Unlocking a Time Capsule

Yesterday, I unlocked a time capsule. In fact, it used slide to unlock.

I was inspired by the latest episode of Tech Won't Save Us, where Paris Marx talked about the /r/dumbphones subreddit and how people go back to using dedicated devices, especially their PSPs and iPods. Curious, I dug through the closet for my old iPod touch. Luckily, I had deposited it alongside the 30-pin dock connector to USB cord and was able to give it some charge.

Powering it on felt strange at first, then warm and cozy. White Apple logo, lock screen. The unlock sound. Everything was as it had ever been. I felt back home.

Based on the last entries in the Notes app, I figure I must have last used it in 2014 or 2015.

There was still a lot of music on there. Surprisingly, my taste had change very little over the past 12 years or so, although metal now takes a much smaller share of my genre mix and many new artists and albums have joined in. I even rediscovered a few albums that I had completely forgotten about.

The listening experience was also different.

First off, I decided to make my time travel authentic and do without the Bluetooth headphones I typically use. After all, I didn't have any of those in 2014 either. My over-ears that still have a 3.5 mm plug had been sitting plugged into my laptop dock for more than a year now unchanged. Even physically plugging in the headphones and feeling that satisfying click was something I hadn't done in a long time. No waiting for the Bluetooth connection, no frustration when they accidentally connect to a different source or when the battery is depleted.

There were no distractions really, as I had no messengers or social media apps installed (which, even if they were there, wouldn't work anymore in the old versions required by this iPod). There were no popups or "suggestions", as there would be when opening Spotify. The interface remains the same on every use, nothing is fetched from servers or moves around, as opposed to Spotify's home screen. One can really feel that this device has been designed for immediacy and offline use.

The only music available comes from your library and is easily browsable, either in the classic hierarchical menu or in Cover Flow. Often, I don't yet have a clue about what I want to listen to when I open a music app and look for inspiration. Spotify's home page typically suggests me the latest things I listened to or things that it presumes would fit my taste. The radio algorithm also stays very close to what I have listened to before. Apart from that, I face choice paralysis. Ironically, that makes me listen to more of the same, despite Spotify's practically endless library. Compare this to the iPod, where at least I used the whole 32 GB library to full capacity.

Strictly speaking, you can also add artists, albums, or songs to your library in Spotify but somehow this has never worked out for me and my library view remains cluttered. I'm not sure if this is a personal issue I have with their app or whether this is true for other people as well. Maybe this is a problem for me because I'm particularly oriented toward artists and albums, less so toward individual songs.

Local files and limited storage also enforced curating music. Which albums do I add to my library? Which subset of my library makes it onto my iPod? These were intentional decisions, put in place by constraints of the time. In some cases, I put in hours of work to find the music in the first place, give files correct metadata and hunt down the highest-quality version of an album cover I could find. I think I had a deeper connection to the music I listened to back then.

Finally, once you have listened through an album, it is really finished. There is no algorithm that automatically takes over. There is no endless stream of things to take your attention hostage, as is now the norm everywhere, be it on social media apps or video streaming.

There were also a few casual games still installed. I most liked Doodle Jump and Tiny Wings. As (not only) mobile games have become enshittified with in-app purchases and poorly disguised elements of gambling, I have given up to cut through the crap to find handcrafted little games like these. If you don't have the luxury of owning an iPhone (or a particular old music player), you can give the limited web version of Tiny Wings, that the author generously put up on his website, a try. Oh, and in case you do know about non-enshittified games for Android that I could enjoy, send me a note!

While digging in my closet, I have dusted off a few more old phones (smart and dumb), but I don't feel a similar emotional attachment to any of these devices.

The iPod had character.

Now, every device feels the same.

I like the iPod's quirky skeuomorphisms. I like its system sounds and its default artwork.

Don't get me wrong, I don't want to idealize this gadget. It was expensive, I wouldn't have been able to get a new one back then. 32 GB was already a compromise, as variants with more storage were completely out of reach. Of course Apple did not support SD cards as external storage. I dislike the locked-down nature of their devices. Syncing required iTunes and every FLAC file had to be converted to Apple lossless.

While listening to music before falling asleep, I noticed how cumbersome it can be to change the brightness when you have to open the Settings app first.

I am not yet sure what to make of this. Am I merely nostalgic for an idealized version of my youth where everything felt simpler and lighter (for the obvious absence of adult responsibilities) or am I onto something here? Are there any adjustments to my habits I want to make now?

I certainly don't want to give up the immediate availability of any song that streaming services offer, but I might go back to curating my own library and incorporate a dedicated music player into my daily routine.

Maybe sit down with this player and more often intently listen to a single album, from start to finish? This might work as a variation on Richard Hemmer's routine of watching a film a day from start to finish. He developed this habit in response to a lacking attention span.

I will, in either case, leave Spotify specifically, for a multitude of reasons. Surprisingly, a number of people around me brought up this topic lately and made the switch to Tidal, Qobuz, or Deezer. One person discovered in this process how to subscribe to podcasts directly via RSS feeds and praised the experience AntennaPod offered her in contrast to Spotify.

As a bonus, here's a lo-fi, ca. 2013 selfie of me that I excavated in the process, taken with the iPod's terrible camera: