Do you think you'll renew your iTunes Music Match next year?

[KittyKatta]

Im impressed with iTunes Music Match but at the same time I really question its value.

The thing I love most about Pandora is that it's NOT my playlist. I love the music I bought/ripped but I'm also sick of it so when I punch in an artist in Pandora then it usually pulls up similar music that I haven't heard. So even if you get Genius to work on your iPod/Match combo then youre still pulling from that stale library you have on your home computer, but now you've added the "feature" of downloading those tracks and hunting to delete them when youre done.

For me, its easily worth the $25 subscription just to match and redownload thousands of songs in my library of CD's. But what happens next year? Access to my music while on-the-go is pointless because it requires loads of bandwidth and high speed data that I dont have. And services like Spotify seem to be offering a more interesting approach to music. So whats the big enticement that will convince people to renew next year after they're done legalizing their libraries?

 

[kas23]

All my music is already 320 Kbps and I have a 64 gb iPhone, which means I have plenty of room to store all my music locally on my iPhone, which means I fail to see the personal utility of iTunes Match, which means I don't plan on subscribing at all.

 

[xxBURT0Nxx]

I'm guessing....

People who purchase their music from iTunes (or Amazon, Google, etc.) will not re-subscribe. It was worth while for the first year to get any CD's they own into the cloud for cheap, after that it's uses start to diminish.

People who purchase physical copies of CD's or illegally download their music will likely continue to pay for iTunes Match to easily obtain high quality legitimate copies of their music.

One question I have, if you stop paying for Match do you then lose all of the songs you uploaded? Or do you get to keep those but not "upload" any more music???

 

[iphone1105]

One question I have, if you stop paying for Match do you then lose all of the songs you uploaded? Or do you get to keep those but not "upload" any more music???

You should just read everything written about it, this is covered.

As for me, I will keep subscribing only because I find it very useful so far. I used to use Zumocast and stream my stuff all day from my Mac. I honestly hated it, didn't like leaving my computer on all day.

With this I can have all my 5,000+ tracks available anywhere and everywhere, with just a button click. For $25 that is worth it, not to mention the obvious of all my old MP3's now being of higher quality. To me it's a win, I can see why some hate though, cuz as we know, haters gonna hate, and theres stuff to hate, but to me it's useful and for $25 thats like pocket change for a service....

 

[xxBURT0Nxx]

You should just read everything written about it, this is covered.

never said it wasn't, but i don't care for the service, nor do i really care to read about it. Was just curious. Forgive me for posting a question on a forum. It's not like I made a thread asking about it...

 

[iphone1105]

never said it wasn't, but i don't care for the service, nor do i really care to read about it. Was just curious. Forgive me for posting a question on a forum. It's not like I made a thread asking about it...

Roll eyes all you want, but one second of effort would've answered the question you have, and you could've done it yourself. It's onlybeen covered 1,000,000 times on this site since launch.

Also wasn't replying to you with the rest, I was replyin in general to OP's post.

 

[ericg301]

it's like 3 days old. considering you have 362 days to decide about renewing...why the rush? i'm sure apple has plenty of additional features/bug fixed lined up to enhance the service even more.

 

[iphone1105]

it's like 3 days old. considering you have 362 days to decide about renewing...why the rush? i'm sure apple has plenty of additional features/bug fixed lined up to enhance the service even more.

Good point, and thats what I am curious about too. I wonder what they'll add, my guess and hope is it will eventually allow you to stream again, like in some of the betas I believe.

 

[xxBURT0Nxx]

Roll eyes all you want, but one second of effort would've answered the question you have, and you could've done it yourself. It's onlybeen covered 1,000,000 times on this site since launch.

Also wasn't replying to you with the rest, I was replyin in general to OP's post.

Forum police... thanks for your concern, like i said, don't care enough to look it up. Posted a simple question at the end of my post....

It's not like I made a whole new thread about it to take up your precious little bandwidth.

and that information hasn't been posted a million times, a search for iTunes Match provides a few threads, then 20 on what to do when iTunes can't match the song, then the official MR thread, and then a few more.

Just clicked through some of those threads, and not once does someone mention what happens to my music that was uploaded to the cloud once I stop paying for match.

haha and after even more searching, anyone who has asked that question just gets told by you to search it has been answered before, with no actual answers in that thread.

Glad not everyone on these forums is as helpful as you.... i mean if they were maybe we would have answers to our questions.

The threads that do pertain to iTunes Match and what happens when you stop paying have no definitive answers.

Does the file still exist in iCloud after i stop paying for match? In other words if I replace the file on my computer with the "matched" version from iCloud, does that song now count as an iTunes purchase? Meaning it will be in the cloud forever? Or once I stop paying for match does it count as a song I ripped to my computer, meaning it will not be available in the cloud?

 

[hexonxonx]

No. I used the service simply to upgrade my songs to 256Kbps. Other than that, I prefer to simply sync my phone through iTunes.

 

[GoTexans]

Y not? I love it

 

[KittyKatta]

One question I have, if you stop paying for Match do you then lose all of the songs you uploaded? Or do you get to keep those but not "upload" any more music???

I was wondering that too so its odd that someone would respond the way they did to you. I have an Air with limited storage space so the idea of having these songs available when I want it is appealing, but its not necessarily worth $25/yr.

A simple "yes" or "no" seems to be a much easier thing to type than a long response filled with things like "this was already covered" and accusations that "haters gonna hate". Its a legitimate question that not everyone thinks of right away.

it's like 3 days old. considering you have 362 days to decide about renewing...why the rush? i'm sure apple has plenty of additional features/bug fixed lined up to enhance the service even more.

With Apple then ANY assumption at future updates is up in the air. Apple is fantastic at "wowwing" the industry but they aren't very eager to update their products with new features AFTER the product is released. (iWork, Aperture, Final Cut, AppleTV, iTunes etc). Maybe this will be different since its a pay service but to be honest, Im not sure I can guess what Apple could offer that would be a value add once everyone has legitimized their collection. Heck, if it was $10 for a single month I'd probably pay that and cancel once my library is done syncing.

 

[hexonxonx]

One question I have, if you stop paying for Match do you then lose all of the songs you uploaded? Or do you get to keep those but not "upload" any more music???

From what I understand, yes. Your uploaded tracks will be deleted from the cloud once you stop paying. They will stay on your computer or phone of course.

 

[xxBURT0Nxx]

I was wondering that too so its odd that someone would respond the way they did to you. I have an Air with limited storage space so the idea of having these songs available when I want it is appealing, but its not necessarily worth $25/yr.

A simple "yes" or "no" seems to be a much easier thing to type than a long response filled with things like "this was already covered" and accusations that "haters gonna hate". Its a legitimate question that not everyone thinks of right away.

yeah, some people are just too good to help others on these boards. Unfortunate, but that's ok. I did a little searching, and once you have a song that has been matched, you can replace the original with the matched version.

As far as I can tell, when you stop paying for match, if you haven't replaced your original songs, your library will continue to have the original tracks at their original bitrates. If you have replaced the songs in your library with the matched versions from the cloud then your library will contain the higher bit rate matched versions, even after you stop paying for match.

So, you will presumably have the "matched" versions in your library even if you don't continue to subscribe to match. What I'm still wondering is if all of those matched songs then count as music purchased from iTunes. In other words, are those songs still available in the cloud, or are they only on your device(s)??

Unfortunate it's so hard to just help someone out rather than saying SEARCH!! Yeah a search on iTunes match pulls up about 50 threads on how to get unmatched songs into the cloud, completely irrelevant to the question, a bunch of multi-page threads, and the few that do pertain to the question don't have a clear cut answer.

Oh well, not a match subscriber, and probably never will be, I was just curious what happens to your music once you stop paying for the service.

 

[gentlefury]

If they choose to continue with this high res download only, then no...if they add in a 128kbps streaming mode for iPhone I will keep it.

For now it was useful for fixing some of my fried tracks.

 

[Tones2]

$25 to store a complete copy of all of your music (well, up to 25,000 songs) including your own meta-data seems pretty darn cheap and convienent to me.

It's certainly NOT great for use with synching to a device and the match process is far from perfect, but it's worth the $25 just for the backup itself and hopefully the synching and matching will improve as time goes on.

Tony

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If they choose to continue with this high res download only, then no...if they add in a 128kbps streaming mode for iPhone I will keep it.

For now it was useful for fixing some of my fried tracks.

I totally agree with the fact that losing the on-the-fly 128 kbps conversion on the device is a deal breaker for using iTunes Match on my device. But it's still OK on my computer.

Tony

 

[iphone1105]

Forum police... thanks for your concern, like i said, don't care enough to look it up. Posted a simple question at the end of my post....

It's not like I made a whole new thread about it to take up your precious little bandwidth.

and that information hasn't been posted a million times, a search for iTunes Match provides a few threads, then 20 on what to do when iTunes can't match the song, then the official MR thread, and then a few more.

Just clicked through some of those threads, and not once does someone mention what happens to my music that was uploaded to the cloud once I stop paying for match.

haha and after even more searching, anyone who has asked that question just gets told by you to search it has been answered before, with no actual answers in that thread.

Glad not everyone on these forums is as helpful as you.... i mean if they were maybe we would have answers to our questions.

The threads that do pertain to iTunes Match and what happens when you stop paying have no definitive answers.

Does the file still exist in iCloud after i stop paying for match? In other words if I replace the file on my computer with the "matched" version from iCloud, does that song now count as an iTunes purchase? Meaning it will be in the cloud forever? Or once I stop paying for match does it count as a song I ripped to my computer, meaning it will not be available in the cloud?

Get more butt hurt about it...I am very helpful, read some of the posts I have helped others in. But your question is obvious, and you're lazy for not reading the damn front page where this info could be had...but seriously, get more butt hurt

 

[verwon]

I'll be keeping mine.

 

[applesith]

I didn't realize kindergartners were so active with back and forth on MR.


Have not purchased yet. I've got just under 10k songs and know a good amount will have to be uploaded. I'm sure I will eventually pull the trigger but not in much of a rush, as I would be using it on the train commuting to work and service can get spotty.

 

[iphone1105]

I didn't realize kindergartners were so active with back and forth on MR.

Yes yes we are, it's basically 98% of the site, this can't be the first time you've noticed...

 

[xxBURT0Nxx]

Get more butt hurt about it...I am very helpful, read some of the posts I have helped others in. But your question is obvious, and you're lazy for not reading the damn front page where this info could be had...but seriously, get more butt hurt

I'm not butt hurt guy, i could care less. As I've said I will probably never use match, I was simply asking a question.

And no the information is NOT on the first page, here I'll post it for you:

After a bit of delay, Apple launched iTunes Match today. The new $25/year service offers users the ability to match their existing iTunes library with high quality versions in Apple's iCloud. The new service, however, has generated a bit of confusion about what exactly happens to your music library after you have enabled it.

One of the first questions, how to determine the iCloud status of a particular song, is solved by right-clicking the column bar at the top of the iTunes window (or pressing Command-J) and making sure "iCloud Status" is selected.

MacRumors forum user Nunyabinez has written a detailed explanation of how iTunes Match works that should answer a number of potential questions if you are planning to enable the feature. We've summarized the key points here, but the full post is worth a read if you are planning on using Tunes Match. Quote:
- When you enable Match it goes through a three step process. Analyzing your library, matching songs, uploading non-matched content. It does this for your whole library. You can't choose to exclude songs other than taking them out of your library.

- If a song is matched, it becomes available to download in 256K AAC. If a song is not matched it is copied in its current format and bit rate up to 320K. If the file is Lossless however, it is converted (presumably by your computer) to a 256k AAC file and then uploaded.

- Nothing happens to your local music when you run match. If you have a lower quality song that was matched you can remove it from your local library and then replace it with the 256k version. What happens is you delete the song, but the entry in iTunes stays, but a little cloud now shows up in a newly added column that shows you that you have a song that is in the cloud but not in your library. You can click on the cloud and it will download it to your local library, where again it is now permanently yours at the higher bit rate.

- Match uses your meta-data. If you in an anal-retentive fashion have made lots of custom edits to your files, that is what gets copied to the cloud. Even if you replace your songs with the upgraded versions you keep your previous meta-data.
iTunes Match launched earlier today with the arrival of iTunes 10.5.1. The $24.99/year service offers cloud-based matching and upload of users' complete iTunes libraries.

Article Link: A Clear Explanation of iTunes Match

so you tell me, wise guy, where does it say in there what happens to my music when i stop paying?

And you are out of your mind if you think people are going to read through 450 replies to get that information.

DB

 

[iphone1105]

Have not purchased yet. I've got just under 10k songs and know a good amount will have to be uploaded. I'm sure I will eventually pull the trigger but not in much of a rush, as I would be using it on the train commuting to work and service can get spotty.

You can download them in advance of your commute. Say as your about to leave the house, download 1 or 2 albums for your commute. It only takes a few minutes while you do other morning tasks on your way to work. That could be an option. FWIW i thought most of my songs would have to be uploaded too, but Apple did match a lot of my stuff that was odd ball type stuff, so you never know! Good luck

 

[verwon]

You can download them in advance of your commute. Say as your about to leave the house, download 1 or 2 albums for your commute. It only takes a few minutes while you do other morning tasks on your way to work. That could be an option. FWIW i thought most of my songs would have to be uploaded too, but Apple did match a lot of my stuff that was odd ball type stuff, so you never know! Good luck

I also had a lot of obscure stuff that surprised me by being matched.

 

[gentlefury]

Funny thing is, I would prefer it to NOT use my meta data...I have several tracks that have either lacking or poor meta data and I would like to have it corrected with what they have.

Is there a way to turn this feature off?

 

[iphone1105]

I also had a lot of obscure stuff that surprised me by being matched.

Me too, I thought for sure they'd be uploads, and in the end, they were matched, which was nice since it allowed me to snag better quality tracks!