At the risk of overgeneralizing, there are two major categories of technologies in the world: special purpose and general purpose. Would it help to have an illustration? OK. A typewriter is a special purpose machine that does one thing and one thing only; it puts words on paper. In contrast, a computer is a general-purpose machine that does many things including, but not limited to, putting words on paper. There are countless examples I could cite. The filet knife, special purpose. The Swiss army knife, general purpose. The digital SLR camera, special purpose. The smart phone, general purpose pocket computer that also has one or more cameras. It is often, though not always, the case that a special purpose tool will be better at accomplishing a task than its general purpose alternative. If one wishes to filet a fish, a dedicated filet knife will be infinitely better for the task than a Swiss army knife (no offense to the Swiss army).

There is not much point in trying to debate whether a smartphone is a better music player than an iPod or a better camera than a Nikon or a better GPS than OnStar. As a general purpose device that can do all of those things as well as I need, the vast majority of the time, my smartphone is like the Swiss army knife: always in my pocket and able to be anything from an encyclopedia to a bubble level if I need it to be. There are so many benefits to the all-in-one, general purpose, device that it hardly needs pointing out. Why, then, do single purpose devices still exist? Why, if Internet advertising is to be believed, is there a movement towards special purpose technologies such as tape players, turntables, film cameras, and other seemingly dead platforms? It’s not nostalgia. The kids who are buying cassette tapes and Walkmans today didn’t grow up with these technologies. They didn’t have vinyl records. Yet there is a resurgence in interest in “retro” and “vintage” technology and I suspect that the reason is quite simple; people are drawn to the experience of focus.

Focus, flow state, distraction free, whatever you wish to call it, even in (maybe especially in) today’s digitally mediated and hyper connected world, has its timeless appeal. While you certainly can sit down with a laptop and a copy of GarageBand and make a song, there’s a good chance that you will start with that intention and wind up on Reddit reading about cats. In contrast, if you pick up a guitar and try to write a song, there is a 0% chance of the guitar popping up a notification or showing you a picture of a bunny with a pancake on its head. Flow, or focus, is simply easier to achieve with a technology/tool that is not connected to other people/places/things that are not related to the thing that you are trying to accomplish.

If you listen to a new album on a streaming service you may be simultaneously on social media or taking pictures of your pets or texting with your sister and while you are certainly able to honestly say that you listened to the record, you did so with only a portion of your attention. What if, instead, you took a record out of the sleeve, set it on a turntable, and listened to it with your full attention, perhaps spending some time looking at the jacket and liner notes while it played, without also playing Angry Birds or tweeting about it? This is an entirely different experience.

If you were to take a film camera or even a digital SLR out for a day of photography, you would be focused on photography in a different way than if you saw something, pulled out your phone, and took a quick picture. Certainly both tools can take photos, but only one keeps your focus on the goal of taking pictures.

This is a realization that has hit me fairly hard over the last few years. I have found myself pondering the seeming contradiction between my having access to the most capable technology I have ever had and my struggles to put the tools to creative uses. My computers are incredibly powerful writing machines but I find writing with them to be very difficult because my mind goes all over the place. There seems to be an inverse relationship between the digital audio tools I have at my disposal and my ability to write and record music as well. I have found myself buying vinyl records again as a way to experience new music because I find that streaming makes it more difficult to deeply engage with the music. What I’m saying, and maybe it’s just me, is that I’ve started to prioritize the experience of single tasking, of focus, of disconnection, over the convenience of general purpose devices. I don’t think I’m alone in this.

Perhaps I take it a little farther than some. I have started using typewriters and fountain pens for focused writing. I have moved to a dedicated music player for listening to my digital music library on the go even though my phone is a very good device for audio. I have acquired and rehabbed a few pre-Internet computers with ancient word processors installed to use and editing revising text for online publication even though it’s technically more complicated to move those files to a modern computer to publish them. I have even bought a dedicated multitrack recording machine to use in my recording studio despite the presence of a very powerful and full featured Mac sitting right there on the desk. In every case I am looking for a tool that allows me to focus on what I am doing without any distractions or the temptation to multitask. I find this mildly ironic since I am somebody who has a healthy dislike of nostalgia and I work in technology and have chased after more powerful convergence technology for most of my adult life. I was one of the first people I know who had an iPhone, I have carried a laptop with me for over 20 years, I built my first digital audio workstation in the 1990s. I am no Luddite. The idea that I would be writing this blog entry on a 60-year-old typewriter would have seemed like insanity to me 15 years ago. And yet, here I am, banging out a blog post on a machine that was built before The Beatles were a thing, despite the iPad Pro sitting on the table next to me, the iMac in the studio, the two Windows laptops in the living room, and the smart phone in my pocket. When I am happy with what I have written I will grab my laptop or phone and read these words out loud and they will be transformed into text by dictation software and I will spell check and revise and then I will post online. Or I might just re-type this using one of my old computers and then transfer the resulting file to a newer machine to post. It’s a lot of work to go through just to write a blog post, but it is work I am willing to do just so I can stay focused long enough to write something I want to write.

I know that I am not typical, but I also know that I am not alone in deciding that this is a more enjoyable and productive way to work. There are authors who work this way. Barack Obama, in his recent autobiography, admitted that he writes his books in longhand on yellow legal paper. George RR Martin writes all of his books on an ancient PC that has no Internet access. Both of those writers have access to all the latest technology, but they still opt for the “obsolete” tech to do focused work. Many, if not most, musicians use good old-fashioned guitars and paper notebooks to write their songs despite the powerful digital music tools at their disposal. Even amongst those who make electronic music, there is a preference for analog synthesizers with their knobs and switches over the myriad of digital software synths that are available. I think it boils down to focus, to a preference for special purpose tools with their inherent limitations and tactile, multi-sensory, experiences.

I readily admit that this philosophy isn’t for everyone. Acquiring, learning to use, and maintaining special purpose tools is (or can be) more expensive since many of the technologies I have mentioned are no longer manufactured and can be difficult to find or fix. There are cheap typewriters on the shelves of thrift stores all over the place, but they are rarely in a condition to be put to immediate use without also learning how to clean, lubricate, and repair them. Old computers are even harder to find and fix and the cost of buying a rehabbed and ready machine is usually pretty steep. Vintage tech often has a collector’s market associated with it and that often means that a cool analog synth that formerly sold for $100 or so will now go for several thousand dollars on eBay. For a lot of people, the all-in-one general purpose tool is all they can afford. I think that’s a real loss.

Tools that improve focus or bring you closer to the experience of creating something were formerly the primary options for making things. If you wanted to write you got a writing tool, if you wanted to make music you got a musical instrument, if you wanted to read you bought a book, if you wanted to listen to music you bought a turn table or a tape player or a CD player and you used each of these technologies exclusively and with intentionality. Then along came computers and smartphones, the market dried up and the dedicated tools were shunted aside and became “vintage” and “retro” and “obsolete”. Just like in the movies, where special effects became primarily the domain of CGI, the old ways became impractical and cost prohibitive. But, movie makers and moviegoers have recently begun to have a renewed appreciation for real life “practical” effects and I hope the same holds true for other analog technologies. A mix tape will always be more real more personal and more meaningful than an online playlist. A physical piece of paper with your words, perhaps handwritten, will always be more real than a Word file or an email. Atoms will always be more immersive than bits, and I like to think that the generation that has been raised with digital devices is starting to discover that the “old ways” still have that one advantage of being focused and visceral in a way that cannot be replicated by a processor and a screen.

Don’t take this as me saying that we should all chuck our technology and go back to carrier pigeons. The ability to share words, sounds, photos, and videos with the rest of the world is one of the great joys of the 21st century. The ability to use the devices we are all carrying around to take pictures and interact with distant friends and navigate in places we have never been before is something I wouldn’t trade for anything. But if you find that you struggle to focus while using these powerful devices, try the analog special purpose equivalent, or at least a digital special purpose one. Try using tools that are only good for the thing that you are trying to do, tools that don’t track or distract or tempt you, tools where there are no rabbit holes to get lost in. See how the experience changes. You might like it.