ipod, I love you

Every person with an iPod that I have talked to or read about organizes their music and their playlists differently. It makes sense - I think it is related to how you remember things, how you listen to music, where and why you use your iPod, etc.

I have a friend who is all over Smart Playlists and keywords - a few thumb moves and she can access songs that have been keyword-tailored to specific moods. It is genius! I have experimented with a few smart playlists, but I still favor "shuffle songs" and manual playlists. Is it laziness on my part? Maybe. But I think it is because I like making mixes - shuffle lets me hear things in orders I would NEVER hear them otherwise (for example, just now the Cure was followed by the divinely named Zoot Sims - And it WORKS! for me, anyway) You never know when something will just sound wonderful out of it's original context. Some songs suffer, of course, and are miserable next to the Ween Cheese song or whatever else may be lying in wait. That's what the skip button is for! I confess that I used to feel guilty using the skip button, like I would hurt the song's feelings. It would not be a lie to say anthropomorphism has been a problem in the past. But now I know that just because you skip it now doesn't mean you won't be hitting the repeat button on it like crazy later.

I know someone who puts all new songs through a special playlist so they are listened to at least once before they hit the general song population. This is another one of those ideas that is so great, but just not for me. One of my favorite things is to have a new song spring out at me in the middle of old favorites. Especially if it is good - I get the cliched chills up my spine and tingly scalp and have to paw around and get the iPod out of my pocket so I can see what this miraculous thing is. Of course if it is really terrible I have to do the same thing (minus the chills and tingles, plus irritation). I do try to stack the new song deck with things that I have downloaded from mp3 blogs or artists websites that at least seem like I will like them, but it's not foolproof by any means.

Rating systems are another place where people can get very specific with their iPod. My system, I acknowledge, is in need of some fine tuning. Currently, songs I like get an instant 3 star rating. Evil songs (a song can be evil for many reasons, such as switching between left and right ear really fast and making me dizzy while I am sitting down, or annoying Blues Traveler- style harmonica solos which drive me to immediate, creative violence) get a 1 star rating which will get them booted off the iPod the next time I hook it up to the computer. 2's are pretty nebulous at the moment, but I think it is morphing into my "you get one more chance" rating. My ratings system needs work - currently the 5 is reserved for actual transcendence, I guess. Nothing has a 5 star rating - I think I have been waiting for something to physically lift me three feet off the ground, which is just silly. 4 stars mean I love it, but I am beginning to recognize that some 4's are more equal than others and they may get bumped to 5.

Shuffle All, are you sure? YES! this is perhaps my second favorite thing about the iPod (the first being that it exists at all). I do listen to albums in the order that the artist put them in, but usually only when it's new to me and I don't know it very well, or when I have become thoroughly obsessed with it and can't listen to anything else. Leslie calls this "the bonding period" and it is very important. But then there comes a point when my shuffle finger is itching and I just have to hit that button. Shuffle within the album, and then... I let it loose on the rest of the iPod. I know that my way is too sloppy for some, but that's ok. I like to let stuff slosh around and bump up against things it might not touch in normal circumstances. In fact, that's what I like about the entire internet! The beauty of the iPod is it will let you do whatever you want.

Synching, or manual updates - the technical element: When I first got my iPod (a 3rd generation with 10 GB) the iPod would hold more than my old hard drive, so I had to use manual updating. Now my computer will hold more than the iPod, so manual updating is still necessary. I like that there is different music in my iTunes library and on my iPod, but that may just be me being delusional and trying to shoehorn my preferences into my circumstances. I'm not so far gone that I really dig the drastically shortened battery life (hey - it's 3 years old!), so maybe there's hope for me yet. I see that there's a website that will sell you batteries to replace it yourself, so I might try that in the new year.

It all comes down to this - I love my iPod. I love that the same little machine can bring as much joy to people who have a laissez-faire approach as to those who attack iTunes with military precision, and all of us in-between.