Discuss: Do iPods cheapen music?

[LBJDemocrat]

I recently received an iPod Shuffle as a present, and I've been thinking that it's possible that iPods really do cheapen music. First of all, I think all portable music players cheapen music to some extent, by making it available at all times. I live in New York City, and about half of the people on the subways are invariably listening to music on headphones. Even one's favorite songs must get tiring after a day of being plugged in all the time. Music on the commute, music at work, music at home. I think it's too much.

The iPod makes it worse because now most people don't even listen to the full albums; they just listen to the songs they like. As a result, the songs they like become less valuable to them.

I think people should spend more time unplugged from this stuff, even the internet; but that's a different story.

[taterguy]

1. It's not the device, it's how it's used

100 years ago people were arguing about whether or not the ability to record music in the first place was bad because it put live musicians out of work when establishments installed jukeboxes.

[LBJDemocrat]

4. Kind of true. nt

[taterguy]

10. Thanks to my digital music collection I was able to instantly pull up that song

(Kind of) True by the Golden Palominos.

It took a few clicks of the mouse and strokes of the keyboard.

In the old days I would have spent half an hour ransacking old boxes of tapes to find it. :)

It's a great song. You could spend a buck or two buying it at the digital music provider of your choice.

Or you could look for the album which probably won't be available at any of your local stores that sell, uh, albums.

[Fran Kubelik]

19. I love the Golden Palominos!

:bounce:

[cemaphonic]

66. that is a great song.

One of the most underappreciated bands ever IMO.

[skygazer]

2. I think music got "cheapened" a long time ago

By "top-40" radio, by record companies who just wanted to churn out albums as fast as possible, by American Idol and the fucking Mickey Mouse Club producing monstrosities like Britney Spears and other talentless hacks.

At least an Ipod allows you to get the one cut from an album that's any good without wasting your money on the other 10 lackluster tunes.

[PeaceNikki]

3. Your point of "most people don't even listen to the full albums"

started with mix tapes and burning CD's. And, hell.. CD's in general where you can easily skip through songs you don't like/know. This concept is not new to portable MP3 players by any stretch.

[ghostsofgiants]

31. Shhh, you're raining on his curmudgeon parade!

[Radical Activist]

35. and radio, which really cheapens music.

[LeftyMom]

5. Depends on how you use them.

Personally, I H_A_T_E the shuffle feature, and only listen to albums all the way through. But I'd much rather carry around my teeny tiny and surprisingly bulletproof ipod than eighty skillion easily scratched CDs.

I do use better headphones or a wired connection in my car, because even though I can barely hear in my good ear, even I can tell that the stock headphones and those RF adapter car things sound like warm, corn-studded shit.

[Mojambo]

6. I have an ipod and I rarely use shuffle

It's almost always full albums at a time.

As for being plugged in on the subway, would you rather listen to nothing during that time? I sure wouldn't.

As for getting sick of your favorite songs, that's not really a problem if you're like me and constantly exploring new stuff.

I could not live without my iPod, and I'm hardly joking at all.

I wish everyone was always plugged into their iPod, because a person plugged in is a person who isn't trying to talk to me.

[LBJDemocrat]

9. Yes; I would rather listen to nothing

Everyone should hear reality for a little while, instead of creating their own reality.

And I like it when people try to talk to me. Yes; it can be a bit exhausting after a day of work, but it's good to interact with people. That's another thing about the iPod - it puts everyone in their own little world, separate from everyone else.

[Mojambo]

12. I agree that people should interact with other people. Just not with me.

:P

[ghostsofgiants]

30. Shuffle is great for variety, or if you can't decide what you want to listen to.

[Mojambo]

37. Sometimes I'll start off on shuffle and then go full album when something pops up. n/t

[ghostsofgiants]

39. Word.

And when you have 13,000+ songs, shuffle can remind you of stuff you forgot you had on there.

[ikojo]

7. I think what the iPod does is return music listening to the 1960s

before concept albums such as Sgt Pepper. True people didn't have portable units, but they DID have little electric record players they could schlep along with them as they went to their friend's house. I know my sisters did. They had a spindle thingy they kept their 45's (45 RPM records NOT a colt 45) on and they had a portable electric record player they would schlep outside to place on the back porch and listen to their music with their friends.

By the time I became a teenager we had portable cassette decks. The Walkman came in the early 80s.

Most people don't want to pay for an entire album only to find themselves listening to one or two tracks. It's too expensive for one thing.

I LOVE my iPod and my iPhone!

LOVE them!

[Starbucks Anarchist]

8. I do put full albums on my iPod.

I also live in NYC, and I'd rather be playing my iPod on the train rather than listen to inane cell-phone conversations or Crazy Guy #742 who tells the whole train about the minute details of his life.

[ikojo]

22. AMEN!!! I feel the same way and I live in St Louis!

I don't care to hear about a person's latest bed buddy from the night before or someone's baby daddy.

Since I was mugged in December 2007, I am hesitant to listen to my iPod on the final stretch of my commute. I don't want anyone seeing I have an iPod or any piece of electronic equipment.

[LBJDemocrat]

48. I got mugged and beaten without an iPod

It's best to be vigilant, but an iPod can get in the way.

[ghostsofgiants]

27. I've got about a thousand full albums on my iPod

And that's only because I've been too lazy to load the rest. :P

[Starbucks Anarchist]

43. I've been using the Shuffle for a year or so.

So I can't fit a thousand albums on mine.

Wait, I don't even have a thousand albums. :P

[ghostsofgiants]

44. Yeah, I have a 160GB Classic.

So nice, haha.

[Radical Activist]

36. So do I.

[npk]

11. IPODS = The end of social contact as we know it.

More people are listening to their ipods on the buses, trains, even waiting in line at the supermarket I see people with the headphones on, and Ipod's plugged in. It i helping to eliminate the very last little bit of social contact that makes us human, conversation. Of course it's not only the Ipod, the internet has basically done the same thing. The Ipod is just more accessible.

[ikojo]

15. Before iPods and Walkmans people on the bus and train

would read or try to appear they were sleeping. It's not like all of the buses and trains were centers of community activity.

What truly has destroyed community and neighborhood cohesion is the backyard. Back in the day people used to sit on their stoop and/or front porch. As people passed they would talk and get to know the people around them. Now people congregate in their back yard. A back yard is a far more private area than is a stoop or a front porch.

[npk]

16. I hear what you are saying

But when you see somebody on the bus with headphones, it is almost impossible to start up conversation. At least when someone is reading a book on the bus, I get the pleasure of being rebuked with a "fuck off". Something I wouldn't get from the person wearing headphones, who would not even be able to hear.

As far as the backyard goes, it's really those damn privacy fences that have cut people off from the world, or at least the neighborhood. People like fences.

[ghostsofgiants]

28. Well we can still usually hear you if you're talking to us.

So if we don't reciprocate in starting a conversation, we're just ignoring you. Consider it a silent "fuck off."

[Starbucks Anarchist]

53. Why is conversation so valued?

What is with the need to be constantly talking all the time, especially with people you don't know?

[Lorien]

63. It's an exchange of information and ideas, a connection to our fellow humans

and it's a dying art form. Great conversation can energize you, can make you examine what you believe and why, and help you to understand yourself and the world around you a bit better. Sadly, it's hard to find many decent conversationalists these days. I grew up in a large college town where everyone I knew AND their parents were extremely well educated. Conversations about philosophy, history, psychology, journeys to the antarctic, breakthroughs in science and other fascinating topics were commonplace. Now most everyone I know just talks about the movies they saw, the restaurants they ate at, and how much they hate Bush. It's a different world; one that I feel increasingly disconnected from.

[Starbucks Anarchist]

64. I agree.

But like you said, the problem is few people actually engage in decent conversation. And on the train in NYC, it's not the best venue to start chatting up strangers.

I'm not a big talker by any means, but I find that few people share the same interests or outlook that I do. Recently, I attended a wedding and was talking with a fellow guest who mentioned he loved movies. I'm a film nerd, so I asked him if he had seen Fellini's "8 1/2," which I had seen recently.

He gave me this stupefying look and said he loved the new Rambo movie. :banghead:

[alarimer]

13. Not really.

We are not longer prisoners of whatever crap corporate radio wants to sell us. Now you can buy whatever songs you want to listen to. Of course that leads to a lot of impulse buying, with probably at least some buyer's remorse. Also, a lot of bands can get heard (on Myspace or whatever) that might not have had a chance before. That's a double-edged sword, because some of those bands really should do something else for a living, but on balance digital music is a good thing.

[Deja Q]

14. Well, 128kbps compression is pretty lame...

So, technically speaking, I'd much rather get a CD and rip my own music to the settings I specify for the quality I want, and the RIAA can put in all the DRM they want to compensate. I'm a good boy. :)

Music has been helpful when power walking (certain limitations and a mandate from the doctor say I am not allowed to run) and when I've got nobody to talk to.

[ghostsofgiants]

17. The OP is about iPods, not iTunes.

Yu can use any bitrate you want on an iPod. (Though the limit on what formats you can use is lame. No OGG? Fuck off.)

[Fran Kubelik]

18. Nope.

I think iPods have brought music back into daily life. I think it has made it more difficult for the music industry as it's a lot harder to get everyone listening to the same thing (thus creating a hit) when everyone has such a vast array of choices...and they can choose what they listen to and when they want to listen to it.

Definitely hasn't cheapened music.

[Chovexani]

20. "Cheapen" it? Sorry.

Record companies cheapened music a few decades ago. Payola was the final stake through the heart.

And, I hate to say it, but you really have no idea how iPods can enrich your music experience if all you've got is a shuffle. I have over 10,000 songs on my iPod, representing thousands of years of musical styles and tastes from around the world. At the flick of a wheel and a click of a button, I can go from Baroque Vienna to 1980s London, to South Africa, to Japan, with a pit stop in 1990s Seattle. I literally have a world of music at my fingertips.

If you don't get how awesome that is and think it somehow "cheapens" things, well, then, good luck. Maybe it's just not for you.

[ghostsofgiants]

23. I'll second that.

[supernova]

25. Yep, I feel the same

It's amazing what a 60 gig iPod will hold, and I don't even have it 1/3 full yet.!

Reminds me, since the calendar is headed that way, I need to sit down sometime soon and load up my holiday music. :-)

[LeftyMom]

26. It also makes it easier to share obscure stuff with other people.

If I happen to make a reference to some obscure song, and the person I'm talking to has no clue what I'm talking about, chances are very high I have that very same song in my purse and can play it for them.

[ghostsofgiants]

29. Yes!

I always go on about some new band that no one knows, and with my iPod, I can actually have them listen to that band.

[TommyO]

21. Considering that I've listened to more of my music

by having it available wherever I go, it has enhanced the value of that music to me.

[AlCzervik]

24. people put full albums on their ipods and other mp3 players all the time.

i don't know who you're talking about.

[Iggo]

33. I've only got about 2000 songs on mine.

Even so, I often use shuffle just to see what I'm in the mood for. It's kind of like a no-commercials radio station with just my songs on it. I hear something I haven't heard in awhile and I go, "Oh yeah!" and go back and rack up that album.

[AlCzervik]

34. exactly, sometimes you forget until you hear one song.

[ghostsofgiants]

32. Nope, you're wrong.

That is all.

[tigereye]

38. ah people thought that about walkmans when they were popular

you can't have too much music - and the more variety, IMHO.

The more the better. Somehow I actually think it might improve music - people fleeing corporate radio in droves! :bounce:

[ghostsofgiants]

45. ...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=105&topic_id=8044535&mesg_id=8044550

[tigereye]

55. every generation complains about "new" music to some extent -

but there is always great music being made, year after year, and that's how it should be.


I have to admit there are some styles of music that leave me cold, but as long as folks enjoy it, why complain?

[ghostsofgiants]

56. Exactly.

And iPods just open up the ability to experience more usic than before. It's awesome. Having pop radio or AOR radio shoved down my throat is more cheapening to msic than the iPod could ever be.

[Rob H.]

40. Making music available at all times in no way cheapens it

It's all about choice. I love music and listen to it all the time: in the morning while I'm getting ready for work, in my car on the way to work, and all day long while I'm at work. True, I listen to my own CDs or iTunes playlists rather than the radio, but that's because 90% of what's on commercial radio is 100% pure shit, imo.

[boilerbabe]

41. It's not just that..

But the fact that the quality of the audio has been compromised, so they say. But the portablility of music is quite nice! Otherwise, those of us that are like insane would just sing stuff over and over and really freak out the rest of the people!! haha.

[supernova]

42. Of course not

the iPod is just another tool, albeit a fun one.

It enhances music by giving you access to your library any time anywhere. You aren't tied to the device used to listen to it, i.e. stuck at home by the record player. You can literally soundtrack your life. I have playlists for chilling out, for exercising, for just bumming around.

For many of us, music is essential for stress relief. It is nice to be able to tune it to my music whenever I feel overwhelmed, regardless of what I am otherwise doing at the moment.

It gives us access to lesser known musicians who while perfectly talented, in the old days of the record comapnies controlling distribution, we would likely not get a chance to hear or know. So these performers more easily find their audience.

[Arugula Latte]

46. My iPod has made me fall back in love with music.

It's the best present I've ever been given.

[ZombieNixon]

47. My iPod cost $349. On my budget, that's not cheapening anything in a hurry.

But, to actually answer the question, no, I couldn't disagree more. I play guitar and write the occasional bit of music as a hobby, so having an iPod has really enabled me to explore music I like and am influenced by. In addition, I doubt I'd have been to the number of great concerts I've attended had it not been for the expansion of my musical horizons due in part to the iPod.

[stuntcat]

49. for me, no

I appreciate it just as much. It's usually on random and I have almost 12,000 songs so I always hear great old songs I wouldn't have remembered to pick out. It's like having a radio station that mixes up all my favorite stuff. I've never not had music playing though, I grew up hanging out in radio stations and my dad was always playing music at home. I wish he was still around, I'd buy him an iPod :headbang:

[bertha katzenengel]

50. No. Music videos corrupt music.

Actually, videos corrupt the imagination. Ask Lewis Black.

[LanternWaste]

51. It's the New & Improved(TM) opaute of the masses.

Not cheapened as much as the new formats and players have simply allowed the music industry to become an Expected Convenience (like toilet paper-- imagine the howls of protest and indignation should TP become a rare commodity), allowing us to tune out of real life whether we're in out own living room, or grocery shopping.

I-Pods, Game Consoles and the Internet have replaced television as the Opiate of Masses... :shrug:

[ghostsofgiants]

57. So, if I'm understanding you correctly, entertainment = bad.

[LanternWaste]

61. Nope.

"So, if I'm understanding you correctly,"

Nope. Didn't think television was bad when it ruled as the opiate. Didn't thing religion was bad when it ruled as the opiate of choice. Didn't even think opium was bad when it was, well.. the opiate.

An observation only on my part, not a judgment...

[CreekDog]

52. sort of. remember when you waited for them to play a song on the radio?

that never happens. and my favorite music? now i get sick of it quickly because i download it and play it repetitively and then have little to listen to.

on the other hand, when i get tired of my mainstays, i find myself open to other music that i haven't typically listened to.

as for what people listen to on the subways, buses and trains, it's just what people do to kill time and break up the monotony, especially now that so many get their news from the net making a newspaper redundant.

[Tektonik]

54. It makes music better

[zanne]

58. I'm old, so I like open-air music.

I like the way it drifts through a room.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

59. They do kill the incentive to make a good album.

Not saying that a lot of bands/artists were making good albums, but with the advent of the ipod, what's even the bother of trying?

[ghostsofgiants]

67. How do you figure?

[mvd]

60. Music is one of hobbies and biggest loves

As such, I like the iPod because it saves room for CDs and has a lot of music all in place. I'm always on the lookout for new, good artists (and there are a lot of good artists out there IMO,) so no disadvantage of too much for me.

[vi5]

62. I listen to more music with my ipod than I did before...

For years I had thousands of cds', cassettes, vinyl, etc. But I reached a certain point where I just couldn't listen to it all because unless I was in the room where I had my stereo or whatever I just couldn't get to everything. Now between time spent on the computer at work, in the car, running, whatever I get to listen to about 10 times as much music in a given day as I did before Ipods.

[NJmaverick]

65. Interesting ideas, you make some very good points

I never thought about it, but you're right IPods are having an impact on the world of music.

[mitchum]

68. Those crappy little earbuds and computer speakers certainly do

[Dora]

69. Whoa, Mr. Grinch. Would you rather we play transistor radios in public?

I'm in my office 40 hours a week, and the environment is not conducive to listening to my personal music collection. The radio/tape deck in my car has been broken even since our son decided to feed it some pennies, and I'd rather speak with my family anyhow. The music I get to hear at home is mostly limited to whatever my husband (a musician) happens to be woodshedding at the time.

The FEW, PRECIOUS moments in a day where I have the time and space to listen to music or podcosts uninterrupted are MINE - whether I'm walking to the office, shuttling around campus, or shopping at Costco.

If, over the course of your day, you see 50 different people wearing headphones, that doesn't mean ANYTHING except that you saw 50 people wearing headphones. There's certainly no evidence for you to arrive at the conclusion that they're plugged in all the time. I suspect that my iPod use in one day ranges anywhere from 5-30 minutes total.

And you have a lovely idea that the single is killing the album, but I doubt that it's correct. I remember when vinyl was ubiquitous and the bins at Tower were STUFFED WITH SINGLES. It seemed like every week my friend Jennifer would have a new 45 for her Tinkerbell record player - and this was in the 70's. Singles drive music sales, and its my opinion/estimation that digital formats have rejuvenated and will rejuvenate the industry in ways the major labels haven't cottoned to yet.

If people are going to "unplug" from anything, music players are at the bottom of my list of priorities. I think pulling people away from their TV sets and out of the advertising stream is far more urgent that depriving them of music.

"Music on the commute, music at work, music at home. I think it's too much." Seriously? Take out music and fill in the blank with something that's actually harmful, like "knife-fights," and you might have an argument.

But music? You might as well be talking about kittens for all the sense you're not making. Your post seriously comes off as an uninformed old crank telling the kids to get off the lawn when we're standing on the sidewalk.