(Image credit: CNET)
In an era where everyone uses music streaming services, I found solace in old technology.
In spring of 2021, I had a revelation: I do not need to be tethered to social media, streaming services, and the internet 24/7. With music as my main interest, and Spotify being my primary way of accessing the inordinate number of albums I was consuming over the pandemic, I realized it was time to free myself by reverting to a relic of the 2000s – the iPod. It’s time to turn my phone off.
My dad gave me an old iPod classic of his that spring. I had to re-learn how the click wheel worked after years of being accustomed to a touch screen, but I quickly became comfortable with the entire interface.
No, you cannot sync the music you downloaded with an Apple Music subscription, for example, and put it on the iPod. You have to have some sort of ownership of the digital files (a decaying part of the music listening experience that was revolutionized in the 2000s by iTunes). Whether it is pirating the music, importing a CD, or purchasing the digital files otherwise, that’s what you need to do before you put music on an iPod. I stuck with importing CDs from both my own and my dad’s library, exploring the old and dabbling in the new.
One thing I took for granted with streaming services is the seemingly infinite number of options you have at your fingertips at any given time. Pretty much any song or album in the world, you can access with a subscription. My iPod, for example, just has a capacity of 80 gigabytes. I can’t load it with entire discographies of all my favorite artists, I need to pick and choose as I see fit.
Disconnecting myself from the unending abundance of music on Spotify, was different for me, but also exciting. Limiting myself to certain albums gave me the opportunity to explore music in a more mindful way, consciously deciding what I want to listen to from a finite list. This, along with having no incessant internet distractions from my phone, felt relaxing and gratifying. During the time of the pandemic when news could feel overwhelming, carving out a time of the day to detach from the internet felt like just what I needed.
I still use that iPod to this day, yet I struggle with mindfully deciding what to put on it at any given time. It always feels like I put too much and not enough on it at the same time. I usually put more music on it than I really need, yet I always feel like something is missing as I use it. Obviously I don’t feel that way about streaming. I still use streaming services, I have both Spotify and Apple Music, I just use the iPod for a different purpose – for a time of relaxation, unwinding and disconnecting from the distractions of the digital world.
Another component to all of this is a sense of nostalgia for the 2000s. I was born in 2001, and in the past few years I have latched onto the culture that defined my youth. That is not to say I am not invested in current pop culture however, as only limiting myself to the past would be, by definition, a conservative mindset, something that couldn’t be further from who I am.
I did not use an iPod classic as a kid, I used my dad’s old iPhone as an iPod touch around 2009 though, and even though I did not have that experience, using an iPod today feeds the nostalgic side of me in addition to giving me a way to decompress and feel less anxious from the internet.
Part of me misses the perceived simplicity of the 2000s decade. Despite still very much being a part of a digital age, for a while there was a transition period where purely digital content and physical media coexisted – purchasing physical movies while still enjoying the videos of early YouTube. In a way, my ongoing use of the iPod connects me back to that time in my life, maybe that says a lot about me.
A desire to free myself from addictive doomscrolling of social media and the internet along with nostalgia for my youth has brought me to this point – a college student in 2024 that has used an iPod regularly for the past three years. While it doesn’t define my music listening experience, it still plays a major role. I am grateful to own a device like that that allows me to find a sense of comfort, away from the overstimulating internet.