An Experiment in Self-Improvement

Why my record player makes me a hypocrite (or not?)

This post is a testament to keeping at something even if it's miles short of what I imagined it to be. I thought this would be a daily blog, and had this idealistic notion of committing myself to contributing every day. But I'm glad that I'm still showing up and writing this.

Anyways. I really like records. We went second-hand record shopping this weekend, and there's something really exciting about sifting through boxes full of $1 records, hoping to find a hidden gem, plucking out anything vaguely interesting for completely random reasons (pretty cover, fun title, band that I have somewhat vaguely heard but am unsure if I have actually heard any songs of/am confusing them with another similarly-named band). And then the thrill of coming back home, waiting to listen to them one by one, with no idea if I will like them or not. And then finally the thrill of listening to something that you would have never otherwise sought out and actually liking it - in my case, Barry Manilow II and The Moody Blues - On The Threshold of a Dream.

At work, I often try to think about making the world objectively "better" - smarter, with access to more things, etc. I live in that "better" world - I have access to all the music I could ever want through Spotify, I can listen to anything, I also have thoughtfully designed UI, tailored to my needs, recommending me things I'm likely to enjoy, etc. etc. And yet I really enjoy the imperfect system, the old system much more.

A note to myself -- I would never deny anyone access to Spotify, and it's still important that everyone should be able to access music. So it's still worth striving for that "better". But also it's worth being humble and accepting that this "better" may not be for everyone, and one should be able to fight/resist it as well. I can choose to also do things the old way if I please. The fact that the old way still exists and is popular -- record stores, etc. -- is because people that felt the same took action and did something about it. They exercised a choice to not just succumb to Spotify.

If Spotify were actively trying to crush vinyl stores and these efforts, that would suck and be shitty. Just like Amazon trying to crush local bookstores.

Just live your life, talk about the joys that you believe in. The world is a tussle of ideas, and the more people trying to think differntly, and act on their choices, the better. The fact that we all listen to Spotify doesn't mean they've made the world worse - we're all exercising a choice to use it.

maybe I'm not a hypocrite after all.

Wow that was so poorly written, unstructured, not very profound, and probably flawed logic in many ways (there are differences between music/culture and making the world better in terms of essential services), but fuck it. I'm just going to push this. Going to commit to putting out my poorly formed, terribly written, imperfect ideas out there.