How Would You Fix iTunes To Make It Useable Again? [Let's Talk]

Buster

No one uses iTunes anymore. iTunes is like that one cool guy from high school who used to be a lot of fun to hangout with, but then everyone grew up and he's still out there prowling the streets of your hometown, getting drunk, attending local football games and hanging out with high school kids. He just failed to grow up like everyone else, and that's kind of what's happened to iTunes. It's antiquated and bloated. People dread using it and even though iTunes 11 is supposed to drop this month, we don't think that's going to change much.

What can Apple do to fix iTunes? Is there even a way to do it? It's an ugly and slow app but it's still important, so it's not like Apple can just nuke it altogether and start over. Should Apple divy up the functionality of iTunes to other OS X apps the same way they do with iOS? We haven't played with iTunes 11, but the demo at last month's keynote didn't make us too hopeful. We'd love to hear you guys' thoughts on what Apple should do to fix iTunes.

iHKDesign

Why do you think nothing will change? What did not make you hopeful? It looks completely rewritten.

FriarNurgle

$99 a year unlimited media streaming service.

There is the question of loss of revenue from media sales but just think of how many people would jump on the chance to get everything in iTunes for less than even Netflix. Pretty sure it would end up being a huge game changer and make more money for Apple and the content owners in the long run.

Halstead B

Would be nice if iTunes U and podcasts sync'd in the cloud for mac/iPod/iPad/iPhone/Apple TV... Right now they don't! At least not that I can get to work...

Secondly, match movies like music! I have the DVD of all my ripped movies. I would take pictures and destroy originals in shredder if required for this feature.

Thirdly, you buy a BRD with a digital copy, you redeem it and only get the SD version of the movie... That's just wrong and why should I have to pay an additional $20+ for the HD version when I already paid $30+ for he combo at the retail store (best buy, future shop, Walmart, etc)...

Cloud needs work as much as iTunes does IMHO.

technochick

Buster said:

It's antiquated and bloated. People dread using it and even though iTunes 11 is supposed to drop this month, we don't think that's going to change much.

Hyperbolic much. Perhaps you don't use it and you don't like it but there are folks that do use it and don't give themselves a heart attack over the issues.

yes it would be nice if they would split out the functions so you don't have to open up your own library just to hit sync for your iPhone etc. But that is something less possible on Windows and they want the two versions to be the same since the iphone/ipad is a key item with switchers. Give them one thing they already know how to do.

Felfac

i completely disagree with everything in this article i regularly use it to listen to music and enjoy using it

technochick

Halstead B said:

Secondly, match movies like music! I have the DVD of all my ripped movies.

Studios won't allow it. Just like they are the ones that require that those digital copies stay SD only and all that crap like you can rent the HD and buy the SD.

But you are correct that the bigger issues are in the store.

Things like this SD/HD nonsense. Also older seasons of TV shows and older movies not being at least 720p. Seasons missing altogether. season 1 was released but not the rest, seasons 1-3 missing but 4 is there. And so on. Also, it's time to drop the SD only option and give us the control of which version downloads whether it's at time of purchase, 'in the cloud' etc. Plus better pricing, global releases at the same time, none of this a year after the season ended crap.

They also need better metadata for proper linking of the right items and finding everything by an artist. Example, Stephen Lang has been in numerous movies, a few tv shows and narrated a number of audiobooks. But you can't find all that when you search for him because his name is missing from the data. Or you find one like Avatar and when you click his name perhaps 3 other movies and one of the audiobooks appears. Search for an audiobook you know he did and that links you to 2 other audiobooks but none of the movies or shows. Avatar might get you say 3 more movies but not all of them. And so on. Tom Felton who is in all 8 of the freaking Harry Potters is only listed in like 3 of them and those don't link to The Borrowers, Anna and the King, his Second Sight guest spot (where he was a major character), his music. Those are just two examples, I could come up with many many more. And then there's soundtracks to totally unrelated things attached to movies, tv shows etc. Mixing up seasons of shows with the same name. Mixing up the stuff in the bookstore so you have erotic fiction and kids how to books together because the two authors have the same first and last name. ???

All this are the things that need to be addressed before worrying about the UI. Because until the quality and data are fixed within the store, the rest is just lipstick on a pig.

SteveA

I would prefer if articles on this site didn't put words into peoples' mouths. I love iTunes and use it every day

Sander Strijbos

I still use iTunes on a daily basis. I completely agree that it is a bloated program, but I run 3 iPods (nano, classic & touch) and an iPhone on them, regularly syncing them (Touch & 4s wireless) at the same time while importing and playing music and iTunes just does what it has to do without a glitch.
No problems for me there. It holds the 11,000+ songs I have in my library rather nicely and the smart playlists are still a delight.
The fact that it is a music, video, app and all other things manager is a bit much for one program. Hopefully iTunes 11 will make it leaner and more efficient. I fully agree with the fact that UI could use an update, since it hasn't really changed that much since the Stone Age. But overall, I don't get the hate people have for iTunes.

Buster

@SteveA that's great if you like it. I'd like to hear why you still like it though. I don't think I've met a person in the last 12 months who has said "geeee whiz! i love the shit out of iTunes." Anytime iTunes comes up in conversations I'm in I just hear about how people hate it, so if those who think the opposite I'd love to hear about it.

Caliborn1

SteveA. Perfect comment you took the words out of my mouth except to add what obnoxious conceit the writer has to start off the article like that. Oh way to grab our short attentions, brilliant

Zod Buster

It's bloated like Apple as a company is becoming..fat and complacent...

kavok

They need to make iTunes back into what it originally was... Music. In iOS they've broken the apps up into Music, Video, Podcasts, iTunes U. They need to do the same on the Mac. Put the iOS apps in the App Store on the Mac, take the movies out and give them their own app, etc. I think all the media would benefit from having something more focused on the individual formats rather than having a multi-trick pony that can't master any of them effectively.

While we are at it, I would like to see iTunes behave more like Safari does with multi-touch capabilities. I can't count how many times I've done a two-finger swipe to go back to a page in iTunes only to remember that iTunes doesn't do that. (Well parts of it does do it, albeit extremely slowly.) In fact a lot of Apple apps in OS X don't do that. Not very consistent.

Halstead B

technochick said:

Studios won't allow it. Just like they are the ones that require that those digital copies stay SD only and all that crap like you can rent the HD and buy the SD.

But you are correct that the bigger issues are in the store.

The studio's are greedy and wonder why ripping is popular as is peer to peer!

Agreed about the store, several movies or TV shows in a series and they don't even have matching Genre's lol too funny and if you fix your meta data then the item is no longer 'downloaded' from the cloud if you purchased from the store...

Agreed on meta data, there is a lot that iTunes does not allow you to edit but they have access to.

On the bright side, I like iTunes because everything is right there at my finger tips (pointer), I can access my shared library from any Apple device, updates/additions/removals are pretty much sync'd excluding those items already mentioned in my previous post. I can sync my iPhone over wifi without issue, check for updates to apps and IOS with same... the only time I need to be in iTunes really is when adding content manually.

I don't find it bloated or hard to use, in fact I rather like it the way it is but am still looking forward to the next incantation.

The only other complaint I have is the help file, would be nice if there were help icons on certain screens so you can link directly to related help content. This if anything would be my biggest beef other than the iTunes U and Podcast issues...

wdowell

Not sure why they cant just nuke it and start again. After all this is Apple - the company who did that with iMovie, Maps and probably other examples.


I do have this itching feeling that Apple has to re-write iTunes for Windows sooner or later (for the "ex-metro" interface") - they cant afford to abandon their PC customers with all the iphones, ipads and ipods, so may be they will finally take the plunge for the mac too...

I see iTunes 11 as being a stop gap while they do it precisely this. I can just imagine it feeling nimble like other modern coded apps. it would be gorgeous. I would personally like to see the various stores, etc etc being broken out but I can see this as not being conducive to apple and many "normal" people who find it easy to have it all in one application.

Fabio Papa

iTunes is bloated. The Windows version even more so. I don't use it to listen to music because I listen to it on my stereo (via an aTV) when I'm at home, or on my iPhone when I'm out and about. Yet, my iTunes on my home Mac is running 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Why? So that my iDevices sync when I'm charging them. Seems like overkill to have a huge, bloated program running all the time just for syncing. Syncing (and streaming to aTV) should be extracted into a separate app that doesn't need to be open. iTunes should be about media, not streaming, not syncing, not managing apps on iDevices, etc.

jtt1975

This is news to me I must admit. Whilst I'm not saying the current iTunes is the greatest UI I've ever used, I've been using it for years and still do. If the author is correct in their statement that people aren't using it, I'd be interested to learn what they are using instead?

I'm looking forward to iTunes 11, as from the little I've seen of it, it looks a massive improvement on 10.7. We'll only know how much of an improvement it is until we use it. That said, aesthetically, it looks miles better.

Unless there's an alternative UI with a better experience to iTunes, I honestly can't see me using anything else.

Dominator

Hey too many content in one place it's great... I always wanted an open iTunes Store for an annual fee... but if that its impossible right now... i'm happy to have my library on one place safe and secure... as an iTunes Match user i have a complain, one of my 15,000 songs change after i get the 256kbps version...

John Howell

There are two major problems with iTunes basic architecture
1: the database can't be shared. It can only be open by one instance of iTunes at a time without risk of corruption.
2: is has to run as an interactive application by a current logged on user.
To fix this I would strip the UI from the database and make it a back end service. As long as the computer is running, the service is available. Without the UI, this should cut down the memory footprint for when you just need it up to sync devices or when the library is being shared. PLEX media server does this very nicely. The service needs to run without a logged in user though. Add DLNA service and cut out another agent most people need to run if sharing content to other players.
3: with the backend stripped out, iTunes front end just becomes a client. Make it the same on iOS, OS X, and windows.
Make the store just a website you can get to without needing iTunes installed.
4: it will never happen, but ditch DRM on ALL content. I'm never going to buy a movie or music video from iTunes if I can't play it on anything I want. I buy a ton of music now, but I have been burnt Twice with faults in rental movies that just wouldn't play, or unable to transfer because of slow response from apples FairPlay servers. DRM isn't stopping the copies anyway, it is just an annoyance.

Anyway, that's my 2 cents. Over all though, I still use iTunes, and the killer feature is when it synchs, it remembers what you have played, and where you got up to. Ver nice for podcasts and movie. Something that seems to be completely arsed up in the new iPod app 8(

John Howell

Sorry; I meant the podcast app sync is broken. I just can't seem to keep my podcasts playlist in synch any more.

tenjay

I still use iTunes, almost daily, but I will admit to using Spotify some in the past few months for just listening to music. I don't think I "love the shit" out of iTunes, but it does do what I need it to which includes listening to some of the music I have, downloading and syncing podcasts to an iPod classic, managing some movies and TV shows imported from TiVo and managing apps and content for two iPhones and an iPad. I think iTunes gets the job done fairly well so maybe I should love it more.

While I see some value in splitting up the functions of iTunes into things like the store, music playback/playlist management, iOS device syncing, video playback, podcasts, etc, I think things get complicated when you need to sync. Could you edit playlists in your syncing app or could you create playlists as you purchase from the store? Can you created playlists with the podcasts, something I do a lot of? Can you edit track info from all apps or just the music playback app? For somebody like me, who uses most of the functions, it is useful to have it all in iTunes. I imagine somebody who doesn't use everything might find it overkill, but they can turn off some of those functions.

My greatest annoyance, which is probably fairly specific to me, is that I have so much content, I have to store it on an external harddrive. Sometimes when I click to play a song, it takes a few seconds for the hd to spin up and begin playing.