i need to let go of spotify08.mar.25

relevant entries: ways of consuming music

about like a year and a few months ago i wrote a log about how i would start to make changes to the way that i listen to music. i think it's time i wrote an update to that!

i wrote about how i wasn't going to be using spotify anymore, but right after writing that log i found an app called xmanager. i was almost in love and have been using it on the daily til 2 days ago or so. i'm not very sure about the details but it seems like spotify rolled something out that makes 'cracked' spotify apps not work. i almost fell to my knees when i found this out. i saw that it was working for some people. i need download an older patch to see if it works but at the end of the day it will still be an unreliable method of listening to music that might not always be there.

all in all, i think my biggest concern is just to have SOMEWHERE where i can listen to new albums without being interumpted by ads or whatever. i'll always use bandcamp but what about artists who don't upload their stuff to bandcamp? call me lazy but i don't wanna go through the trouble of downloading an album that i don't even know if i'll like. to me that has always been the convenience of streaming platforms. at the very least, spotify with an ad blocker seems to be working well (enough) on my desktop browser. and at least i still have youtube as well.

i've been slowly but surely been increasing my digital album collection on my PC thanks to lucida. did not know this existed til i saw a button for it on someone's site so thank you very much for the knowledge! but all of that is just on my PC.

i've had thoughts about getting myself an used MP3 player like the sony walkman i used to own when i was little given that my phone's storage and battery life is so ASS! but right now i kinda don't have the budget to spend it on silly things like that. maybe a microSD card for my phone will do. but again. i hate my phone. someday i'll have my digital collection of music on the go. i guess for now, bandcamp will do the job.

that is basically my plan going forward. i don't think i'll ever let go of spotify as long as i still have a way of accessing it without ads with no $$$. but i feel like it's just a matter of time. i have so many playlists over there oh lord. at least there's exportify.net

an update on some other things touched on that past log: i LOVE my beloved discs, but i only listen to them when the power goes out. my current car has a CD player but it doesn't read any discs... not sure what's the problem. i listen to this radio station that i used to listen to when i was in middle and high school. and man.the quality of music they air is so.... it might be the nostalgia goggles for 2010's music but FUCK man. it's not really the same. they used to have a very cohesive playlist of dance and electronic songs. but nowadays they are literally just your average pop radio station and it pisses me off so much. you used to be better!!!! i mostly use the train to go to places though (public transportation walking to places not having to drive ) so at least i don't really get pissed off that much.

i will now grind some uni work.

a lot happening01.mar.25

this week felt like a finals week. been studying my ass off for 2 exams that i literally JUST got out of. my intro to programming exam was on thursday and my calculus exam was on friday. i am pretty confident in both of them!

though i definitely poured so so many hours of study into that calculus one. actually just the class in general. i am so lucky that my current professor has videos of his classes available online because he just goes so fucking fast!!! i am always catching up with his classes at the end of the end. which i guess it kinda pays off since its just more practice that i get. but i just like making sure that i'm actually understanding what's going on. math is something that i literally have to give my everything to in order to get a good grade. but i guess it makes sense as someone who still does math with their fingers. my basic math levels are lowkey on the floor. and basically my only strength is that i just like to study. i am hoping for a B in my calculus test.

at least my intro to programming exam is in the bag though. i might have some stuff wrong. mostly related to what the RAM does compared to the CPU. girl i forgor. my javascript knowledge really is carrying this class as well. i sometimes put notes on my notebook asking hmm i wonder if there's something like this in JS. i really like the class as well my professor. her vibes are great. and she's super friendly too. i got a 9.5/10 on a quiz and she drew a smiley face on my paper :) i feel like i'm in elementary school.

talking about computer science, there has been some activities being held by compsci students for people who wanted to learn how to use text editors, the terminal, and git. i went to these mostly because, despite knowing a good amount of most of these things, i'm pretty new to all of this. there's always a good chance i might learn something new. and i did! during the git activity on friday, i used my personal acc for the activity since that's the one i have connected to git. and one of the guys put on screen my whole ass github profile which led me to be outed as someone who already knew (almost) everything they were covering. i guess i was a bit embarrassed because of how silly profile looks. the guy was kinda surprised anyway and basically oh you already know all of this stuff, neat!. when that was over, another guy came up to me saying that he got super curious about my profile and visited it along side my site saying that it was really cool they were all very nice and talked to me for a bit which i appreciate. i really gotta get braver at talking to people. after that, it made me realize all of the opportunities that growing this site has led me to.

oh good lord it's march. anyways. i'm still working on version 5 of the homepage. i've been having so much fun coding it. it's pretty much done but i wanna release it once i finish the CSS media queries so it looks ok on smaller screens and mobile. i really can't wait to finish it!!! do expect it pretty soon :3 i hope everyone is doing well.