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iTunes Match Expands To Latin America, Netherlands, Baltics
Sir Mal Fet writes "iTunes Match, Apple's service that allows re-downloading all your music, ripped CDs, and other music files across all your libraries using the iCloud service, has been made available in most of Latin America, the Netherlands, and the Baltic states. " Here's one user's review of the service. Is it worth the $25/year? Do you use the service?"
I find it useful, because it basically keeps my phone and my laptop (my main pc) in sync without me ever having to do anything. (such as plug the phone into the laptop and take the sync manually)
Most on /. won't like the idea of living in Apple's ecosystem, but if you're using an iPhone anyway it's convenient.
Apple are as Gods among men if they got the record companies to agree to this, even for $25/yr.
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They basically are charging you for the ability to redownload music and the convenience to autodownload all your files onto all your devices (rather then having to manually transfer it).
No, that's basically a description of the free google music system. It works pretty well if you have the patience to upload (it has a cap of 20000 songs and I've calculated that would take me something like 6 months to upload at my current measured real world upload rate)
I thought the advantage of paying for itunes match was you get to automagically upgrade your cruddy 128K rips to 384K or lossless or whatever.
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
I'm subscribed. When I subscribed, I had about 3.7k files < 256kbps (I remember the numbers because looked to see if it was worth it). After the matching, I now have ~ 1k files at < 256kbps. Of those, most are non-commercial tracks that have never appeared in any other form (hello http://remix.kwed.org) - I download their quarterly playlists.
So overall, a good job and I'm satisfied it saved me a ton of time upgrading my own rips. However that's the good - time for the bad.
Artwork. Artwork has been a mess. When I initially matched, I noticed a lot of my tracks had poor quality artwork (not due to match, they always had them). I went through and fixed them all - a few moments later, Match came back and blatted everything - right back to poor quality artwork again. Making it accept the newer high quality has been very hit and miss, usually involving deleting the track frmo my library and Match then re-importing - even then it doesn't always work.
That's artwork everywhere. Now to specific problems with the iPhone. I turned off Match due to a bad wi-fi area I was in - I had a connection, but couldn't get anywhere. As soon as I turned Match off, all artwork was wiped from my phone. Turning Match back on again appears to have randomly reinstated some artwork and not others.
Sorting. I had some hassle again and turned Match off on the iPhone. I then put it back on again, and suddenly the sort order of my artists was massively out - I have artists starting with K appearing under the 'I' section. It's not random, the artists are actually sorted in alphabetic order, however if you use your thumb to scroll down directly to letter 'M', for example, the first artist listed is James Newton Howard. Hmm....
The other thing is that I'm not sure I'll stay subscribed next year. As a labour-saving initial hit, the price was worth it for me. Now my files are matched anyway, I'm not sure it's worth it for me any more -I'm just as happy with the wireless syncing.
Cheers,
Ian
With iTunes Match, if a song in your library matches a song that Apple already has in it's library, it doesn't upload it all. It registers that you own the song and will download a 256Kbps DRM free version to your other computers/devices -- whether or not you bought the song from Apple.
Leverage. You don't just say no to your biggest retailer. It also makes business sense because the labels get some of that iTunes Match money, all without any effort from their part. Just goes to show what we could have had by now if someone had stood up to these guys before Apple came along.
If all else fails, immortality can always be assured by spectacular error.
Downloading past purchases from the App Store, iBookstore, and iTunes Store
"To download previously purchased apps, books, music or TV Shows to your computer
Open iTunes 10.4 or later on your computer. (You can download the latest version of iTunes here.)
If you're not already signed in, click Sign In and enter your Apple ID and password.
After you've signed in, click Purchased on the right side in the iTunes Store under the QUICK LINKS the section.
From your Purchased page, click the tab for the content type you're looking for (Music, TV Shows, Apps, or Books).
Click Songs or Albums to change the page view and All or "Not in My Library" to view your purchased content that currently is not downloaded on your computer.
Click the download icon to the right of each item to download that item."
People talk a lot of smack about Apple too. Often based on poor information.
If all else fails, immortality can always be assured by spectacular error.
That's not a monopoly. Monopoly = 1 seller, many buyers. Owners of an iPod could buy music from anywhere + the iTunes store, owners of other devices could buy music from anywhere except the iTunes store (for DRM'ed music, other players could play non-DRM AAC files.) It's more like an exclusivity agreement.
If all else fails, immortality can always be assured by spectacular error.
First, the match part replaced bunch of crappy rips with their higher-quality stuff, and I'm not just talking about bit rates. A lot of rips out there just sound bad, and the ones I did from vinyl have the obligatory vinyl noise - the match is clean.
Second, I have way more music than fits on my iPhone. Having the stuff in the cloud solves that problem very nicely.
Third, it just works the way it should - stuff I buy or "acquire" on one device is automagically available on all of my other devices. Makes the notion of doing syncs - wirelessly or not - seem quaint.
Spotify lets you listen to any music they have in their library, from anywhere. It all goes away when you stop paying for Spotify.
iTunes match lets you listen to any of YOUR music, anywhere. That includes rips of CD's no longer sold, live recordings, etc. If you stop paying for iTunes match you still get to keep everything you downloaded (which you should have anyway since you uploaded it to begin with).
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Actually, owners of other devices can buy music on iTunes too, all without DRM. Video is another matter, but Apple has considerably less clout with the film companies.