[BRIEF NOTE] On the joys of portable music players and associated multitasking

[rfmcdonald]

Back in 2005, Andrew Sullivan--in what is surely just one gaffe among many--complained about iPods in the Times of London. Even though he himself confesses to being an iPod user, he feared that the iPod would destroy society.

What was once an occasional musical diversion became a compulsive obsession. Now I have my iTunes in my iMac for my iPod in my iWorld. It’s Narcissus heaven: we’ve finally put the “i” into Me.

And, like all addictive cults, it’s spreading. There are now 22m iPod owners in the United States and Apple is becoming a mass-market company for the first time.

[. . .]

Atomisation by little white boxes and cell phones. Society without the social. Others who are chosen — not met at random. Human beings have never lived like this before. Yes, we have always had homes, retreats or places where we went to relax, unwind or shut out the world.

But we didn’t walk around the world like hermit crabs with our isolation surgically attached.

Music was once the preserve of the living room or the concert hall. It was sometimes solitary but it was primarily a shared experience, something that brought people together, gave them the comfort of knowing that others too understood the pleasure of a Brahms symphony or that Beatles album.

But music is as atomised now as living is. And it’s secret. That bloke next to you on the bus could be listening to heavy metal or a Gregorian chant. You’ll never know. And so, bit by bit, you’ll never really know him. And by his white wires, he is indicating he doesn’t really want to know you.

[. . .]

We become masters of our own interests, more connected to people like us over the internet, more instantly in touch with anything we want, need or think we want and think we need. Ever tried a Stairmaster in silence? But what are we missing? That hilarious shard of an overheard conversation that stays with you all day; the child whose chatter on the pavement takes you back to your early memories; birdsong; weather; accents; the laughter of others. And those thoughts that come not by filling your head with selected diversion, but by allowing your mind to wander aimlessly through the regular background noise of human and mechanical life.

Over at Reason (yes, I know, but it's still a good article), Katherine Mangu-Ward pointed out that Sullivan's point isn't very new or original.

In blogging his horror, Sullivan joins a long line of worrywarts who have fretted about the cultural and political impact of portable music. But in The Perfect Thing: How the iPod Shuffles Commerce, Culture, and Coolness (Simon & Schuster), technology reporter Steven Levy argues that the ability to check out of the public sphere is one of the many virtues of Steve Jobs' minuscule machine. As the sociologist Rey Chow said of the iPod's predecessor, the Sony Walkman: "This is the freedom to be deaf to the loudspeakers of history. The Walkman allows me...to be a missing part of history."

There are parts of history that nearly everyone would be happy to miss out on. In New York's mayoral campaign of 2005, Levy relates, one candidate complained how hard it was to hijack peaceful pedestrians on their way to work when they have those white earbuds plugged in. "We have to come up with something to jam the iPods," he whined. But that's the beauty of the iPod. There's no jamming it. It's a self-contained unit, not reliant on a radio signal or even on the output of a record company.

Just as importantly, I'd like to point out that for me, at least, portable music players don't exclude the world. Whenever I go walking with my device, I don't shut out the world, I can't if I'm to walk safely or interact with other people. What I get is additional stimulation, another factor to enjoy along with the slant of the sunshine and the sight of other people and the rhythm of my feet. Multitasking's not something that humans do well, true, but who said that multiple stimulants are bad things? Walking along Dupont Street and listening to a Depeche Mode remix can't be a bad thing. Sullivan, I fear, projects too much.

(Besides, there has always been an "I" in music. Did everyone ever enjoy the same music in the same way? Silliness.)