meditations on the "shuffle songs" function of an ipod.

[gleamingkey]

again i find myself at my desk downstairs at the hilltop office. and again, i’m wasting time, only this time, i’m listening to my ipod on shuffle. i have been doing so for the past half hour or so, part of which was during my lunch break. while on the later portion of this lunch break, it occurred to me how typically 21st-Century the concept of

Comments

[meloraborealis]

nice TD quote. gotta love it.

as far as the shuffle function... is it really random? i cant count the times that i've been listening to shuffle and two songs from the same album happen to come up in a row. not to mention the fact that more often than not, and by that i mean somewhere between 60% & 70% of the time, when i play shuffle my ipod seems to pick the exact song that i want to hear next, i just would not have ever been able to figure it out. to be honest with you, sometimes i consider not making mixes anymore because they completely overwhelm me every time... and my friggin ipod makes them better than i do. but that's just me.

do not read this, it's too dorky to handle

[broknjayd]

i've heard (though i'm not sure) that ipods on random tend towards songs with a higher playcount. the thinking would be that if the song has a higher play count, you listen to it more because you like it more and will therefore be happier (everything in computer world is about making people happier, i've discovered this summer). on that same thinking, if you listen to one song on an album frequently then you probably listen to another song on that album just as frequently so they would both come up in frequent rotation

Re: do not read this, it's too dorky to handle

[meloraborealis]

i actually thought about all that before i wrote, i mean not in those terms because i'm not that smart, but i am definitely aware of that whole program tweaking idea. but i checked my settings and you can set it to make it more likely to play songs by the same artist or from the same album. it's called smart shuffle, but the range is "more likely" - "random" - "less likely". i have it set to random because i would assume that it's the only one that's actually randomized. but its not. and now my head hurts, and i dont really think i understand the shuffle function any better. damn. weed.

Re: do not read this, it's too dorky to handle

[gleamingkey]

i think lilia's onto something; now that she mentions it, it DOES seem like the ipod isn't TRULY random in its shuffling...but even if it ISN'T totally random [it takes your entire library, ordered by song, and reorders it, making a playlist, so you never hear the same song twice], it's still random enough that i often hear at least one song on random that i had forgotten about, or not listened to in hella long.

as for the smart shuffle, it's cool and uncool at the same time. the reason it's cool is because, with it on, you are less likely to hear two songs by the same artist back to back. but it's uncool because if you're listening to a playlist with two or three albums, it will systematically play one track from A, one from C, one from B, one from A, one from B, one from C....so that you get this obnoxious back-and-forth feel that recalls the frenzy of not being able to select one album.

i like this conversation. good comments, girls!

heart
patrick

[artofdrowning22]

ok this is actually in response to your previous post, i came on to reply to that and then saw this one and figured it was easier...so here's the deal. you just haven't been drinking long enough. i know that sounds hella dumb, but check it: you are having the same issues that all of us had back in like the 10th grade, you're just way more sensible and conscious of it. drinking at all isn't necessarily a bad thing. i got past the whole drinking and emotional shit, and i can't tell you how nice it is to socially drink. it's so much better. when ryan comes home from work these days, we have a beer and cook dinner, and maybe have another while we watch a movie, but it's just so chill...and when i'm at school, it's great to walk across the road in the afternoon with a mate and have a scotch and an intelligent conversation, or to go out and meet some friends and split a pitcher and watch the hockey game...so by all means, avoid the ugly shit (i've SO been there), but give yourself a chance to just enjoy a social drink or two. this is one of

[gleamingkey]

see, this is the way i would love to be able to operate. and i sort of can. i can sort of enjoy going to my friend's house in the afternoon and having a couple beers, relaxing in the sun, whatever. but once i have a little bit of alcohol in me, i don't want to go back to sobriety until i wake up the next day. so if it's 3:00 in the afternoon, and i'm only planning on hanging out for an hour, then heading home to finish homework and go to rehearsal...i'll just have the first couple, then decide nothing else is important and that i need to keep drinking. now, since i'm in lowkey hangout mode, i might stick to a couple beers--or one, even--an hour. but i maintain some level of buzz until i go to sleep

[broknjayd]

other then total nerd-ing out, i wanted to say that this post was really well written and thought out.

you should like, write for something.

pitchfork? what? who said that?

[gleamingkey]

hahahahahahaha yeah, like they'd ever have my ghetto ass.

[videsans_vous]

brilliant.

i miss reading your rants. please come back more often.

on another note: working full time is totally fucking lame. and its eating my soul.

pps: miss you.

[gleamingkey]

thank you.

i plan to write more often; especially now that i'm working on this larger bank project.

working full time is hella gay.

i miss you too, but we might be in the cruz for like a day this weekend, so maybe we can make that shit happen?

heart
booty

[redphotoframe]

oh man, i'd like copies of all of them if you make them! the mix you made for me was amaaazing. since i am so greedy, i'll send you cd-r's for them if you email me your address once you're done.