Interface Implications
One interesting side effect of my inability to get my main Linux desktop sound working, is my current usage of my netbook as my multimedia machine – with DVDs streamed over by VLC, shows watched via TV on Demand and my entire MP3 collection stored on it.
And one interesting observation has popped up – I’ve become more likely to listen to songs in my collection to the end. How? Well, my machine doesn’t have media keys, so there’s no quick switching of tracks. Also, the player I’ve decided on, foobar2000 allows me to customise the interface. I’ve actually gone and removed everything except the playlist and the small visualisation – and made the only hotkey be adding a song to the queue.
It’s utterly spartan – even more so than say a Ipod Shuffle. It’s got even less control than my Bluetooth headphones do when I use those with my phone – where I regularly skip songs.
I just think it’s an interesting side effect of minimalism that it stops hyper-actively skipping through tracks.
Comments Off