Time to dust off the click wheel.
In today’s edition of Do You Feel Old?, it’s been exactly 25 years since the unveiling of the original iPod, one of the most important products in not only Apple’s own history, but that of consumer technology in general. The MP3 player that everyone coveted famously promised to give you 1,000 songs in your pocket, and Apple is reminding us of what a feat that was with a cute anniversary Easter egg.
If you attempt to load a broken page on the Apple Music website (try this one for size) you’ll be met with a fully interactive virtual version of the OG iPod. Beneath the standard “page not found” message are the words “give this a spin instead,” and if you know your way around an iPod you can navigate a library of 1,029 playable songs.
The click wheel and general controls are all interactive, if forgivably a bit buggy in my experience. I advise trying this on your phone or tablet, so you can use the touch screen to make it feel even more nostalgically iPod-y. (I also had issues getting it to work at all on the desktop.)
The interface is exactly as you remember it, with sections for Playlists, Artists, Songs and Settings. Much of the included music is all delightfully early 2000s-coded, featuring artists like Baha Men, blink-182 and Eminem. I’m in the UK, so I don’t know if artists like Daniel Bedingfield, The Fratellis and Klaxons also show up if you’re browsing in the US. I’m pretty sure none of them made much of an impression across the pond. And sadly you don’t get more than 90 seconds of any included track.
