iTunes or how to mess up something really good
When I first ran into iTunes I thought it was amazing. I mean really, so you can download all these songs, for a relatively small price and it’s all legal? Whoa, awesome! Last year, about this time, I downloaded an album from iTunes. It was all good, cheaper than buying the disk on Amazon so I was happy. Then slowly things started turning sour.
First of all, the quality is good, but it’s not what I’m used to. Maybe it’s just for this specific album, but anyway it’s not that “you can’t tell the difference between this and an audio CD” thing, like most of my music library. Second, some of the songs weren’t cut off correctly. So, the beginning of track 3 will be actually on the end of track 2 and so on. Not a big issue unless you’re a fan of shuffling.. but I am. (Note: emailing them about the issue didn’t merit a response)
But it really really started sucking when I realized the only way I can listen to this stuff is WITH iTunes (and more on that in a minute). I can’t play it in my normal music player where all my other thousands of tracks are, I can’t burn a CD with it (so no listening to this in the car) and at that time I was playing music from my phone so no iPod meaning I couldn’t take my music with me. Well thank you iTunes, for saving me $3 and taking all the fun out of digital music! I actually have to buy the album AGAIN from somewhere else if I want to be able to ever really listen to it. So, instead of saving me $3 you cost me $10. Great!
While we’re at it, let’s talk about the software iTunes. First off, I admire Apple for their good software. No really. The only thing that makes Macs good is Mac OS X. Not the hardware, definitely not the price. Just the OS. Also, Safari is a good browser (at least on Mac OS, I had no experience with it on Windows) and I had no complains about it. Also some of the photo/video software I ran into from Apple was quite good. So yeah, I like Apple software. Generally good quality stuff.
But then there’s iTunes. iTunes takes more resources than anything else I’ve ever seen. It takes about the same time to launch on my laptop as Adobe Photoshop and that’s known to be a beast. If they implemented any multithreading in it, they did it badly, nearly any operation freezes the whole thing until it completes (and it takes its time to complete ANYTHING). I hate having to open it and I try and keep the time it’s open to a minimum, because it simply destroys my multitasking. When iTunes is doing something, everything else needs to stand down. Including my brain, because I’m just stuck waiting for it to do something.
Apple, face it, iTunes is your MOST used software. If this is the way you advertise your software division, don’t be surprised that many people won’t pay the extra bucks for your Mac OS. Maybe it’s time you fix this fail boat of a program. And your DRM policies, before everyone switches to something better and you lose all the market share in the music industry you worked so hard to get.
Mmm..The iPhone is strong with you, Mr. Jobs
What a day… Wow.
So, Euro ’08 first. We have Romania – France : 0 – 0. Quite an ugly game on both sides, but at least we survived it well. On the other hand, a beautiful show of football (yes, football, DEAL WITH IT!), The Netherlands just blew Italy way with an amazing 3-0. Wow, kudos to the Dutch, superb counter-attack! Now, I am anxiously awaiting the Romania – Italy match on Friday, a decisive game for either team. Good luck guys, you’ll need it!
On the other hand, back in the geek world, we have WWDC and Steve Jobs presenting the amazing new iPhone. I must say, if I immediately fell in love with the interface of the first iPhone, but in the end decided against buying it for lack of features and an unjustified price, this one is simply irresistible (yes irresistible, meaning that I’m trying to resist it but I CAN’T). Add the new and exciting MobileMe technology (finally SOMEBODY heard our screams of anguish and found a solution for syncing and backing up stuff nicely) and the price tag that is just blowing the competition way (not to mention MY MIND) and you have yourself a little marvel. Sure, it has its bugs. It doesn’t seem to be able to record video and Mr. Jobs didn’t share with us exactly how quickly the battery will die if you dare use both 3G and GPS. The material is probably inferior quality (replacing metal with plastic is never a good idea), I’m sure some stuff will not work exactly as advertised, the test results might be a bit exaggerated, but honestly, I would not want to be Nokia’s or RIM’s CEO right now (wouldn’t mind having some stock in Apple though). Suddenly, I understand how and why one could camp out to buy a gadget the day it comes out. Steve, I admit it publicly, you’ve captured my heart with a plastic box in a way I thought only beautiful women could. As much as I dislike many of Apple’s policies, I must say, it’s slowly but surely becoming my #1 choice for products. Keep it up for as long as you can and the sky is the limit!
If everyday of my life had this much excitement in it, I would probably completely quit energizing drinks!
Who needs caffeine when you have news like that?
