“I’d like to preface this case study by stating that my intentions behind redesigning Apple Music were in no way driven by indignation or spite,” Jason Yuan writes for Medium.
“Earlier this year I applied and interviewed for a graphic design internship at Apple Music (an opportunity of a lifetime), and was turned down with a very kind letter stating that although they liked my work, they wanted to see more growth and training,” Yuan writes. “At first, I was frustrated — Northwestern University doesn’t offer any sort of undergraduate graphic design program, so whatever growth they were looking for would have to be self taught… but as soon as I came to this realization, I became inspired to embark on what became a a three-month long journey to the holy grail — the iOS app that Apple Music deserves.”
“What you’ll find below is a case study offering potential solutions to address some of Apple Music’s problems, as well as ideas for future development,” Yuan writes. “My process was guided by qualitative user research, Apple’s official Design Principles, and my own designer intuition.”
Check it all out in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Wonder what might have happened had Yuan walked into his Apple interview with his Apple Music redesign in hand?
To answer MDNs ponder–S Jobs would’ve hired him. New Apple regime (Cue, Cook et al) seem insilated from change and critical forward thinking. Sucks that Apple no longer thinks or operates from the ‘start-up’ ‘small company’ mentality that served them so well before..
Sorry..’insulated’
He just landed himself a job with Apple Music within the month.
This article illustrates the need for the applicant to demonstrate his/her value to the Company. Initially Yuan couldn’t do that to the Company’s satisfaction.
Crucially, instead of walking away, Yuan improved his value proposition, and was hired.
This is a tremendous lesson for everyone seeking employment. The Company does not owe you a job. It is up to the applicant to demonstrate that the Company will be enriched by employing their talent.
Student doesn’t get hired, but does a “change this”, “change that” and the public reacts like a mother that says her 10 year old is a computer wiz just because he can go to settings and enable hotspot. “Wow, my kid just turned my phone into a router. I can use my iPad and link to it as if it was on wifi!”, she says. Then when Apple hires the student, maybe because of an article in MDN and its followers demanding that he be hired, and the design changes are done the same followers demand heads roll at Apple because they simply do not know how to do UI anymore. “Buy Spotify, Buy Pandora”, that is what they will be shouting out at that time.
Everyone is just so frustrated with iTunes/Apple Music. It’s been horrible for years and it’s indefensible. User experience is what separates Apple from the others. Unfortunately when it comes to iTunes/Apple Music, the separation is the others sprinting ahead. I keep hoping the next release will fix things and continue to be disappointed. Fingers crossed that it will be better this June.
I agree with you. At this point, I just leave Apple Music alone. I stopped trying to learn it. It’s like Apple regressed significantly.
maybe the poor dude belongs to the ‘wrong’ minority.
Asian students make up typically the largest or second largest group in tech colleges. Caltech undergraduate for example has 42% Asian and 29% White.
(42% are just USA Asians, not counting international Asians)
https://www.registrar.caltech.edu/academics/enrollment
If companies follow ‘Diversity’ initiatives to fit groups to their actual demographic population numbers Asians are going to get whacked: Too many applicants for jobs.
(note College numbers for Asians would be even HIGHER if most schools don’t also have limits on Asian enrolment. ).
NOT saying this is what happened at Apple but maybe.
That’s why I find this ‘diversity’ initiatives troubling. Places should hire the ‘best’ and forget colour.
My advise to Asians : (if Diversity rules are fully enforced your climb in tech is UPHILL ) instead PRACTICE BASKETBALL , then get Tim Cook etc to fight for DIVERSITY in the NBA (75% African American Players)…
(just joking ok… people get VERY sensitive over this… )
to add fuel to fire : Princeton study on Asians getting into elite universities:
“An Asian-American student has to score 140 points higher than a white student, 270 points higher than a Hispanic student and 450 points higher than a black student on the SAT to be on equal footing,”
LOL,
Practice those jump shots dudes….
Some good thinking behind the redesign ideas he’s got.
Apple, hire the guy.
Nice effort but no sale here.
The “hoarder” versus “nomad” dimension sounds nice but is too simplistic.
He falls into the monolingual trap forgetting completely that multilingual people enjoy music of different languages, and need to categorize them differently even if they are both of the same stupid Apple narrow minded genre.
“Sampler” instead of “New Music Mix” is a very small step in the right direction. Like corporate FM radio, Apple Music is intent to push the latest releases from the biggest labels. A real music savant prefers to enjoy not the artist’s latest hit single ad nauseum, but deeper cuts from earlier releases as well. Let’s face it, nothing Bryan Adams has released in 20 years is better than the straight up rock on “Cuts Like a Knife”.
Guestures suck. Since the iPhone is a mobile device, the last thing you want is an interface that forces you to press in a precise little icon, swipe a certain way, or worst of all press with a certain force. Use big icons that perform clear actions. Apple’s latest interfaces suck for humans with human-sized fingers. Adding “gamification” complexity doesn’t improve that.
Visual experience: okay, great, to a graphic artist, I’m sure that’s fun work. But every artist already employs someone to create album cover art. Why should Apple waste its time doing so? And why should the graphic art be a pointless large box background taking up tons of screen space with only a small inset circle picture showing the artist or whatever? Its very space inefficient and meaningless. Apple needs to be smart enough to show complete album art and complete lyrics in a compelling way.
Jason then decides to “optimize” the white space in an attempt to fix the current sterile lifeless Apple design theme. But he fails. There is just as much wasted white space as ever. Usability sucks, the font of the bottom icon labels remains unreadable. Selectable elements remain nearly invisible grey on white. Making a list “bouncy” to add motion is pointless and annoying. Dividing a screen into two zones is a waste of screen space that could be better used for controls and legible information. Nobody needs to see “My Sampler” and “Recently Played” continuously full time. They should be separate screen selections.
Here’s one that tops them all: “Mood” settings. On the proposed screen as a mood, “Breaking Pop” and “#OnRepeat” are listed. Can anyone explain what mood you would be in to choose these things? I think not. Apple and Jason seem totally clueless to the reality that true music lovers need multi-selection filters and powerful user-overridable metadata attached to songs. In the past, manual and auto playlists were relatively easy and fun to create on a Mac. You just had to be able to tag your music properly for your needs. Now Apple decides that a “mood” is going to be able to dial in a music playlist for your college reunion or special evening with your spouse. Suuuuure.
Long story short, it’s nice that somebody is trying to polish the edges of the Apple Music turd, but what remains is a big round turd.
Apple needs to stop pushing subscriptions and offer completely separate apps for your music collection that you own, and your Apple Music rental service. There never was a point in merging the two, because some of us are never going to enjoy the rental experience.
Apple’s just pissing into the wind.
Not exactly ground breaking.
So he tweaked the basic layout and tidied up the typography (as we say in the design industry) which in essence means that Apple’s design solution works.