Goodbye, MP3 Player
It appears that I have finally lost my Samsung YP-C1 MP3 player. I was gardening Friday morning and it fell out of my shirt pocket, so I put it in my pants pocket instead. After I got home, I realized that I did not have it any more. I went back to the garden and retraced my steps, but did not see it, and today it rained all day, so even if it turns up I am guessing the device will be unusable.
I feel upset for being stupid and not securing it better. I feel sad for losing it. Fortunately I am not in crisis, however. Thanks to a Kijiji purchase last year and the generosity of a few people who responded to my previous MP3 player entry entry (thanks Michael! thanks Laurel!) entry, I have other players I can use to distract myself from the mundane horrors of daily existence. I am pretty grateful for that. (I am still open to offers for other MP3 players, if you have any you are not using.)
I still miss my MP3 player, though. I bought it from Canada Computers in 2007, and it served me well for over five years:
- I liked its interface. It showed me the title of the current MP3, a progress bar showing how much of the track had been played, a time display showing the current track's position, and the number of podcasts remaining in my playlist. It was not until I tried using other MP3 players that I recognized how appropriate that interface was.
- I liked its navigation. Because I used my MP3 player for podcasts and not music, setting the skip interval to 1 minute meant I could rewind and fast-forward relatively painlessly.
- I liked that it took a AA battery, which increased its lifespan dramatically. So many other MP3 players have built-in batteries that wear out in a year.
- Its capacity of 512MB was not fantastic, but it was enough to store several days worth of listening, especially after I learned how to transcode audio files to 48kbps on my computer.
- It was reliable and well-built. It broke a couple of times but I was able to take it apart and get it fixed. For the most part the buttons continued to work reliably for years and years. I dropped it several times but it did not break.
- I liked that it showed up as a simple mass-storage device on my computer, which made loading and unloading MP3s easy.
The main disadvantage to this player was that it used a proprietary cable for connecting to a computer. I worried endlessly about losing that cable, because getting a replacement would be so difficult. But in the end I lost the MP3 player instead.
I don't like to admit this, but I have a bad habit of getting emotionally attached to my possessions. That was definitely the case with this MP3 player, probably because I used it pretty much every single day.
I wish there was still a market for these kinds of well-built players, but that era is over. People just use their phones now, and being technologically-backwards I am not keen on carrying a tracking device around just so I can listen to podcasts.
It is debatable whether listening to podcasts has been a net benefit in my life, but the reality is that I am stuck now, and am exceedingly unlikely to give podcasts up if I have any choice in the matter. Being able to dispense my drug of choice efficiently and reliably was a great luxury.
Goodbye, MP3 player. I will miss you.