iStuff Has Officially Taken Over the World!

I intensely dislike the stronghold iTunes, iPod, and all of the iStuff that goes with it has over the whole music enjoyment process. I give you some background:

A couple (maybe a few) of years ago, I asked for nothing but Target giftcards as gifts for my birthday and Christmas. As they are so close together, I tend to get alot of stuff at the end of the year. On this particular year, I had wanted to purchase an iPod.

I received ample giftcards to purchase my iPod, but iPods were scarce that year. Target (including online) had no idea when they would be restocked. It was into January when I decided to research other brands.

I found one I liked online that had triple the features of the iPod I planned to buy for the same price. The only problem was that it was an off brand, something I'd never heard of. I bought it anyway.

I was so excited to get my MP3 player, but still had alot to learn. As it happened, I had no idea that iTunes was only friendly to an iPod and that their music wouldn't play on anything else. I had purchased iTunes cards with my remaining giftcard money and they were useless. Until I found Hymn Project.

I downloaded some software, rather tentatively, that would convert my iTunes protected files into unprotected files that I could put on my player AND they would work. The software runs in the background and automatically deposits the unprotected files into a folder each time I downloaded something from iTunes.

But, it was too late. I had already developed my intense dislike for all that is iStuff. It was taking over the world. After I used up my iTunes credit, I vowed to never use iTunes again. I later discovered that most online music services have the protected files (and now I understand why), but, for the most part, the other files could be played on my player. But not iTunes. No, iTunes only works with iPod.

Back to now. A few months ago, my off brand gave up on me and would no longer work. I set out to buy a new one and this time iPods were in excess everywhere. But, I sure as hell wasn't going to buy an iPod after I had developed such a strong dislike for iStuff. By the way, the MP3 player I bought is awesome and way better than an iPod, I'm sure of it.

Anyhow, there are very few shows on TV that I HAVE to watch. One of these is "The Office." I don't watch shows as they are scheduled, I DVR them and watch them at my convenience.

Last night, I was sitting down to watch TV and realized that I hadn't watched the special-one-hour-Christmas-party-episode-of-the-office. Before starting it, I began deleting the many episodes of "Full House" and "Sabrina, the Teen-aged Witch" that my daughter wants me to record, but rarely watches. I think you see it coming. I got so "delete" happy, that I accidentally deleted "The Office." *GASP*

After spending time trying to find it on the internet, I realized that the only way I was going to get it was to download it from iTunes. It was certainly worth the $1.99, but was it worth using iTunes?

I regret to inform you that I broke my 2-year long iTunes abstinence.

And that is why iStuff has officially taken over the world.