iTunes “is really starting to show its age. Its underpinnings are becoming increasingly creaky thanks to the weight of features, files and expectations being shovelled upon it – and its fast turning into bloatware of almost Redmond-like proportions,” TechRadar writes.
Here are 10 things we think Apple should do for iTunes 9:
1. Clean up the user interface
2. Bar the Genius
3. Better file handling
4. Better handling for multiple libraries
5. Better file tracking
6. Better database handling
7. Better codec support
8. Multi-room for the rest of us
9. A better, cheaper iTunes Store
10. iTunes Pro
Full article, explaining each of the 10 points above, here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “‘spinaltap'” for the heads up.]
Better Cover Art support!
@shiva105
-ability to make more complex playlists. For example, I’d like to be able to set criteria such as ((genre = rock or genre = metal) and length > 3:00). Right now, the only way to do this is to create a bunch of “sub-playlists”.
Doesn’t iTunes do this already? With “Smart Playlist”?
He lost me at number 2 “Bar the Genius.”
That’s such a paranoid point, it kind of paints the guy as a total nut bar.
Not worth reading after that.
Points 4, 5, and 6 are all the same point.
Clean up the user interface: The iTunes 7 UI wasn’t perfect. But the iTunes 8 UI is horrid. Apple should repair the crippled Preferences menu, add a question after installation about which view should be used in the Music Library, and make the UI more consistent.
Bar the Genius: As long as Apple restores the ability to remove arrows linking to the iTunes Store, I’ll just keep the Genius feature turned off.
Better file handling, Better handling for multiple libraries, Better file tracking, and Better database handling: I totally agree with the author of the article!
Better codec support: This is the main reason why I don’t use iTunes as my main audio/video manager. On the audio side, I would like to see iTunes offer playback support for FLAC, OGG (both open source and increasingly popular), and WMA. The author of the article does a good job of mentioning the most important video codecs that should be supported in iTunes. There’s a audio/video manager for Linux called Banshee. I feel that Banshee is worthy of Apple’s attention — at least in the category of codec support.
Multi-room for the rest of us: I agree with the author of the article.
A better, cheaper iTunes Store: Apple charges a fair price for most of its songs/albums, and HD content at full bitrates would be prohibitive for most users in terms of download times and hard drive space. But Lossless DRM-free for all songs is a must for audiophiles. Although I would personally prefer FLAC because it’s open source, songs in the Apple Lossless format would still be a drastic improvement over what’s currently being sold on iTunes. I understand that the entertainment industry is reluctant to allow the iTunes Store to be 100% DRM-free. But Apple is now in a strong enough bargaining position that it can force the entertainment industry to cooperate in this area.
iTunes Pro: Bad idea! Apple expects consumers to pay for iTunes Store content. Apple also expects consumers to buy at least one iPod and/or iPhone. The least Apple can do is provide a free interface. A much better idea revenue-wise would be for Apple to port iTunes to Linux. The open source community has the potential to be a significant cash-cow for Apple. Besides, Apple owes the open source community — without open source OS X wouldn’t exist.
FLAC!!!
FLAC
FLAC
“7. Better codec support”
we know who this guy is right there. he wants OGG. he is some wanna be uber geek with a Barry Manalow collection in OGG he listens to in a freeware player on win 3.1, cause this “modern OS stuff is all crap” and he can’t figure linux out.
give him a break. he needs one.
Thinker: Multi-room for the rest of us: I agree with the author of the article.
As I already said above: The iPhone or iPod Touch with the Apple Remote app already is exactly what the author apparently missed — and much more!
You can easily select on your iPhone / iPod Touch which Airport Express you want iTunes to play your music to. Apple already dioes provide all the components. You just need to open your eyes!
Thinker: Better codec support: This is the main reason why I don’t use iTunes as my main audio/video manager. On the audio side, I would like to see iTunes offer playback support for FLAC, OGG (both open source and increasingly popular), and WMA. The author of the article does a good job of mentioning the most important video codecs that should be supported in iTunes. There’s a audio/video manager for Linux called Banshee. I feel that Banshee is worthy of Apple’s attention — at least in the category of codec support.
Get the respective codec plugin for QuickTime and you’re all set. iTunes uses the QuickTime framework and the codecs installed into it.
“iTunes Pro?? How can you compare that to Final Cut, Logic, and Aperture? Apple’s Pro Apps are content CREATION tools. iTunes is for playing content, not creating it. What would iTunes Pro do? Play your music better?”
no, pro would be a creation tool, you are right!
hehe, its called garageband.
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“FLAC, OGG (both open source and increasingly popular)”
you have an error.
“FLAC, OGG (both open source and increasingly popular with kids who live in moms basement and will never get laid.)”
fixed it for ya.
If Apple did something that had as much codec support and underlying geekiness of VLC, or if they just acquired them altogether, iTunes would no doubt stand to gain a lot. However, I don’t believe that MKV is a great codec. It maybe be my computer, or perhaps the people who encoded it did a crap ass job, but almost every MKV file I’ve ever played freezes up. Frame rate is godawful. As for his suggestion to implement FLV, I’m sure it’d be nice, but most media I play is in MPEG-2/4, DIVX and AVI. If people would embrace MOV as much as they have some of these other encoding schemes, maybe I’d actually use QuickTime more, but for now it’s VLC all the way.
“A much better idea revenue-wise would be for Apple to port iTunes to Linux. The open source community has the potential to be a significant cash-cow for Apple. “
really, cause my experience with the OSS community disagrees. if they can’t load it for free, the torrent it. or at least every single person i know from that community feels that way. can you show that they will pay even a penny a song? i see no evidence.
….and the proof is in your statement. “Apple owes the open source community.”
no. Apple plays by the OSS rules, gives work back, and has people involved in projects that benefit them. yet you think they owe you something. for what? because without them Apple wouldn’t exist? why? because they took a good free (BSD) base for their OS? lemme check the license….. no, no….. not seeing it.
typic of the OSS people i know, “free” only applies to what you get, somehow others owe you. and for nothing at that.
piss off, the grownups are talking tech.
A lot of this is generating click views by being cranky, and not all the suggestions are bad, but some of them are just BS. I love the Genius feature, and screw TechRadar for thinking that his desire not to have it trumps mine to have it. If he doesn’t want to use, he DOESN’T HAVE TO. Simple. Bloatware? Rubbish. And the whiny complaining about Coverflow [don’t use it if you don’t like it] and the iPhoto-like grid behavior [you may not like it aesthetically, but he’s wrong that it is not functional], are just silly. As for the claim that the iTS prices are “sky high,” please, get a real job.
He’s way off in wanting to get rid of Genius. I love it. I’ve wanted playlists for a long time but have never wanted to take the time create them. Genius creates them for me instantly, and I can do as many as I want.
I like being able to have a variety of artists playing one after the other. This is one of the advantages to this system versus having to listen to several songs in a row by the same artist when plying CDs or vinyl (which you can still do if you want). Also, I’m constantly rediscovering music I forgot I had.
If you don’t like Apple’s recommendations for new songs to buy, ignore them.
I for one would like an iTunes Pro if it included home media streaming/storage. Apple could make a Time Capsule/Media Hub that can store and stream media around the house. I’d buy one.
iTunes Server!!
I want all my computers in the house (2 iMacs & 1 MacBook Pro, 1 Windows XP home built box) to share and update to 1 iTunes central server, Apple TV could be used for this in the next iteration with bigger HD and Multi Core processor.
Why does Apple count 1 computer for every account on that computer?
Is he talking about the Windoze version of iTunes???
I don’t have any Itunes problems on my macbook or my mac-mini
Hey, if Microsoft could do as well, I would buy it.
But even Microsoft does not create a product that well.
After reading the article, it is obvious that when the author was a baby, his mother dropped him on his head. Or he does crack.
Windows Media support, indeed.
“iTunes Server!!
I want all my computers in the house (2 iMacs & 1 MacBook Pro, 1 Windows XP home built box) to share and update to 1 iTunes central server, Apple TV could be used for this in the next iteration with bigger HD and Multi Core processor.”
now that is an idea.
Olternaut:
I can’t believe nobody here actually answered this one, as it is practically common knowledge. You cannot transfer your music from your iPod to your computer. This wasn’t Apple’s choice; on early models, this was possible (via iTunes), but as soon as iPod became wildly popular, and as soon Apple began negotiating with labels for the iTunes store, this was restricted. Music recording labels don’t want people to walk around with iPods full of music and just hook up and copy all that music over to friends’ computers. Apple had no choice. All other MP3 player makers are essentially flying under the radar here, and the Labels just don’t want to bother, since they represent negligible percentage.
Windows Media will never be playable on the Mac. AVI and WMA wrappers do work, as long as the content is encoded in something non-microsoft-proprietary (such as MPEG-4, Sorenson, etc.) However, Microsofts codecs are proprietary and Apple will never license them — they directly compete with Quicktime and the MPEG standards that Apple champions.
For the geeky kind, there are plug-ins for Quicktime that support OGG, FLAC and few other obscure open-source codecs (thereby making iTunes also support them).
@Cubert… Yes, you’re correct, I want to find duplicates whey they are not named exactly the same.
@nekogami13
I will look in yo to see if that makes the jobs, thanks for the tip!
Shiva105:
-ability to make more complex playlists. For example, I'd like to be able to set criteria such as ((genre = rock or genre = metal) and length > 3:00). Right now, the only way to do this is to create a bunch of "sub-playlists".-ability to set the "sort by" for multiple tracks at a time
Smart playlists will do exactly what you want. Add genre twice (‘Rock’, then ‘Metal’), then add ‘time is less than 3:00.
Sorting by multiple tracks at the time? Just click on the heading and your tracks are sorted by the category heading. Not sure what other sorting could you possibly want to do.
@ ping
“The iPhone or iPod Touch with the Apple Remote app already is exactly what the author apparently missed…” I’m perfectly happy with my iPod 5G (except it has a small hard drive and doesn’t support FLAC). If I were interested in AirTunes, which I’m not, I certainly wouldn’t buy an iPhone or iPod Touch just so I could gain remote control functionality.
“Get the respective codec plugin for QuickTime and you’re all set. iTunes uses the QuickTime framework and the codecs installed into it.” Apple does not offer a FLAC plugin for QuickTime, and the hacks of which I am aware are rather unreliable and/or impractical. I’d love to learn that I’m wrong about this! So please, provide more info if you can.
@ shen
“FLAC, OGG (both open source and increasingly popular with kids who live in moms basement and will never get laid.)” Your stereotyping isn’t very accurate. I’m 25, own my own home, and get laid on a regular basis.
“Really, cause my experience with the OSS community disagrees.” Maybe you should investigate the amount of effort that the open source community has put into getting iTunes to function in Wine, and the main reason behind that effort — the iTunes Store.
“….and the proof is in your statement. ‘Apple owes the open source community.'” The open source community built significant portions of Apple’s house (OS X). So the least that Apple can do is occasionally invite the open source community to dinner (port iTunes and support FLAC & OGG).
“Apple plays by the OSS rules, gives work back, and has people involved in projects that benefit them. yet you think they owe you something. for what?” It’s called goodwill…
@ Predrag
“For the geeky kind, there are plug-ins for Quicktime that support OGG, FLAC and few other obscure open-source codecs (thereby making iTunes also support them).” As stated above, the only plugins that I know of to get FLAC working in iTunes are unreliable/impractical hacks — must manually import one file at a time, only 50% of users report success, causes iTunes to crash a lot, etc. As also stated above, I’d love to discover that I’m wrong about all of this. Please provide more info if you can.
I am sure these two (OGG, FLAC) are both good codecs and all, but it seems to me that the reliability of their codec offerings for Quicktime (either in Windows, or on Mac) is directly proportional to their popularity.
If the OGG/FLAC community took some time, I’m sure they’d be able to do as good a job as DivX (or Flip4Mac) people did for DivX and WMV, respectively. It really isn’t Apple’s job to promote or even develop a competing codec for their flagship media solution. Apple’s ultimate goal is to get all those people who currently user Windows Media (or Real Media) to switch to QuickTime, and that includes media consumers, as well as content creators.