I completely HATE  Apple Music

[HopefulHumanist]

There are two things that Apple Music represents, let's look at each one individually so you understand:

1. "Radio" In iTMS, it's called "iTunes Radio". In an app, it's called Pandora. In Apple Music it's called "For You", "Playlists", and "New". There is nothing that Apple Music can do in these various versions of "Radio" that iTunes Radio and Pandora can't do for free.

2. "Library" In iTMS, it's called "paid downloads". In Apple Music it's called "offline". iTMS it costs $1 per song. Apple Music it costs $120 a year. Both do the same thing, both cost money, just one is a hell of a lot more money.

So, when I say that iTunes and Apple Music are the same thing just marketed differently and all the 'great' features of Apple Music are currently available for free that's what I'm talking about. "For You", "Playlists", and "New" is just marketing nonsense that translates to "iTunes Radio Custom Stations" which cost nothing. "Offline" is just marketing nonsense that translates to "sucker, you just paid $120 a year for the rest of your life for Feel My Face ha ha".

BJ

You got a few things wrong here.

The Radio feature is listed as "Radio" in both iTunes and Music.app with Apple Music enabled. Beats 1, featured stations and user-created stations are completely free; without a subscription. They basically just got rid of the branding "iTunes Radio" and added Beats 1.

For You is totally different from Radio. For You takes into account songs/albums you've listened to and ones you've "loved" and gives you curated playlists from music professionals and publications. There are playlists made for "best of" lists, current references (e.g. ghost writing discussion in hip hop), moods, activities, etc. Radio is created based on a single song, artist, album or genre and tweaked with playback but each radio is a separate entity.

Yeah, they're both serving you listening recommendations but I don't think that's enough to say they're the same.

New is just new music and top charts. It basically serves as iTunes Store-like front for Apple Music. The name isn't apt but it's not pretending to be a curation or recommendation generator. Playlists is just your playlists lmao...

On streaming vs. purchased, value is subjective. If you listen to enough music yearly that you would have to pay more than $120 a year to buy, it may make more sense for you to stream. Especially, if you get on a family plan. And some people actually like the curation stuff, I am one of them. It's nice to let go of having to have complete control over everything about my library and what I listen to next.

Offline is just that. Having your music available in the absence of wifi can be very useful.

 

[boltjames]

You got a few things wrong here.

The Radio feature is listed as "Radio" in both iTunes and Music.app with Apple Music enabled. Beats 1, featured stations and user-created stations are completely free; without a subscription. They basically just got rid of the branding "iTunes Radio" and added Beats 1.

For You is totally different from Radio. For You takes into account songs/albums you've listened to and ones you've "loved" and gives you curated playlists from music professionals and publications. There are playlists made for "best of" lists, current references (e.g. ghost writing discussion in hip hop), moods, activities, etc. Radio is created based on a single song, artist, album or genre and tweaked with playback but each radio is a separate entity.

Yeah, they're both serving you listening recommendations but I don't think that's enough to say they're the same.

New is just new music and top charts. It basically serves as iTunes Store-like front for Apple Music. The name isn't apt but it's not pretending to be a curation or recommendation generator. Playlists is just your playlists lmao...

On streaming vs. purchased, value is subjective. If you listen to enough music yearly that you would have to pay more than $120 a year to buy, it may make more sense for you to stream. Especially, if you get on a family plan. And some people actually like the curation stuff, I am one of them. It's nice to let go of having to have complete control over everything about my library and what I listen to next.

Offline is just that. Having your music available in the absence of wifi can be very useful.

No, I didn't, it's just semantics.

Radio: As you say, they're both serving listening recommendations just packaged differently. In iTunes Radio, I can create a handful of custom radio stations like "Tame Impala Radio" and "Sunday Morning Radio" and wind up with the same thing as "genre playlists" or whatever you want to call them in Apple Music Radio.

Offline: AM "Offline" is the same thing as iTMS "Downloads" as far as the Library is concerned. It's the place that the music you paid for lives for listening whenever you want.

Overall: Flash back a month and Apple Music already existed, it was just called something else. The only difference between Apple Music and iTunes is how Apple gets paid. One is a-la-carte for $1 a song. The other is all-you-can-eat for $120 a year. To pitch it as something "revolutionary" is ridiculous.

BJ

 

[HopefulHumanist]

No, I didn't, it's just semantics.

Radio: As you say, they're both serving listening recommendations just packaged differently. In iTunes Radio, I can create a handful of custom radio stations like "Tame Impala Radio" and "Sunday Morning Radio" and wind up with the same thing as "genre playlists" or whatever you want to call them in Apple Music Radio.

Offline: AM "Offline" is the same thing as iTMS "Downloads" as far as the Library is concerned. It's the place that the music you paid for lives for listening whenever you want.

Overall: Flash back a month and Apple Music already existed, it was just called something else. The only difference between Apple Music and iTunes is how Apple gets paid. One is a-la-carte for $1 a song. The other is all-you-can-eat for $120 a year. To pitch it as something "revolutionary" is ridiculous.

BJ

If those differences are just semantics, then words don't really mean anything but whatever.

 

[johannnn]

iTMS it costs $1 per song. Apple Music it costs $120 a year. Both do the same thing, both cost money, just one is a hell of a lot more money.
BJ

Only if you want to live your life like a poor person who only listen to <120 freely chosen songs per year.

 

[boltjames]

Only if you want to live your life like a poor person who only listen to <120 freely chosen songs per year.

I personally have a 25,000 song collection already, comprised of CD rips and iTMS downloads that cost me in excess of $20,000.

The average iTunes user spends $12 a year on buying music per Apple's own data.

The issue is that Pandora and iTunes Radio do a great job of exposing today's listeners to new music and older classics and are free. Even myself with my vast curated library spend more time listening to iTunes Radio than I do my own collection. Apparently, so does everyone else.

BJ

 

[whsbuss]

I personally have a 25,000 song collection already, comprised of CD rips and iTMS downloads that cost me in excess of $20,000.

The average iTunes user spends $12 a year on buying music per Apple's own data.

The issue is that Pandora and iTunes Radio do a great job of exposing today's listeners to new music and older classics and are free. Even myself with my vast curated library spend more time listening to iTunes Radio than I do my own collection. Apparently, so does everyone else.

BJ

Quite impressive collection. I too enjoy listening to Pandora, AM Radio, and iHeartRadio for potential new music or one I have not heard. But what I find is after 1/2 to 1 hour I revert back to my AM library and playlists. Especially when doing bike riding and universal weights workout. And even if Apple's data suggest ~$12 per year, having all-I-can-listen-to music is very satisfying.

 

[Tech198]

A few more problems i found here with Apple Music:-

- any songs u upload yourself, album artwork automatically is not uploaded, because the artwork changes.. .. If u go to "For you" and search for the album "added" you will fine "+" because while the album has all the same songs, the artwork is different.... Clicking "+" this way is not the answer as this will only cause duplicate songs.

Confirmed, u must re-apply artwork every time u upload

- I've had experienced where all tracks in a given album added to playlist were greyed out and unable to play (Your Apple music subscription has expired." when its not. since a sign out and sign in again fixed this, to album songs appeared greyed out yet u can still play them...

Again, solution was to just remove and re-add album from AM.

- Worse case, u'r uploaded songs get converted to Apple's DRM, which they should not be, because u own them, if you delete them locally and re-downloaded these previously uploaded songs u will find they are now DRM protected.

Be warned and keep backups like I did.

As a whole the service is good to use, but all the artwork u need to re-apply just because u uploaded everything, and the fact u have no idea what else will happen, the trade off from the massive library and convenience of AM, its just not worth it.

On a side note: I was also wondering i know iTunes match doesn't have DRM, but what about DRM protected music that is NOT on the store, if u have these, and upload them with match would they be DRM free or stay "as is" ?

 

[CEmajr]

Couldn't you create a playlist in Apple Music, add all of Muse's songs to it, and then just run the playlist?

That makes too much sense, it's Apple's fault.

OP clearly doesn't understand how radio stations work. No streaming radio service plays all songs by the same artist that you select. Not even Pandora. In fact, I would hate it if I created a radio station and it just played songs from the same artist all the time.

 

[manu chao]

Radio: As you say, they're both serving listening recommendations just packaged differently. In iTunes Radio, I can create a handful of custom radio stations like "Tame Impala Radio" and "Sunday Morning Radio" and wind up with the same thing as "genre playlists" or whatever you want to call them in Apple Music Radio.

A radio is an infinite playlist, completely computer generated (except for Beats 1 which is human generated but also has DJs talking, so it is not pure music). And much like DJs add talking, radio might add commercials.

A playlist is limited list (about 25 songs?) that is either human or machine-generated. You can save a playlist and listen to it again (which you only can on some of the shows from Beats 1). Since 'radio-playlists' are infinite, they are constantly changing (you don't get the same 25 songs repeated in the same order), thus you cannot save them. You can restart the radio 'station', but it is very unlikely that you get the same songs (and even if they start the same, if you liked the part of song 101 through 121, you cannot easily save that part as a playlist).

Overall: Flash back a month and Apple Music already existed, it was just called something else. The only difference between Apple Music and iTunes is how Apple gets paid. One is a-la-carte for $1 a song. The other is all-you-can-eat for $120 a year.

That's like saying owning a car or riding a cab is the same thing. Yes, both are cars and both get you from A to B, but that is about it.

 

[boltjames]

A radio is an infinite playlist, completely computer generated (except for Beats 1 which is human generated but also has DJs talking, so it is not pure music). And much like DJs add talking, radio might add commercials.

A playlist is limited list (about 25 songs?) that is either human or machine-generated. You can save a playlist and listen to it again (which you only can on some of the shows from Beats 1). Since 'radio-playlists' are infinite, they are constantly changing (you don't get the same 25 songs repeated in the same order), thus you cannot save them. You can restart the radio 'station', but it is very unlikely that you get the same songs (and even if they start the same, if you liked the part of song 101 through 121, you cannot easily save that part as a playlist).

So let me get this straight: The only true thing of value in Apple Music is access to the 30 Million Song Library and you're telling me that an Apple Music Radio Station ("playlist") that's limited to 25 songs is better than an iTunes Radio Station ("custom station") that's limitless? LOL.

That's like saying owning a car or riding a cab is the same thing. Yes, both are cars and both get you from A to B, but that is about it.

No, because the music is the same. Whether you paid $1 for "Brown Sugar" by the Rolling Stones or paid $120 to Apple to listen to the song offline, it's the same song. They play on the same device, they are just as easy to pull down, there is no difference other than the payment method.

Oh, and if you really want to get down to brass tacks, the iTunes Music Store has complete catalogs from influential artists like The Beatles, Neil Young, Prince and dozens of others that don't appear in Apple Music. Be careful which service you view as a "cab" and which one a "BMW".

BJ

 

[jmmo20]

https://9to5mac.files.wordpress.com/2015/08/screen-shot-2015-08-11-at-11-59-46-pm.png?w=1000

so it turns out that the majority of music played by Beats 1 is hip hop / rap.
it might as well be call Beat$ On3

 

[navaira]

This graph is a bit... odd. There is "Hip-Hop/Rap" AND "Hip-Hop". There is "Electronic" and "Electronica". There is "Alternative" and "Indie Rock". Is The Smiths considered alternative or indie rock? Where would a band like New Order fit in? Is Frank Ocean "Hip-Hop/Rap", "Hip-Hop", "Electronic" or "R&B/Soul"?

I don't think it's a real surprise that hip-hop is the most played genre on Beats One though, I tried it about four times and every single time struck hip-hop gold. Perhaps if I waited for an hour, I'd hear some "Alternative", but, sorry, no.

 

[boltjames]

so it turns out that the majority of music played by Beats 1 is hip hop / rap.
it might as well be call Beat$ On3

Might as well be called iTunes Radio Hip-Hop station which is free.

The more one studies Apple Music, the more one realizes that it is just a repackaging of what's already out there. If Apple truly wants to innovate, and how about spending the time on, you know, innovation.

BJ

 

[Julien]

Might as well be called iTunes Radio Hip-Hop station which is free.

The more one studies Apple Music, the more one realizes that it is just a repackaging of what's already out there. If Apple truly wants to innovate, and how about spending the time on, you know, innovation.

BJ

Apple is supposedly taking a 'hands off' approach to Beats 1 and allowing it to be programed by the DJ's (and others involved). Also Apple will probably make more genre specific stations when/if Beats 2,3,4 and 5 go online.

 

[manu chao]

So let me get this straight: The only true thing of value in Apple Music is access to the 30 Million Song Library and you're telling me that an Apple Music Radio Station ("playlist") that's limited to 25 songs is better than an iTunes Radio Station ("custom station") that's limitless?

No, I am just talking about the difference between radio stations and custom playlists. Nowhere did I equate playlists with Apple Music in total. On-demand access to individual songs is another one of Apple Music's main features.

No, because the music is the same. Whether you paid $1 for "Brown Sugar" by the Rolling Stones or paid $120 to Apple to listen to the song offline, it's the same song. They play on the same device, they are just as easy to pull down, there is no difference other than the payment method.

It is not just a different payment method (eg, check vs credit card). It is a completely different marginal cost: zero marginal cost with Apple Music vs ~$1 marginal cost with the iTunes Store. A better example is car-sharing vs your own car. With car-sharing you essentially pay per use, whereas with owned cars the fixed costs might easily exceed the variable ones.

 

[whsbuss]

Might as well be called iTunes Radio Hip-Hop station which is free.

The more one studies Apple Music, the more one realizes that it is just a repackaging of what's already out there. If Apple truly wants to innovate, and how about spending the time on, you know, innovation.

BJ

I'm not sure what you expected from AM? Streaming is streaming. Like what you like.

 

[jmmo20]

Apple is supposedly taking a 'hands off' approach to Beats 1 and allowing it to be programed by the DJ's (and others involved). Also Apple will probably make more genre specific stations when/if Beats 2,3,4 and 5 go online.

The one European representative within those DJs is the sister of 2 English rappers. Consequently she loves rap and plays it way too Much.

There are quite a lot of amazing djs in Europe. Yet they can only be bothered with rap.

Meh

 

[Tech198]

Quick tip: anyone having matched tracks, replacing their version of a song, i found on Apple discussions, just temporary rename the title of the song before turning on icloud cloud or updating from Preferences. or in File menu, Library.

Any song will upload because it now has different name. If won't clash when u change it back.

 

[boltjames]

I'm not sure what you expected from AM? Streaming is streaming. Like what you like.

Well for starters, I didn't expect to have to pay $120 a year for iTunes radio which is currently free and I didn't expect there to be caveats to the supposedly 'deep catalog' like missing artists and infected libraries.

Look more closely and the old model of iTunes Radio + the iTunes Music Store is far better for consumers because you're not overpaying for millions of bad songs you never wanted in the first place.

BJ

 

[HopefulHumanist]

Well for starters, I didn't expect to have to pay $120 a year for iTunes radio which is currently free and I didn't expect there to be caveats to the supposedly 'deep catalog' like missing artists and infected libraries.

Look more closely and the old model of iTunes Radio + the iTunes Music Store is far better for consumers because you're not overpaying for millions of bad songs you never wanted in the first place.

BJ

Dude, the radio, in all its forms, is still free. All you have to do is sign into your Apple ID. The subscription gets you Apple Music (catalog, For You, New) and iCloud Music Library (storage of your own library in the cloud).

Nothing has changed for people that prefer to purchase music, save for the interface on iOS maybe.

 

[navaira]

The iTunes interface also changed. And the search function only works correctly in AM and iTunes Store tabs.

 

[Tech198]

Spotify is $120 a year as well, so its not expensive with Apple.

U are not forced to listened to an album with AM, just like any streaming service, u listen to songs,,, not albums (unless u what too)

same with playlists,,,, u add songs to playlists just as u did in the past,,, no difference the previous...

Search also works in playlists, always has.

 

[decksnap]

I don't understand why you should have to manually create a playlist for an artist. Seems pretty clunky to me. Why can you not simply go to an Artist's page and press play? That's how spotify does it.

You would think they might have thought of this scenario:

Hey, let's listen to X.
Go to X
Play X

Why is this so hard?

 

[Tech198]

I think i now know the feeling most users have issues matching to wrong version of a song, Apple music replacing songs, etc, even though Apple stated that "Listen to all your music everywhere" which btw, that should never take priority over the fact Apple music matches "songs" which is the where the issue lies in the first place..

e.g. You're shining (Dark mix) replaced on Apple music, unless i manually edited the title to fore it to upload (which would be why so many have messed up library since not only would song be replaced, but the version u do not want, e.g. live vs studio version, but now u also have messed up album art to deal with.... Not a pleasant experience.

no one will go thought their entire local collection 2,000+ even let alone more, just to "fix" this up..

I don't care how popular Apple music is, how many labels are on board to make it worth while, and while i do enjoy the fact Apple music has got some good stuff, the need to re-do your local library, and its not as simple as "listen to your songs everywhere" without any modification needed, will far outweigh that of AM.

I feel for those users, but then again, all other serves do the same... Google music.... I guess the only one that doesn't is Spotify... So either have the best of AM music with a messy library switch...

If only Apple had made it match songs AND albums, that is a service.... bot nothing just works when u only match songs alone.

I may just decide to keep AM, but forced to listen to my albums local..... which is sad, because i want to stream, but am not about to modify any just to do this because Apple chooses to only match by songs.

 

[v0caltic]

I feel for those users, but then again, all other serves do the same... Google music.... I guess the only one that doesn't is Spotify... So either have the best of AM music with a messy library switch...

I'm using Google Music now because they have a music manager app that lets you upload your local files and flag incorrectly matched songs and force it to use your version.