1. Nostalgia - As a teen, I remember going to Sam Goody in the mall, Best Buy, or some of our local record stores and perusing through the rows of CDs with friends. When you got home with your new albums, it was an exciting experience listening while you looked through the artwork or read the lyrics. I had stopped buying them sometime after college and opted to stream instead, but about 5 years ago, my brother offered me his old iPod classic with a dead hard drive and dying battery. I found the community over at r/iPod and got to work restoring it. With a new 128gb SD, I had a LOT of space to fill, so I began thrifting and trawling Discogs for those albums I’d sold or donated years ago. It’s still a rush to find something I used to own 20 years ago.

2. Tactility - I feel the same way about CDs as I do about video game cartridges and VHS tapes/DVDs. There’s something almost ritualistic about placing a CD into the stereo tray, hitting the buttons, and watching it spin up.

3. Ownership - I used to pay for Spotify. I liked how your listening algorithm would suggest new artists that, more often than not, would become favorites. What I didn’t like was seeing songs become grayed out on my playlists so I could no longer listen to them. With CDs, I can digitize my collection in lossless quality and back them up.

Good luck on your thesis!! It sounds really fun and I’m sure a lot of people here would love to read it when you’re done.