all my music is four years old (or more)

I have never been a big collector of music. In fact, even in the heyday of unfettered peer-to-peer networking which seemed to peak while I was in college, I didn't download that many songs. I'll readily concede that p2p networks have grown considerably in the last four years, but they have certainly attracted the attention of parties with vested interests in the nature of the content being so freely swapped. Regardless, my music collecting days began a sharply downward descent after I moved out of the dorms. The result is that I have a music collection that is curiously dated. There's nothing less than four years old and very little in the year or two before then.

This line of thought was prompted when I decided to dump all the MP3s I had into one big Winamp playlist and let it shuffle through songs. I have some really strange stuff. For instance, I think it speaks to the power of the 'Boy Band' phenomenon that even I have a handful of songs from those compelling luminaries. And why oh why do I have any techno and house music? And how can System of a Down and Disturbed coexist with Lifehouse and Jars of Clay? They simply do.

I also went through many jags where I collected songs from a particular artist or group or even everything from the soundtrack of a movie. But hey, I like the music on the soundtracks of both O Brother, Where Art Thou? and The Matrix. And who doesn't like The Imperial March from The Empire Strikes Back.

All this speaks the vague and eclectic music tastes I seem to have. More than anything, I see it as a compelling argument that there is little loyalty to be had in the business, at least from folks like me. I listen to music in the radio. I haven't bought an actual CD in over two years. In those same two years, I've probably purchased a handful of songs on iTunes, but generally disliked the user experience since I hadn't drunk the Apple Kool-Aid at the time. (And while I find their laptops compelling, I still don't care enough about music to buy into a user experience that is highly proprietary.)

Oh, there's no point to this post. Just rambling.