation you fool. Wealth is not wealth, it is lust of materialism, that what Jesus warned you of.
Posted by: Dog_named_Boo on October 22, 2006 at 7:41 PM | PERMALINK
reward for their hard work. -American Chicken Hawk
Usury is not hard work, hard work is digging a ditch, sitting in an office creating nothing from nothing is usury. Capice?
Posted by: Dog_named_Boo on October 22, 2006 at 7:43 PM | PERMALINK
Swift: The LA Times piece isn't very good. The book is. I had exactly the same reaction as you to the headphone stuff, but in the book Levy almost immediately acknowledges that headphones have been around for a long time and then segues into some pretty interesting stuff.
The LAT article tries to compress his entire book into a thousand words, and that doesn't work well. It's his longer riffs on this stuff that are interesting.
Posted by: Kevin Drum on October 22, 2006 at 7:44 PM | PERMALINK
I don't see why I should bother reading about the iPod, when I have an iPod.
Posted by: charlie don't surf on October 22, 2006 at 8:24 PM | PERMALINK
It's a little known fact that George w. Bush is an iPod fan. Being the intellectual that he is, he only listens to books-on-tape, and then mostly history and political treatises. He never takes his iPod out the random shuffle mode either.
Posted by: Richard on October 22, 2006 at 8:24 PM | PERMALINK
Shuffle is a good feture to have as an option.
But only Steve Jobs can sell a player with no screen that does ONLY shuffle, and have his worshippers actually buy it in droves.
Posted by: JS on October 22, 2006 at 8:51 PM | PERMALINK
I rarely shuffle just because I have over 500 albums (okay, cd's whatever) in my library and the music style changes too much from song to song.
but that's the beauty of it. when i'm sitting there at work, for 9 hours, i like hearing dischordant combinations of artists and songs. Minor Threat followed by Joni Mitchell, then Jurassic 5, Del McCroury, Led Zeppelin and Slint. i stick to albums at home and in the car. but i like the mix, at work.
Posted by: cleek on October 22, 2006 at 9:07 PM | PERMALINK
Instead of wasting our hard-earned money on I-Pods, the American people should consider sending that to the RNC, with the cash going towards the defeat of Islamofascists. THAT would really be an I-Pod, right?
Stupid liberals...
Posted by: Al on October 22, 2006 at 9:17 PM | PERMALINK
These comments clarify why Rumsfeld can get away with an obsession with gadgets rather than content and context.
Posted by: ither on October 22, 2006 at 10:06 PM | PERMALINK
I remember when the transistor radios were cool.
Fit in your pocket and you had this DJ shuffling the songs for you rather than a machine. But I don't remember any breathless blather about the epic change the transitor radio caused similar to that I read almost everyday about the ipod.
Posted by: PanJack on October 22, 2006 at 10:19 PM | PERMALINK
I'll never get an iPod. There are several reasons.
1) Apple Product. Like many aethiests v. fundamentalists, I have been witnessed several too many times by Mac evangelists and have responded with knee-jerk resistance
2) It's an eggshell device. I drop my mp3 player (Sony's Walkman) regularly and I mostly listen to it while jogging. The iPod would crumble to dust if it had to stand up to my use.
3) The wheel. In most versions of the iPod they use the wheel pannel. To me this is completely counter intuitive and despite my girlfriend having an iPod for 4 years and my use of it I still can't get used t it.
4) Batteries. My Sony walkman can run on full volume on the battery for something like 40 hours. Say I listen to it about 12 hours a week. I only need to charge it every 3-4.
5) No advantages. The iPod can of course be used as a portable data transfer device, but so can my sony walkman. The walkman has 512 MB which while not in the iPod's upperange models, was a nice buy at about $70 and it serves my needs just fine.
Extra) I hate the shuffle concept because when I load music onto an mp3 player, because I am jogging, I need to distract myself. I am a very visual person. Thus, the music I load onto it and the order I put it in allows me to imagine a story (and indeed the story I imagined while jogging has now become my first completed draft of a novel) and the shuffle breaks that narrative.
So that's why I'll never get an iPod. It's not a bad device, but it was not designed for me.
Posted by: MNPundit on October 23, 2006 at 12:23 AM | PERMALINK
As a person who is very attracted to the longer forms of music, I find reading about shuffleolatry a little like contemplating the final heat-death of the universe.
Eclecticism is not pastiche. Sticking a bazillion songs on shuffle that all follow the basic groundrules of pop does not promote a deepened aesthetic experience of the music. Using a computer program to sort by tempo or beat intensity would, naturally, rob shuffling of what little meaning it does possess (fine, I guess, if you don't listen to music which incorporates changes in dynamics -- let alone tempo or meter shifts). Shuffling Beethoven symphony movements would be the act of a craven aesthetic nihilist.
Somebody with *real* edge shuffles John Cage's Cartridge Music with Ladytron :)
Fortunately that person, of course, doesn't exist.
Bob
Posted by: rmck1 on October 23, 2006 at 12:24 AM | PERMALINK
I use the shuffle feature almost exclusively while at work. I don't have the time to deal with figuring out what I'd prefer to hear. At home?
I only use the shuffle when I'm not sure what I want to listen to. Once something catches my ear, the shuffle is turned off
Posted by: JoeW on October 23, 2006 at 6:10 AM | PERMALINK
"It's a little known fact that George w. Bush is an iPod fan. Being the intellectual that he is, he only listens to books-on-tape, and then mostly history and political treatises. He never takes his iPod out the random shuffle mode either."
Certainly accounts for his mode of speaking.
Posted by: Steve Paradis on October 23, 2006 at 9:58 AM | PERMALINK
Quoth Bob:
Somebody with *real* edge shuffles John Cage's Cartridge Music with Ladytron
I shuffle Messiaen with the Dead Milkmen.
Does that make me "edgy", or psychotic?
Posted by: thalarctos on October 23, 2006 at 11:36 AM | PERMALINK
This seventy-year-old thanks the iPod for helping to take loud music out of the public sphere.
Posted by: Hedley Lamarr on October 23, 2006 at 11:37 AM | PERMALINK
Interesting thing about the iPod is that it isn't close to being the best product on the market.
Holier-than-thou Mac users like to thumb their noses at the masses using Windows driven PCs. Yet the seemingly ubiquitous iPod is about as up-to-date in features as a Sony Walkman, and iTunes as a downloading service sucks with extreme prejudice (not that any of them are really any good or close to comprehensive).
Discuss.
Posted by: JeffII on October 23, 2006 at 11:52 AM | PERMALINK
The Ipod is just a brand that brings prestige to its owners for a premium price. Its ability to store files is no different than any other device.
Posted by: Hostile on October 23, 2006 at 12:07 PM | PERMALINK
The most important thing about the iPod culture isn't people walking around with headphones. As many have pointed out, that's been commonplace for more than 25 years now. What baffles me is the underlying assumption that the choice of music on your iPod is somehow an expression of your individuality. I guess this is an outgrowth of the teenaged habit of giving your girlfriend a cassette tape or CD with a mix of songs, rather than just telling her what you think and feel.
Posted by: wally on October 23, 2006 at 12:08 PM | PERMALINK
I never got the appeal of shuffle with a wide music collection: I like all the music I have, but I certainly don't like it together, nor does all of it fit my mood at any given time. I usually listen by albums, because I'm mostly too lazy to make playlists.
Posted by: cmdicely on October 23, 2006 at 12:10 PM | PERMALINK
Interesting thing about the iPod is that it isn't close to being the best product on the market.
"Best" of course is highly subjective. Clearly, you don't like it the best. So what?
Holier-than-thou Mac users like to thumb their noses at the masses using Windows driven PCs.
What do Mac users have to do with this? Most iPod users are PC users, not Mac users.
Yet the seemingly ubiquitous iPod is about as up-to-date in features as a Sony Walkman, and iTunes as a downloading service sucks with extreme prejudice (not that any of them are really any good or close to comprehensive).
I've used a few of the downloadings services, and all of them seemed to suck at least as much as iTMS. Although, again, this is all highly subjective.
But, really, you have a couple of opinions about the iPod and the iTMS, and an irrelevant stereotype about Mac vs. PC users, and you seem to think that adds up to some profound social commentary.
Posted by: cmdicely on October 23, 2006 at 12:15 PM | PERMALINK
Tech writer blows tech company.
(aka Michael Malone syndrome)
Wake me when something interesting happens.
Posted by: Roger Ailes on October 23, 2006 at 12:18 PM | PERMALINK
The Ipod is just a brand that brings prestige to its owners for a premium price.
Last time I went to Best Buy, other digitial media players with similar capacity were selling for about the same price as video iPods, so I don't see the price premium as being all that significant.
Its ability to store files is no different than any other device.
The ability to store files is a necessary prerequisite for the primary features of a portable media player, but isn't really the primary feature itself, so that's kind of a meaningless comparison.
Posted by: cmdicely on October 23, 2006 at 12:21 PM | PERMALINK
"Best" of course is highly subjective. Clearly, you don't like it the best. So what?Posted by: cmdicely
Spoken like an true apostle of all things Apple.
I didn't say I don't "like it best." Read the tech and music reviews. The iPod was passed a couple of years ago by a number of other digital music players. It's over-priced and not all that well-made.
Posted by: JeffII on October 23, 2006 at 12:33 PM | PERMALINK
True the random option was there for CD players, but what has changed with the iPod is that I have basically my entire music library with me all the time, so it shuffles between many more songs at any given time. In the past music basically was in 6 disc chunks (what the changer in the car or at home held)
Now with the iPod I organized my musicc into genres that I created and have several sets of 200-300 songs that I let play randomly depending on the mood I'm in when listening. In my car (a BMW with iPod adaptor) all the music is divided into 6 playlists which correspond to the 6 presets on the stereo so I go days without ever hearing the same song twice.
Posted by: Eric K on October 23, 2006 at 2:36 PM | PERMALINK
I have no idea if the "shuffle" algorithm bears any resemblance to the one used in iTunes (I'm guessing "probably") - or to the "random" feature in the Desktop Pictures control panel in OS X (which seems to not be as random as I'd like).
But really; iRiver tends to have a stronger feature-set for the buck. Including some nice things like a built-in audio recorder, and fm tuner.
Posted by: osama_been_forgotten on October 23, 2006 at 3:30 PM | PERMALINK
Shuffle Mode has been the bomb ever since the first reasonably priced disc changers came out in late 80's/early 90's. Now there's just a lot more discs (choices) and better cueing/blending (disc changers could be slow, especially the more discs added) with the IPod, but nothing new by any stretch of the imagination.
Posted by: Jimm on October 23, 2006 at 7:18 PM | PERMALINK
I can see how "shuffle" is more available and mainstream now for a lot of people with portable MP3 players though, since it not only puts a disc changer in your walkman, but lets you acquire and add to it by song and not album.
Posted by: Jimm on October 23, 2006 at 7:22 PM | PERMALINK
The beauty of the iPod is its simplicity - the controls are elegant, and the display is crisp and simple. It was superior to anything else when it was introduced. With iTunes, that's what propelled iPod's mindshare. It's gonna take more than just 'more features' to beat Apple now, since most people just go with what they know.
Posted by: Andy on October 23, 2006 at 10:39 PM | PERMALINK