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iOS 13's Music App Sucks

samuelstevens.me

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Re: iOS 13's Music App Sucks

#111

Post by chipotle_coyote »

andrewzah wrote: post #100
vlucas wrote: post #86

> First things first, why do I get a tab bar with 5 icons, and I only ever use 2 of them? I don’t care about “For You”, “Browse” and I certainly don’t give a rat’s ass about ”Radio”. You lost me on the opening sentence. I didn't even bother to read the rest of the article. I was expecting this to be based some some valid objective reasons why the app sucks, not personal preferences. I use Spotify, and have found the…

It would be prudent to not be judgemental off of one sentence, particularly because the author was discussing something else. Apple music has a station (radio) feature , which you can start from a song or album. It functions similarly to spotify's radio feature and is not what the author was talking about. Apple's "radio" tab , not feature, shows you an advertisement for Beats 1 taking up half of the screen, then "re…

I'm looking at the radio tab in Apple Music right now, and it is not exactly what you're describing. The first row is shows from Beats 1, which might be what you mean, but the next row is "Recently Played" radio stations, which will include both stations you start from songs/albums (a la Spotify) as well as any of the dozens of Apple Music's genre-based radio stations: mine currently has "Chill" (ambient electronica, "Classical Holiday" (Christmas), "1990s Rock" (self-explanatory), and "The Rippingtons" (based on that jazz group). The next sections include other shows, broadcast radio like NPR and CBS News, snd radio by genre.

tl;dr: the Apple Music Radio tab is radio all the way down, either stations or shows. It's exactly what it says on the tin.

The For You tab, by contrast, seems to be very similar to the way you describe Spotify's home page, doesn't it? Mixes which are based on your preferences along with your recently played songs and albums.

The article's author doesn't want to ever use For You or Radio, evidently, which is fine, although I think it misses out on one of the primary reasons to use a streaming music service (discovery).

Re: iOS 13's Music App Sucks

#112

Post by zymhan »

oflannabhra wrote: post #8

I have an Apple Music subscription and use Apple Music (the app) daily. In this article, I hear a lot of "I". IMO, the big challenge with Apple Music is all the legacy that a) personal libraries, b) iTunes Match, and c) iTunes purchases all bring to the new streaming paradigm. Those are problems Apple has to solve, and can't just discard. Apple's customers have plowed tons of $$$ to "own" their libraries, and Apple i…

Why did Apple have to sacrifice the old Music app, that was designed around a traditional library of files, to make the Apple Music app?

It used to be that an iPhone was also an iPod. An iPhone now, especially with Apple Music, is nowhere close to that experience.

Re: iOS 13's Music App Sucks

#113

Post by teunispeters »

Shebanator wrote: post #55

As someone who worked on Google Play Music for many years, I'd like to point out that a lot of the UX criticisms here are really just personal preferences, and those preferences are based in very large part on the way you listen to music. Some people are "lean back" listeners who just want to put on a radio station of music they like and not fiddle with it. Others are expert curators who have tens of thousands of tra…

Something in common between both the modern "music" app from apple and google music app (android) is both try to push streaming services and there's no way to disable or block that.

Making them both VERY unsuitable to a device where a child has access.

Re: iOS 13's Music App Sucks

#114

Post by zymhan »

mattcantstop wrote: post #109

Rdio was amazing. I use Apple Music now (family plan) but I would pay probably $25/month to have Rdio back. Rdio had the best features for following other people who had similar interests to me and seeing what they were currently listening to. It was amazing. And it was an experience using Rdio. I would be in the app during my work day quite a lot seeing what music there was to discover. Music discovery was never bet…

It makes me sad that Pandora never expanded the social features within their platform. It has never been easy, or even always possible, to just share a song with another Pandora user.

Re: iOS 13's Music App Sucks

#115

Post by Shebanator »

Someone1234 wrote: post #77
Shebanator wrote: post #55

As someone who worked on Google Play Music for many years, I'd like to point out that a lot of the UX criticisms here are really just personal preferences, and those preferences are based in very large part on the way you listen to music. Some people are "lean back" listeners who just want to put on a radio station of music they like and not fiddle with it. Others are expert curators who have tens of thousands of tra…

What surprises me most about your post is that someone actually worked on Google Play Music for multiple years. Doing what? From what I could see, it shipped, then immediately turned into abandoned-ware which it still is today (in spite of being "replaced" by YouTube Music which is also abandoned-ware almost from its release). I actually still pay for GPM (for Ad-Free YouTube) but also pay for Amazon's Unlimited beca…

I worked on GPM prior to the youtube merge, and for a short time after. We did a lot of things: when I first started there it didn't offer streaming subscriptions at all, or radio, or....

Re: iOS 13's Music App Sucks

#116

Post by StreamBright »

samstevens wrote: post #23
oflannabhra wrote: post #8

I have an Apple Music subscription and use Apple Music (the app) daily. In this article, I hear a lot of "I". IMO, the big challenge with Apple Music is all the legacy that a) personal libraries, b) iTunes Match, and c) iTunes purchases all bring to the new streaming paradigm. Those are problems Apple has to solve, and can't just discard. Apple's customers have plowed tons of $$$ to "own" their libraries, and Apple i…

Author here; I agree that I'm not considering other users in my rants. I'm not a designer, and don't have solutions that would help everyone that Apple is targeting with this product. Part of the reason I'm unhappy with the options forced on me is the removal of my ability to customize the tabs. If Apple wants to push Radio, that's fine. Do I have to suffer navigational difficulties, when previously I could replace t…

I agree with you on most points. For me, the most annoying is that the new version freezes a lot and it silently transcodes your ALAC to some lossy format.

Re: iOS 13's Music App Sucks

#117

Post by sli »

Analemma_ wrote: post #27
dangus wrote: post #14

> Except that I already pay for Apple Music, I don’t use these tabs, and I’m considering leaving Apple Music for Spotify Stop ranting and do it. Vote with your wallet. Your $10 tells Apple that everything is fine. I don’t subscribe to any music, personally. I use the Music app with Apple Music disabled (Settings > Music > Show Apple Music (Off)).

> Stop ranting and do it. Vote with your wallet. Your $10 tells Apple that everything is fine. There are annoying things I can find with every platform/company and their associated fans, but this is a sickness that seems unique to Apple users: they gripe and complain, but-- sometimes in the first sentence of their post!-- vow that they will never switch to something else. Which makes all their complaining pointless,…

This is nothing but confirmation bias, because the random bloggers who write about it can in no way accurately represent Apple's userbase. Android bloggers bash Apple and retreat to their OS the same as you claim Apple ones do.

Re: iOS 13's Music App Sucks

#118

Post by chipotle_coyote »

derefr wrote: post #47

I feel like Music.app is a pair of similar apps squished together, when they share no common frontend functionality and work far better apart: • Apple Music (the subscription service) • iTunes (the library with syncing and an optional digital music locker subscription-service) Each of the two has its own obvious top-level navigation. Each of the two has its own independent backend services (e.g. the recommendations i…

Well, for one possible answer: I personally don't want "music that I have added to my library by ripping or buying digital files of" and "music that I have added to my library by clicking 'favorite' in a streaming music service" to be separate libraries. "Okay, I want to listen to a song or two from the most recent album by The Black Keys, so I'll go to this app, but now I'd like to listen to ELO's Greatest Hits, so I'll go to that app." I just want to say "I would like to listen to my music."

Re: iOS 13's Music App Sucks

#119

Post by andrewzah »

chipotle_coyote wrote: post #111
andrewzah wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would be prudent to not be judgemental off of one sentence, particularly because the author was discussing something else. Apple music has a station (radio) feature , which you can start from a song or album. It functions similarly to spotify's radio feature and is not what the author was talking about. Apple's "radio" tab , not feature, shows you an advertisement for Beats 1 taking up half of the screen, then "re…

I'm looking at the radio tab in Apple Music right now, and it is not exactly what you're describing. The first row is shows from Beats 1, which might be what you mean, but the next row is "Recently Played" radio stations, which will include both stations you start from songs/albums (a la Spotify) as well as any of the dozens of Apple Music's genre-based radio stations: mine currently has "Chill" (ambient electronica,…

Ah I was on the wrong tab, not sure what the middle one is called in English. Not that it makes a huge difference, as the radio tab is also pretty useless. It does show recent stations that I listened to, but also a whole bunch of irrelevant stuff that, again, doesn't appear to take any of my preferences into account.

You have to scroll far down to get past random podcasts and artist shows, and the genres list is just an alphabetical list of genres... Is it so hard to show me stations that I might enjoy, at the top of the tab? I listen to classical, classic rock, prog rock, and jazz. I would expect to see a "You might enjoy" section with a) those music categories, or b) artists from those music categories ("Bill Evans Trio" radio, etc).

Compared to spotify, these two tabs are basically useless. I may as well search for a song/album and make my own stations, which I already do. At least when I pay for spotify I don't have random advertisements like beats1 taking up space before recommendations / what I actually would like to see.

Re: iOS 13's Music App Sucks

#120

Post by sbarre »

The elephant in the room here is that Apple forces you to use the Music app to manage/navigate/enjoy the music you have locally on your phone (I'm 90% sure I'm right about this).

They maintain a monopoly on that functionality, and therefore when they make decisions that don't align with your desires or expectations, you have no recourse. You can't just use a different app - on your own device - that suits you better.

If they opened this up to third-party apps, we wouldn't even be having this conversation.

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