“I recently wrote for this column about problems with iCloud not matching the correct versions of songs. This is a huge source of frustration for music lovers who want their music in the cloud,” Kirk McElhearn writes for Macworld. “But iCloud Music Library has other annoyances. One of these is the iCloud Status that you may see in your iTunes library: No Longer Available.”
“Record labels and artists are free to choose whether to allow their music to be available on streaming services. There are still some holdouts,” McElhearn writes. “Things get complicated when music that you have added to your iCloud Music Library from Apple Music is pulled. Labels can withdraw the right to stream certain songs and albums at any time, but you won’t be notified. You may see albums and songs in your library, but their titles are a slightly lighter color (depending on the view), and their iCloud status is No Longer Available.”
McElhearn writes, “It’s hard to spot these tracks, unless you go to play one, or unless you make a smart playlist.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: We agree with McElhearn that as use of music streaming services becomes more pervasive, it’s likely that the record labels “do like Disney does with movies, making old albums available to stream, then pulling them to try to drum up sales.” As McElhearn suggests, Apple could help users better identify this issue by displaying a notification when iCloud Music Library tracks switch to “no longer available.”