Social psychologist Barry Schwartz, author of The Paradox of Choice: Why More Is Less, identifies changes from our habit of listening to singles, too: "Less album listening means that people aren't forced to listen to things that don't turn them on right away, and as a result, tastes change less."

2. Grabbing tons of music (most of which you probably aren't all that interested in) just to fill up the storage space.

Interesting concept about how the access to so much music is actually ruining the young listeners ability to expand musical tastes.

Widespread choice in music is an Internet phenomenon rather than an iPod thing.

What I will attribute to the iPod are two cultural shifts:

1. Music is becoming more of a solitary listening experience.

2. Grabbing tons of music (most of which you probably aren't all that interested in) just to fill up the storage space.

When you look at what the musical tastes of a typical itunes shopper is, you could arguably say that it is a 'young listeners' chart..although, I'm not sure if the term 'young listeners' should really apply in that study.

It's blinkingly obvious that many ipod owners are 'hoarder-geeks', rather than a broadstroke 'young listeners'. They take great pride in the fact that they have a low quality version of thousands of albums (they probably never bought) in their pocket.

And as for iphone owners...well...how small does your cock have to be?

Hoarding songs is a trait associated with people who treat music as the audio equivalent to wallpaper - they're not really listening to the music.

If they didn't have an ipod, they would be hoarding something else. Like stamps, biros, star-trek memorabilia or umbrella handles.

That study, to me, is just another sad insight on the apple generation. A sad insight that's validated when you look at the top selling albums on itunes in 2007.

A chart which illustrates the distinct lack of taste of itunes shoppers.

There are some serious music lovers with great taste out there using ipods..but, they don't register on the radar because they're in the minority....which makes it more a study on what sort of taste in music the apple generation have.

My ritual:

1)Go to the record shop.
2)Agonize for an hour over what I should buy. Make multiple trips through the aisles picking up and putting back as I go.
3)Check out and leave the store and head home ASAP
4)Put on album and listen to in from start to finish and hopefully read the lyric sheets and check out the artwork.

When you look at what the musical tastes of a typical itunes shopper is, you could arguably say that it is a 'young listeners' chart..although, I'm not sure if the term 'young listeners' should really apply in that study.

It's blinkingly obvious that many ipod owners are 'hoarder-geeks', rather than a broadstroke 'young listeners'. They take great pride in the fact that they have a low quality version of thousands of albums (they probably never bought) in their pocket.

Hoarding songs is a trait associated with people who treat music as the audio equivalent to wallpaper - they're not really listening to the music.

That study, to me, is just another sad insight on the apple generation. A sad insight that's validated when you look at the top selling albums on itunes in 2007.

A chart which illustrates the distinct lack of taste of itunes shoppers.

There are some serious music lovers with great taste out there using ipods..but, they don't register on the radar because they're in the minority....which makes it more a study on what sort of taste in music the apple generation have.

Funny thing about iPod assholes is that while they used to ask for "songs" from pals who were "into music", they now ask for FULL albums as they've got the space, and there's a perverse "ownership of tracks" dynamic happenning.

Again - fuck Apple and Jobs.

Still not Popeye.

I never existed in a world without cassette tapes. Was there no vinyl swapping? No "ownership of lp" dynamic happening?

As much as I'd like to say I still buy vinyl and play my records all the time, it's just not true. I've kept all my vinyl and digitized some of it, and may even eventually do a nice quasi-audiophile turntable setup. But having my whole library on the PC and a big chunk of it on an iPod has gotten me more excited about music than I've ever been in my life. And I was obsessive enough to be poring over Billboard when I was 10 years old, loved buying 10 or 12 singles a week, etc. I do have some nostalgia for those days, but being able to have such quick and unfettered access to my music trumps it. In my case it has most certainly opened up my taste, rather than ruined it.
And I think high bitrate mp3's sound just fine, sorry. I've tried lossless and it just ain't worth it for me.