I have (discounted) subscriptions to both Apple Music and Spotify. Apple Music wins for integration with personal libraries; Spotify's approach to local file handling is a kludge and I listen to a lot of music that's not available on either platform. Spotify wins for their recommendation system and continuity; I haven't found AM's recommendations to be as good and it's still boggling how hard Apple pushes Continuity in everything but music.
iOS 13's Music App Sucks
141–150 of 261 posts
Re: iOS 13's Music App Sucks
#142Earlier quoted context omitted.
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.
Go to iOS Settings -> Music. The first toggle is literally "Show Apple Music", which instantly disables all "streaming services" features, while keeping the sync-your-own-library-and-playlists-over-iCloud if you're a iTunes Match subscriber.
I've never had it stick. Not interested in any of their subscription services... not in anyone's.
I'll buy albums and copy them over to a local music share then onto android devices. I still use the "music" app on android, I just blacklist it from access from child - which makes me sad as there's a lot of music there they'd love to listen to. (Apple has terribly fragile screens. Android doesn't - at least if you go for the cheaper models. That's a whole different debate though)
Re: iOS 13's Music App Sucks
#143While I can cope with the UI, what really drives me nuts are actual bugs. Sometimes, albums are split into two parts. Sometimes, songs are randomly missing. When downloading music, sometimes it takes forever or just doesn’t download at all. My most favorite one: when I plug the phone into my car, in 1/2 cases it stops playback (even from another app) and starts playing a random song. It’s always the same. And it’s a good song. But it is something different. Imagine you get into your car at 6am listening to a podcast and suddenly Metallica starts screaming at you.
Re: iOS 13's Music App Sucks
#144As 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…
Besides upselling incentivizing clutter, what's annoying is Apple feels the need to completely redesign the iTunes UI every year.
Re: iOS 13's Music App Sucks
#145As 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…
[deleted]
Re: iOS 13's Music App Sucks
#146Earlier quoted context omitted.
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…
It may be abandonware, but it works well, and has very few bugs. I hope it stays abandoned in its current state for a long time.
I've been using play music since it came out and I pay for youtube red or w,e it's currently branded. I can't deny that the reason I chose it is still valid: I can upload my music and stream it. I have obscure stuff that is not in any licensed streaming service and it's nice to be able to pull it up on any computer.
However, there are many severe issues.
* It crashes every single time the app is closed in iOS.
* The ability to edit metadata is missing in iOS.
* iOS integration is missing features that are present in apple music and spotify, such as appearing as a music player in all contexts relevant to the OS.
* Duplicate tracks show up everywhere.
* Playlists often do not update when changes are made to them.
* Playlists sometimes just go missing for a while.
* The web browser interface gets out of sync often.
* It is not clear when tracks are ones in your library or from google's licensed library.
* Uploaded tracks are often deduplicated without warning or notice, resulting in lightly modified tracks and rare releases to be replaced with licensed versions.
* Sometimes I cannot get things to upload without trying a dozen times across multiple days.
This is par for google and it is bar none the the worst software I choose to use.
Re: iOS 13's Music App Sucks
#147One of the context menus mentioned in the article says:
Suggest Less Like This
Re: iOS 13's Music App Sucks
#148Earlier quoted context omitted.
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…
It may be abandonware, but it works well, and has very few bugs. I hope it stays abandoned in its current state for a long time.
Sadly it’s my understanding that they plan to shut down google play music completely in favor of YouTube music at some point this year (at least according to a friend-of-a-friend who works on it). It’s already quite buggy and frustrating, but I still use it mainly because I am on the grandfathered $8/month plan and also get ad-free YouTube included.
That being said I went through my Google Play billing recently and realized I’ve spent hundreds and hundreds of dollars on Google Play Music over the years. I don’t think I’ve listened to that much money’s worth of music considering the songs are about a dollar each to buy and I don’t add that many new songs every year.
Someone should build a tool that scans your streaming library on Google Play Music/Apple Music/Spotify or whatever and adds all of those tracks to an Amazon MP3 shopping cart to help you transition off the recurring service. I wouldn’t be surprised if something exists that does something similar using torrents.
Re: iOS 13's Music App Sucks
#149Earlier quoted context omitted.
It may be abandonware, but it works well, and has very few bugs. I hope it stays abandoned in its current state for a long time.
Maybe it’s better now. But for years basic playlist functionality on google music was buggy for me (randomly reordering songs and some other issues I have forgotten). Also no Linux app. Finally swapped to Spotify and never looked back. But I really miss being able to upload my old music.
It’s been many years since I’ve used Spotify but I remember they had the ability to add your own custom music to your library. Is that no longer the case?
Re: iOS 13's Music App Sucks
#150The 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.…
No, this is not correct. I sell an App that lets you play music that is stored locally on your phone. Before you rush to get it though: it is restricted to Operas. It also lets you play cloud music in your library if you subscribe to iTunes Match.