Age is a blessing but its also fucking terrifying.
Especially when I realized it had been20 years since the iPod was released.
Once I stopped hyperventilating, I understood this was okay.
Because the iPod changed my life.
And, to this very day, I believe its the greatest gadget ever created.
It didnt begin that way though.
Before I got my hands on an iPod, I thought MP3 players were stupid.
The year is 2005.
So, around 2001, I saved up to get myself a teeny-weeny Panasonic MP3 player.
It was a terrific unit and ahead of its time but there was a serious issue: storage.
It played music off an SD card and the one that came with it was only 64MB.
In real terms, this meant I could get just over an albums worth of songs on it.
Not ideal for someone with shelves buckling under the weight of CDs.
Right now, I can hear you saying JUST BUY A BIGGER SD CARD, CALLUM!
And I tried, I really did.
That means a 128MB SD card set you back roughly $384.
A lot of cash for not much music.
So I did the only logical thing and switched to the future of music technology: minidisc.
As ridiculous as that sounds, there was a certain amount of sense to my decision.
For a few years, my backpack jangled with sound of a minidisc library.
It was at this stage in my life that I first saw an iPod.
What benefit could I, a minidisc prince, take from an MP3 player likethat?
Of course, this changed when I actually got my hands on one.
Its a moment Ill never forget…
I was on holiday in Spain with my family.
My sister had just got an iPod for her birthday and I couldnt care less.
My minidisc obsession was in full swing and Id already tried this whole digital music malarky.
The future, I knew, was all physical.
After a few days of being around the iPod though, I got curious.
This rig which was about the same size as my Minidisc player overflowed with music.
Using it was so… elegant.
And thus began my love affair with the hardware.
The iPod Photo came out that year and I never looked back.
The oversized role the iPod played in my life is complex and nuanced.
At the turn of the millennium, I became completely obsessed with music.
No matter my mental health struggles, music and my iPod were always there.
The gadget was more than a tool, it was a companion.
Of course, theres an argument to be made that this is unrelated to the iPod itself.
But I tried out several different MP3 players and, to me, none had the iPods magic.
