On Sun, September 17, 2006 17:00, Stephanie Jo Kent wrote:
Ok. Here's the deal. I'm really dumb about a lot of this stuff. I just updated iTunes to 7.0. Did a Party Shuffle. I'm wondering about the "randomness factor". Specifically, the chances that a sequence of several songs would fall into sync?
I'm interested in qualitative answers as well as any quantitative results. For instance, is there some snoop software that reads my measurable statistics in relation to online music?
Steph, I've been curious about the metaphysics of shuffle as well -- wondering if there are flavors and varieties of randomness to the iPod, or just an all-or-nothing order-vs.-chaos. As has been pointed out, iTunes has an adjustable feature (under Preferences>Playback) in the form of a slider that "allows you to control how likely you are to hear multiple songs in a row by the same artist or from the same album." But on a more conceptual and psychologically interesting level, I encourage you to check out a piece that ran in the New York Times in 2004 titled "Tunes, a Hard Drive And (Just Maybe) a Brain." Find it at http://tinyurl.com/fxodj (you may need to register to view). Best, -- Bob Rehak Visiting Assistant Professor Film and Media Studies Swarthmore College