The Juice ain't Worth the Squeeze—Media Tracking
What starts as a simple dive into media tracking apps quickly spirals into tangents about puzzles from hell, glamping with bison and mustangs, fistfights with Satan in Pittsburgh, and the glory days of scrobbling music. Along the way, Peter and Eden hash out their very different relationships with games, books, music, and movies—and why, at the end of the day, “the juice is not worth the squeeze” when it comes to tracking everything we consume.
Opening catch-up:
- Eden returns from travel and vents about the oppressive Midwestern humidity.
- Eden recounts a cursed puzzle vacation and a surreal HipCamp adventure that included glamping in a bus, staying at a mustang ranch, and hearing a wild coma story involving battling Satan.
- A detour into mobile gaming: Eden introduces the absurd yet addictive horse girl racing game Uma Musume.
- Peter shares his ongoing love for Taskmaster, Donkey Kong Bonanza on the Switch 2, and recent reading progress (Wind and Truth, Tiny Experiments).
- Music talk:
- New releases from Carbomb, Abigail Williams, and Blackbraid.
- Remembering Eric Wunder of Cobalt, with Peter realizing Slow Forever might be his true desert island album.
Main Topic: Media tracking apps and services.
- Video games: Eden dabbled with Backloggd but finds it too much work; Peter doesn’t see the appeal beyond Steam’s built-in history.
- Books: Eden logs reads in a notebook; Peter wrestles with StoryGraph, Hardcover, and Goodreads but finds the friction too high. Notion experiments fail; AI-summarized notes for nonfiction survive.
- Music: Nostalgia for scrobbling and Last.fm; frustrations with Spotify, Apple Music, and Plex setups. Peter praises Plexamp and Rune; Eden experiments with Cloud Beats and dreams of a NAS.
- Movies/TV: Eden dislikes fragmented platforms; Peter mentions using Sequel lightly but relies most on Call Sheet, an IMDb alternative. Eden uses League of Comic Geeks only to track physical comics in his collection.
Closing thoughts: both agree that while tracking can be tempting, talking to people and communities is a far more rewarding way to discover new media.