Apple has for months offered a trade-in service for first generation nanos to get a free new nano. It was one of the first things I wrote about on this site. I even ordered the box to trade my ipod in. But I didn’t. At least not yet. I couldn’t trade in my first baby.
You see, the original first generation nano was my first ipod. I was young, and for my birthday after months of begging my parents, they got me a beautiful black ipod nano along with two CDs from my favorite band, the beatles to populate it. I was so excited. I fell in love. That ipod lasted me several years before being replaced by a new, third generation Nano I’d won, but I still loved it like a baby. It was my first, and I kept it on my shelf as an artifact of the evolution of technology next to a floppy disk, and several versions of itunes on disk that I had collected.
When the time came to trade it in, I just couldn’t do it. I like to say that if you’re happy with a ’75 Chevy, there’s no reason to upgrade to a ferrari even if you could. I love new technology, and the new possibilities it brings, but I don’t want to forget that this was a slow evolution to the incredible technology we have today, so instead of trading in my nano, I’ll keep it, to remind me what I have learned.