finished piece on 8 track

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-"They have turned a thousand useless luxuries into necessities!" -- Mark Twain
-
-I just sold an and old Oldsmobile 8 track cassette player on eBay for $86.
+I just sold an old Oldsmobile 8 track cassette player on eBay for $86. Yes, I sold an antiquated music player that takes a format no one has manufactured in over four decades for $86. 
 
 I pulled it out of the bus. It's a stock item for a Cutlass Supreme from the late 1960s through early 1970s. I have no idea how it came to be in a 1969 Dodge Travco. What I do have an idea about is why I just sold it, as-is, could-be-working, could not be working, for $86. 
 
-Seriously, I sold an antiquated music player that takes a format no one has manufactured in over four decades for $86. 
+In purely practical terms the current value of the 8 track is bewildering and when you first encounter it, you are thinking in practical terms. Practically speaking 8 track cassettes are unwieldy, easily damaged, didn't sound very good even when they were brand new and were never produced in the quantities that vinyl or even the cassette tapes that replaced them were.
+
+The 8 track did not get $86 because it was practical.
+
+Practical would be the brand new, reasonably high end car stereo that will replace the 8 track, which set me back a mere $45 on Amazon. It will play every digital music format you've ever heard of and dozens more you haven't. It's a knock off of a fancier name-brand model most likely made by the same slave laborers in the same factory. Capitalism. 
+
+But even I would be the first to admit it's also a complete piece of crap, made of cheap plastic and designed to be chucked in a rubbish bin the minute it starts to malfunction. In fact the advent of the car stereo wiring "harness" -- which eliminates any need to understand soldering and reduces the installation process to clicking little plastic pieces into place -- was designed to facilitated this kind disposability. Consumer capitalism.
+
+The 8 track player on the other hand is not disposable in the same way. Nor is it installation-friendly. Whoever installs it will be soldering it in, or perhaps twisting and taping some wires, but either way there will most definitely not be any snapping of plastic. It will take time. Even after all the time it takes to repair it, it will take time to install it.
+
+But there's the thing. If it does turn out to not be working, it be repaired by anyone with the patience to sit down, take it apart and figure out how it works. 
 
-In purely practical terms the current value of the 8 track is bewildering. Eight track cassettes are unwieldy, easily damaged, didn't sound very good even when they were brand new and were never produced in the quantities that vinyl or even the cassette tapes that replaced them were. They were something of black swan when it comes to music storage formats.
+This is the first part of why I think the 8 track still has so much value to this day. The world is increasingly disposable, not just by design, but by inherent complexity vs price. The cheap stereo is fixable too -- as anyone who's tinkered with a Raspberry Pi can tell you, it's not that hard to solder, though it does take some practice -- but it requires more specialized knowledge and (often) a circuit diagram of some sort. And because a new one is only $45 it's tough to come up with a convincing argument for fixing it.
 
-Consider that the brand new, reasonably high end car stereo that will replace that eight track costs a mere $45 on Amazon. It will play every digital music format you've ever heard of and dozens more you haven't. It's a knock off of a fancier name-brand model most likely made by the same slave laborers in the same factory. Capitalism. 
+Purely mechanical devices like the 8-track, which consists of some machined bearings, a capstan, a solenoid coil and a couple other elements, are much easier to figure out on your own, without a schematic. It's also made of things that are fixable, which adds a new dimension to ownership. This is not just a thing you traded for some tickets, which you traded hours of your life to get, but a thing you can fix should you need to. There is an element of self-reliance present that it is not present in the Amazon plastic crap.
 
-It's also a complete piece of crap, made of cheap plastic and designed to be chucked in a rubbish bin the minute it starts to malfunction. In fact the advent of the car stereo wiring "harness", which eliminates any need to understand soldering and reduces the installation process to clicking little plastic pieces into place, was designed to facilitated just this kind disposability. Consumer capitalism.
+There is a kind of satisfaction in taking something apart, wrapping your head around how it works and then putting it back together better than it was before. Sure, at this point you might have to fabricate some parts if they turn out the be broken, but with 3D printers that's well within the realm of possibility (and, should 3D printers not be around there are still plenty of old fashioned metal lathe in metal shops all over the place).
 
-The 8-track player on the other hand is a purely mechanical device. Whoever installs it will be soldering it in, or perhaps just twisting and taping some wires, but either way there will most definitely not be any snapping of plastic. It can, if it does turn out to not be working, be repaired by just about anyone with the patience to sit down, take it apart and figure out how it works. 
+What's more, no matter what the things is -- clocks, wood burning stoves, vehicles, radios, turntables, even houses -- I guarantee there are people out there devoting their free time and energy to fixing it. These people have created forums and share knowledge, tips and tricks all over the internet, often you find people joining in who used to work in factories making the thing in question. 
 
-What's more, there is a kind of satisfaction in taking something apart, wrapping your head around how it works and then putting it back together better than it was before. No matter what the things is -- clocks, wood burning stoves, vehicles, radios, even houses -- I guarantee there are people out there devoting their free time and energy to fixing it.
+In the 8 track's case there is [8trackheaven.com](http://8trackheaven.com/), which does not appear to be maintained, but has another clue as to why [people find value in older stuff](http://8trackheaven.com/archive/why.html):
 
-Sure, at this point you might have to fabricate some parts if they turn out the be broken, but with 3D printers that's well within the realm of possibility. Forget even 3D printers, even if you have to turn to a good old fashioned metal lathe or something, well, they're still around. 
+> When you say yes to 8-track you're generally saying no to the accepted wisdom of our hallowed consumer culture, decrying this religion of consumption as the worship of hollow, deceptive idols.... Commit an act of consumer disobedience with us and reject the unjust laws of a marketplace ruled by greed. Follow the way of the 8-track and reap the spiritual rewards that come with renewing and recycling instead of stepping in line with the cattle so captivated with the consumerist culture that ultimately benefits only landfill brokers.
 
-Anyone with the free time and patience to study it can fix a mechanical device by reconstructing it roughly the state it has when it began its useful life. This is what makes an ancient 8 track sell for more than a modern stereo[^1], but more to the point, it's what gives the 8 track any value at all.
+I think this little manifesto-style rejection hints at something else in the appeal of restoration, something beyond the ability to repair things. I think that buying and restoring mechanical devices from earlier eras is also a way of traveling through time back to a world we may well have never personally known. There's an element of nostalgia, but nostalgia for something never experienced.
 
-I think there is something else going on as well though. I think that buying and restoring mechanical devices from earlier eras a way of traveling through time back to a past we may well have never personally known. Some of it may be nostalgia, but some of it is something else.
+I have no memory of 1969 Dodge Travcos, but in recreating one I'm connecting back to era I never got to experience. It's not nostalgia for that time, not really romanticism of it either. It's something different, tangibly different. That time is gone, but echoes of it remain in the objects that come down to us. And I think that the world's response to the Travco, [the endless smiles and waves](/jrnl//2015/06/big-blue-bus) reflect that connection, that echo of age that gave us the Travco. 
 
-On one hand there is the act of reconstructing the past in the present: the thing, whatever it may be, is from the past and you are in the present. But the restoration process is also a way to taking something from the present back into the past, back in time to the way it was when it was new. It's a bit like trying to recreate a memory you never had.
+That age had ideas about itself, about the objects that surrounded it, grew out of it. There is nothing like the Travco on the road now and that says as much about us now as it does about Travcos then. This often brings with it an implicit, or as in the 8-track manifesto, an explicit rejection of the perceived values of today in favor of either the values of the past or simply the value of stasis. The 8-track manifesto is nostalgic for 8-tracks necessary, it's simply that 8-tracks become the stopping point of technological progression. They are good enough.
 
-I have no memory of 1969 Dodge Travcos, but in recreating one I'm connecting back to era I never got to experience. It's not nostalgia for that time, not really romanticism of it either, it's just something different, tangibly different. The time is gone, but echos of it remain in the objects that come down to us.
+This is a big part of why I have the Travco. Not that it is best RV every built, but that it is good enough. It does not provide every comfort of home and in that sense it becomes a kind of critique of our modern conception of comfort. Do you really need two TVs in your RV?
 
-And I think that the world's response to the Travco, [the endless smiles and waves](/jrnl//2015/06/big-blue-bus) reflect that connection, that echo of age that gave us the Travco. That age had ideas about itself, about the objects that surrounded it, grew out of it. There is nothing like the Travco on the road now and that says as much about us now as it does about Travco's then.
+More to the point the restoration is the embodiment of that reject, look, here is an era when no one thought it necessary to have two TVs in their RV. It becomes a kind of nostalgia for a set of values -- though you need to be careful about this since there are some really shitty values lurking back in the age of the Travco and 8-track -- but I don't know that nostalgia is quite the word. I'm not sure we have a word to describe the rejection and embracing.
 
-The same is true of 8 tracks. Or I suspect it is anyway. Like the person who bought the 8-track, I'm part of some process of recreating a collective memory of the sort I'm not sure we have a word to describe. Nostalgia is the one that comes to mind, but to me that has a negative tinge to it.
+Antoine de Saint-Exupéry writes in <cite>Wind, Sand and Stars</cite>, "To grasp the meaning of the world of today we use a language created to express the world of yesterday."
 
-Antoine de Saint-Exupéry writes in tk, "To grasp the meaning of the world of today we use a language created to express the world of yesterday." I thought of this line -- as I often do -- when I was struggling to find a word int he last paragraph, but then it also seems true of objects. That is, you could easily change it read: to grasp the meaning of the world of today we use objects that are expressions of the world of yesterday.
+I thought of this line when I was struggling to find a word in the last paragraph, but then I thought that perhaps we do the same thing with object. That is, you could easily change it read: to grasp the meaning of the world of today we use objects that are expressions of the world of yesterday.
 
 Perhaps this is me getting old, but the Travco makes more sense to me than any vehicle being made now. And I don't mean the technical, the engine complexity of now versus then, though that is certainly part of it, but there are less technical things too. 
 
-The way the engineers of the Travco looked at the world is reflected in what they built. The way the engineers who built the Honda maxivan I also currently own look at the world is reflected in their choices as well. And these are very markedly different ways of looking at the world. The engineers of the Honda assume me an idiot. It won't let me open the side doors when it's in drive. It will howl with beeping should I shift out of park while the door is still open. It doesn't tell me what the oil pressure is, but it will angrily flash an inscrutable light when it senses the oil pressure getting low. 
+The way the engineers of the Travco looked at the world is reflected in what they built. The way the engineers who built the Honda maxivan I also currently own look at the world is reflected in their choices as well. And these are very markedly different ways of looking at the world. The engineers of the Honda assume me an idiot. They won't let me open the side doors when the vehicle is in drive. They made it howl with beeping should I shift out of park while the door is still open. They decided not to tell me what the oil pressure is, but instead angrily flash an inscrutable light when the oil pressure getting low. 
 
-These are minor things that irritate me not because of their actual function but because of what they say about how the designers of the Honda think about me and the rest of the world. It doesn't stop there either. The engineers of the Honda take a dim view of professional mechanics as well. Honda's own workers are not mechanics, they're certified technicians. The world of the Honda is exclusive, stratified, and specialized. It has no place for the mechanic of old and certainly now place for you and I[^2]
+These are minor things that irritate me not because of their actual function but because of what they say about how the designers of the Honda think about me and the rest of the world. It doesn't stop there either. The engineers of the Honda take a dim view of professional mechanics as well. Honda's own workers are not mechanics, they're certified technicians. The world of the Honda is exclusive, stratified, and specialized. It has no place for the mechanic of old and certainly now place for you and I[^2]. 
 
 I cannot make sense of a world where designers believe they are better at knowing what I am capable of than I am. 
 
 This is true of the disposable stereo as well. It has stickers all over it and warnings on the box about voiding the warranty if you unscrew a certain screw to access the inside (as if not having a warranty were some horrible thing). All technology has moved in this direction, much of it to the point of using obscure torx screws and other deliberate attempts to stymie tinkering.
 
-This is a world that I cannot make sense of, nor can, I suspect, the buyer of my 8 track. Why? What is so horrible that could happen if I take a think apart? That I might break it? Well then I would have broken it. And learned something.
+Why? What is so horrible that could happen if I take a think apart? That I might break it? Well then I would have broken it. And learned something.
 
-I can make sense of the world the designers of the Travco lived in. It feels more like home to me. There are access panels everywhere. A lengthy guide tells me how to disassemble most of the core components in the vehicle. Even ones you can't reach without tearing out the walls -- the 12V electrical system are show complete with schematics. The designers of the Travco felt I might want to -- indeed they knew I would have to -- get to the engine, so the built a massive, awkward access hatch that's half as large as the seats on either side of it.
+This is a world that I cannot make sense of, nor can, I suspect, the buyer of my 8 track. 
 
-It is, like all vehicles of its era, designed to be tinkered with. Because tinkering is the thing that makes us human. Or at least that's the message I get when I sit in the Travco tinkering with things. I notice how there's not just a vent at the back of the fridge, but a panel that opens to give access to the entire 2-way fridge internals. I notice how  the tk example of access or deliberately making things either to fix.
+I can make sense of the design world the creators of the Travco came from. It feels more like home to me. It is built to empower the owner, not stymie them. There are access panels everywhere. A lengthy guide tells me how to disassemble most of the core components in the vehicle. Even ones you can't reach without tearing out the walls -- the 12V electrical system is shown complete with schematics. The designers of the Travco felt I might want to -- indeed they knew I would have to -- get to the engine, so the built a massive, awkward access hatch that's half as large as the seats on either side of it.
 
-The next line in Saint-Exupéry's book is, "The life of the past seems to us nearer our true natures, but only for the reason that it is nearer our language." Is the same true of objects? Are objects of the past nearer to us because they are closer to the time we first acquired objects? Perhaps. Perhaps modern consumer capitalist society has just created a world in which not only are most manufactured goods utter crap, but they're created by designers who prize infantilization above all else.
+It is, like all vehicles of its era, designed to be tinkered with. Because tinkering is the thing that makes us human. Or at least that's the message I get when I sit in the Travco tinkering with things. I notice how there's not just a vent at the back of the fridge, but a panel that opens to give access to the entire 2-way fridge internals. I also notice that in the original sales brochures the easy of repair is a central selling point. Not so long ago we liked the fix things ourselves.
 
-Call it nostalgia, call it a desire to grasp the world. The name isn't important. I don't know who bought the 8 track, but I do suspect that she's a bit like me -- she's looking for something to tinker with, something to take back in time to its original state, back in time to a world perhaps she never new, but misses none the less. We are like Saint-Exupéry writes, "emigrants who have not founded our homeland".
+The next line in Saint-Exupéry's book is, "The life of the past seems to us nearer our true natures, but only for the reason that it is nearer our language." Is the same true of objects? Are objects of the past nearer to us because they are nearer to our natures. Perhaps. 
 
+I don't know who bought the 8 track, but I do suspect that she's a bit like me -- she's looking for something to tinker with, something to take back in time to its original state, back in time to a world perhaps she never knew, but misses none the less. We are like Saint-Exupéry writes, "emigrants who have not founded our homeland", and I wish her the best of luck in trying to create it.
 
 [^1]: In an ideal capitalist system anyway. In fact we don't live in a system like that. We live in a system where price of the new stereo is artificially low because we in the west have decided were okay with exploiting people in other parts of the world for the sole purpose of making sure we have $45 stereos.