Apple Announces iTunes 7, Movies, Set-Top Box

necro81 writes, "As anticipated, Apple announced several additions and upgrades to its iPod and iTunes lineup. The iPod now comes in an 80 GB model, with a $50 price drop for the 30 GB model. The 2nd generation iPod Nano harkens back to the iPod Mini with metallic, multi-colored shells (though as diminutive as ever) and comes in an 8 GB model. The Shuffle has been completely redesigned and shrunk down to the size of a matchbook. All of this comes with the release of iTunes 7, which includes support for downloading full-length movies from iTMS." All 75 movies initially available are from Disney-related studios. The new iTunes will download cover art for all the songs in your library, no matter where you got them from, as long as you have an iTunes account. (A confirmation dialog says: "Information about songs with missing artwork will be sent to Apple. Apple does not keep any information related to the contents of your music library.") There's a new album-cover browsing view of your library. And Steve Jobs gave a sneak preview of a project code-named iTV: a Mac Mini-like wireless set-top box. Engadget has a blow-by-blow of Steve Jobs's presentation.

Re:I liked the old nano...

I don't know, I kinda dig the new Nano. I liked the colors, espically when a family has kids (or adults) with more than one nano in the house. It helps to seperate them. Also, you could always get the skins for the Nanos, but then the size got bigger. I would liked to have seen some bluetooth or wifi capabilities for transfering the music/video wirelessly, but guess not.

Re:I liked the old nano...

Ditto that. I had to get a new skin for my phone because the GF...

Ok, you had me up until that point, but girlfriend? Please. What are you doing on /. then?

Re:I liked the old nano...

Waiting for her to get back from school?

Re:I liked the old nano...

The major complaint about the Nano was that its surface got scratched too easily. Apple fixes this by going back to alluminium while keeping the same size factor, and adds "fancy" colours (ok, I'm not a big fan of those either, but you can get a black or silver one anyway), and people keep complaining? Geez.

Gapless Playback!

Gapless Payck for iPod! Wonder if they will update the 5th gen with this?? Please???

Re:Gapless Playback!

No, iTunes has never had true gapless playback. There's always been at least a slight hiccup in between tracks, no matter how you set it up. The old crossfade set to 0 trick also wasn't a complete solution - if you had a transition with a fast tempo, you'd hear it screw up a beat or two.

I'm really eager to try this out and see if they truly fixed it.

Re:Gapless Playback!

Gapless is what's been keeping me from upgrading as well. I've got an old black-and-white 20GB iPod which I've been using the hell out of for years now (I've burned through two batteries on it, and was planning on buying yet another in a few months.)

Color screens did not make me want to replace it.
Nor did photos.
Nor did putting the buttons on the clickwheel.
Nor did the longer battery life.
Nor did videos.

But gapless playback? They hooked me. I RAN to the Apple Store over my lunch hour, only to be told to "check again tomorrow", which I most certainly will do.

The sweet thing about this is, since it also plays videos and a smattering of time-killer games, I can sell off both my old iPod and my souped-up PSP to friends who want them, and just about break even on the upgrade! w00t!

Re:Gapless Playback!

I haven't finished sync'ing my video iPod yet, but after installing iTunes 7, it brought up a dialog as it went through my library saying it was updating for gapless playback.

This would imply that it's done within the audio files themselves, perhaps making it usable on all iPods.

I'll see shortly.

The new music view/organize modes in iTunes are great. One is divided by albums, showing a small image of the album cover along with all the tracks. The other looks like they licensed "Cover Flow", it looks like flipping through albums in your old physical collection. Definitely better visual feedback then scrolling through a huge text list of songs.

Re:Gapless Playback!

As I said elsewhere, it works on my 5th gen, although Sound Check creates a noticeable volume change between the two songs.

Gapless Playback Notes

I've had a chance to play with this a bit, and here are my findings, using a couple of test files with a seamless transition in between. Previously, every method of playback produced a gap (or so I believed).

• Within iTunes 7: no gap
• iTunes 6: gap
• 1 GB iPod shuffle, firmware 1.1.4 (iTunes says it's up to date): gap
• 30 GB 5th generation iPod with video, firmware 1.1 (iTunes says it's up to date): gap
• iTunes 6, outputting to Airport Express: NO GAP! Huh? I did not expect this at all. The same files always have a gap when outputting to that computer's speakers in iTunes 6. I tried old backups of those songs that hadn't been touched by iTunes 7, still no gap for the Airport Express, gap for the computer speakers. Weird.
• iTunes 7, outputting to Airport Express: could not get iTunes 7 to connect to the AE. Anyone else have this problem?

For the people who've reported gapless playback in existing generation iPods, can you double check? Any further details? Firmware versions? Won't work for me. I guess I'll have to listen to one of the new iPods in store before purchasing.

THey also added gapless playback

As well as an overhaul of the iTunes interface. One of the weirder things they added though was the "explicit" warning to music bought from the music store that is well, explicit.

But perhaps most shocking and sacrilegious: they changed the color of the music note! It is blue now! How could they destroy tradition like that!

Re:THey also added gapless playback

It was blue (and other colors) before.

Behold! The iTunes Icon Timeline! [techmanifesto.com] Note that the icons on that page are the real deal until you get to "Alternative iTunes icons", then the rest are mildly crappy "fan art". (Ugh.)

Re:THey also added gapless playback

By the way, that sinking sound you hear coming from Redmond is the hope of Microsoft in taking over the living room through Zune, the XBox 360, and Media Center PCs.

Although, it could also be a chair sailing out the window. I bet they're bolting down everything in the campus today.

Re:Why not?? Xbox360 + MCE= iTV

You make a classic mistake when analyzing Apple or Tivo whatever. They aren't selling the features, because EVERYONE has the same features. They are selling the interface or rather complete user experience. This system will certainly be easy easy. Ok, you have itunes installed. Next step, plug in the iTV to the wall. Then plug the wires to your tv, which will be just like hooking up a VCR. Ok...now I'm done! I can use the itunes interface to buy, which I understand, and the movies I want will show up on my TV. Not only is it simple, but it doesn't break the user's metaphor for how these things work. My movies are on my computer, but I can play them on my TV.

Xbox 360 breaks the metaphor. Ok, so I want to buy a movie. I plug in my xbox 360 (wait...isn't that for games?) then I go to the movie store on the xbox. I browse and press download. Ok...where are my movies living now? On the xbox? Uhhh..ok...but what if I turn off the xbox?

A savvy user knows the answer to these questions. Of course the xbox is just like your pc, and I'm sure the xbox movie download will work great. But the issue here is that the experience seems a little more confusing, just a little harder to deal with. And that is a major marketing hurdle. Tivo and Apple overcame consumer resistance to tech that savvy people were never afraid to use. The Tivo is so easy to deal with the consumer loses their fear of using a computer to record shows, which sounds too complex. The previous barrier to mp3 player adoption was the complexity in sorting music and getting it on the device. Apple combined ideas and features everyone else already had in a way that wasn't too indimitating for average users. Now, in the consumer's mind an ipod is something they can use. Apple comes around with a thing that is like an ipod for your tv. Easy. The consumer will not be afraid of this because they already have an idea of how this works (of course, they are wrong about that, but that doesn't matter). It will make sense to people, the fear of complexity is easy to overcome here. Microsoft (or sony or amazon or whoever) has a major hill to climb. The first user objection to the Amazon system is "how does it get on my TV?". The objection to the xBox 360 is that people think of it as a game console and using it to download movies is going to sound complex, even if it isn't. Most consumers didn't want Tivo because they hadn't seen it and it sounded too hard. Tivo caught on once enough people had it that people could see how easy it was and lose that fear. So like a sibling poster said, the major innovation here is marketing, followed up by products that deliver as promised. Apple marketing convinces people that they CAN use an ipod. Then the product actually is easy enough to use that it meets this expectation.

Let's be serious...microsoft does not have a reputation for ease of use.

Re:THey also added gapless playback

When are they going to utilize the brown note [wikipedia.org]?

play by play

MacRumorsLive
09:51 am iLounge: Griffin Technology, Belkin, Incase and Nike are in attendance.
09:52 am iLounge: Folks are crowding to get up-front seats. (wonder why?)
10:03 am iLounge: theater is filled to capacity (755 person theater). Podium on the right, a computer setup on the left of the stage (looks like an iMac)
10:04 am the event appears to have begun
10:05 am iLounge: talks about iPod sports kit. Foot Locker is blown away by sales. 450,000 sales in 90 days
10:06 am iLounge: iPods. 3 iPods: iPod, Nano, and Shuffle
10:07 am iLounge: iPod is getting enhanced today. 60% brighter with brighness control, 3.5 hours video playback (up from 2 hrs... big version goes to 6.5 hours), new headphones, gapless playback
10:08 am iLounge: new iPod software features: instant searching, new games (Bejeweled, Cubis 2, Mahjong, Mini golf, pac man, tetris, texas holdem, vortex, and zuma)
10:09 am iLounge: games for sale off iTunes for $4.99
10:10 am iLounge: games will work on 5G ipods
10:12 am iLounge: 249 and 349 with 60GB and 80GB capacity [SHOULD BE 30GB, 80GB. See below]
10:12 am iLounge: Nano is now, as rumored, Aluminum and in colors
10:14 am iLounge: Green silver black blue pink
10:14 am iLounge: 24 hour batter life
10:15 am iLounge: New software just like standard iPod
10:16 am iLounge: 3 models, but with double storage capacity at each model (and varying colors available)
10:16 am iLounge: 2GB is $149 in silver only
10:16 am iLounge: 4GB is $199 in all colors but black
10:16 am iLounge: 8GB is $249 in all colors
10:17 am iLounge: All models are 52% smaller in volume than previous nano. new charger, new armband, new lanyard
10:18 am iLounge: iPod Shuffle is now 2nd generationl size of iPod Radio Remote
10:21 am iLounge: metal body, 1 model (1GB), $79, ships in october.
10:22 am Engadget: (for nano) $149 2GB ipod is aluminum only, $199 4GB has colors, $249 8GB is black only
10:23 am iLounge: iTunes 7 today
10:24 am iLounge: Source list now includes library with sep libraries for all forms of media
10:24 am iLounge: Store now has own section, devices have their own sections, playlists too
10:25 am iLounge: iTunes will give you cover art for free if you are missing cover art (thanks Steve)
10:26 am iLounge: 3 different views of iTunes, list view, album view (with art and tracks), then "cover flow view" lets you rapidly find what you want by album cover
10:27 am iLounge: iPod updater appears to be now integrated into iTunes
10:28 am iLounge: TV shows are now encoded at 640x480 (h264), up from 320x240
10:28 am Engadget: Today we're introducing the biggest single enhancement: iTunes 7
You say "it looks the same," but it isn't
[the left nav is more cleanly organized without being radically different]
We've added a View switch, a 3-position switch. we've added a 2nd view called album view, so you can scroll through your music library and look at it by album. what if you ripped your CDs and don't have the covers? Today we're announcing free missing album cover art for all the music in your library if you have an itune acct. itunes will automatically download it for free
but there's something even better. that's the third view. it's called Cover Flow view. [LOOKS LIKE FLIPPLING THROUGH YOUR CD RACK]
10:30 am iLounge: you can now sync between multiple computers using an iPod, as long as both are authorized on the same account
10:30 am Engadget: Now, all of this video is encoded with the best encoding in the world, H.264. We've been distributing it at 320x240. Today, we're going to take that up a notch to 640x480. That's 4x the resolution. iTunes 7 also has seamless playback for video.
10:31 am 10:27AM Engadget: You can update your iPod from right inside iTunes now, you don't need to go to Preferences. You can say, "I want to sync the 10 most recent unwatched episides of all my TV shows."
10:31 am iLounge: Demo of iT

Myfairtunes6/7?

does anyone know if myfairtunes6 still works with the new version of iTunes?

How Much Space

How much can your pocket hold? That's up to you and your iPod. It holds up to 20,000 songs, up to 25,000 photos, and up to 100 hours of video -- or any combination of each.

If only Apple new that I like 10 minute songs, 4096x3072 pics, and 3 hour movies.

Re:How Much Space

How much can your pocket hold? That's up to you and your iPod. It holds up to 20,000 songs, up to 25,000 photos, and up to 100 hours of video -- or any combination of each.

If only Apple new that I like 10 minute songs, 4096x3072 pics, and 3 hour movies.

Yeah.

They really should also market the raw capacity in GB on the Apple Store page. Maybe before the number of songs. In bold.

Re:iTunes 7

the cover view is made crappy by not grouping compilations - hence the same album art repeated for different artists.

It seems it shows you cover art in the order in which your music is sorted. If you're sorting by "Artist", for example, then yes, it will show you the same cover art multiple times if there are multiple artists on the album. That's because it's actually sorting the cover art by artist.

If you sort by Album, however, I think you'll find that your complaint goes away.

Re:iTunes 7

Click the "Album" column header again. It goes from sorting by "Album," to "Album by Artist," to "Album by Year," then back to "Album."

Another expensive Christmas

For fuck's sake. I hate giving money to Apple. But now my girlfriend's going to insist on having one of these new iPod Nanos for Christmas. And what really winds me up is that she isn't even going to care about the capacity, or the battery, or the patented scroll-wheel interface, or iTunes integration, or anything like that. She's going to want it because it's blue.

Re:Another expensive Christmas

Um... Didn't you read what he wrote: "For fuck's sake"?

Shocking Interface Change

When I downloaded and installed iTunes 7, I was rather stunned to see the new interface. It doesn't even remotely resemble a standard Mac OS X Aqua application. It looks... well, almost like a gray Windows application. Or a Java application. Yuck. Dear Apple, please bring back the old, standard look and feel. Enough said!

Re:Shocking Interface Change

It looks like Mail.app. That's 10000x better than the all-brushed-metal monstrosity it was before.

Re:Shocking Interface Change

Where've you been? Brushed metal was ditched with iTunes 6. And none of the cosmetic changes with iTunes 7 bear any resemblance to Mail.app.

The most noticable difference appears to be the new scollbars. I agree with the original poster -- I don't like them.

Can we please just get everything looking consistent again Apple? Please? Before you stick Java scollbars on iTunes 7, can we please ditch brushed metal in Finder (and a half dozen other Apple apps that ship with OS X)?

I mean seriously, OS X is starting to look more frankensteinish than your typical Linux installation. I can count 5 different application "looks" now:

- iLife (darker, unified toolbar, squared off corners)
- iTunes 7 (same as iLife, new scrollbars)
- Mail.app (unified toolbar, lighter than iLife, rounder corners)
- Safari/Finder/iCal (etc) (brushed metal)
- TextEdit/Preview (etc) (older non-unified look)

I love my MacBook Pro, but I'm not sure what happened to that consistency that Macs were supposed to be known for. :(

Re:Shocking Interface Change

Would it be nice if all the iApps had a similar look? Yes. Is it more important that they all have a similar "feel"? Yes.

OK, please follow me and close the main window by clicking the red button in:
iTunes - nothing remarkable happens, it is just the window that vanishes
iDVD - closes the current project, goes to opening screen
iChat - nothing remarkable happens, it is just the window that vanishes
iDVD - closes the current project, goes to opening screen
iPhoto - quits application

Three types of behaviour in five applications on a principal part of the interface. I wish Apple shared your beliefs.

Re:Shocking Interface Change

Actually that's the way it should be. Allow me to explain the reasoning:

iTunes/iChat: They can keep doing their thing even without any windows around and you will probably use them that way. iTunes will keep playing music, iChat will keep you connected and people might contact you.
iDVD/iMovie (I assume that was a typo): They are project based. Close the project, go back to the opening screen. There's not much to do with neither app without a project open.
iPhoto: The window manages the library. Nothing to do without it around. Application quits.

Hope that helps.

Re:Shocking Interface Change

There is an app out there that will unify all of the OS X apps (even Firefox) with a common skin. It skins them to be a pretty standard OS X-ish feel, a much like Mail.app (w/o unified buttons), exept slightly darker. It also stips the brushed metal from brushed apps. I haven't ran it in awhile, so can't say if it works with the new iTunes. Its called UNO.

If the interface schizophrenia is getting to you, it might be the best solution, until Apple at least realized that their getting slightly off base with the "a style per app" philosophy. How hard is it to just use some stardardized Aqua on everything? Do individual apps really need to stand out, can function speak for them? I damn well know I'm running iTunes (sound coming from speakers, etc), and don't need it to be styled in such a way to let me know that "yep, thats itunes" when I look at it. Its annoying that they screw up their own standards.

Sorry for the rant, preaching to the choir.

Re:Big question...

Why is it that we eagerly participate in a mad rush to publicize every single product at every single Apple PR event? No one else *ever* gets that kind of coverage.

Two reasons. One: we love new iPods. and Two: Apple nearly wrote the book on this sort of marketing technique, and we still love to fall for it every single time.

Re:Big question...

Well, this announcement's kind of significant. Apple's taking a risk here, but if they pull it off, what you're seeing, once all the pieces are in place (such as the "iTV") is an entire reinvention of visual media delibery. That is, this announcement may well be the most radical thing in that field since the VCR and cable television.

Of course, nobody cares about that, most of the postings here are "OMG! A blue iPod! I so want that!!" Still, this is the forum that brought you "No wireless. Less space than a Nomad. Lame."

iTunes 7, the Movie Store (with the pre-existing TV shows), and the "iTV" (name pending.) Cool. Be interesting to see if Apple can pull it off.

iTV

Looking forward to this - but the big question will be, can you import video, or does it all have to come from iTunes Music Store? Namely, will Apple support via iTunes, just as they do for CDs, importing DVDs? Because a set top box that can only play video from an iTunes-bearing computer is relatively useless in comparison with Tivo/DVR/EyeTV/whathaveyou. Combine your standard cable company's DVR box with EyeTV and you can get any video you want on your Mac mini. No need for an "iTV" then. I guess if they just want to make it easy for people to get their iTunes videos onto their TV screen, that'll be good for most, but I would hope they at least provide some advanced functionality.

Re:iTV

It looks like it will be an appliance that will simply stream video wirelessly from any Mac or Windows system with iTunes.

But, since you can absolutely import any video you wish (including, say, ripped DVDs) into iTunes, there's no reason you wouldn't be able to play any media you wished.

This is likely for people that DO NOT already have some kind of media center or EyeTV/EyeHome/DVR setup: the target for this isn't people who already have made the leap to having full-fledged computer systems in their living room. The target for this is the same as for AirPort Express: not people who build an MP3 and media station computer in their living room. People who want to plop down a device, hook the A/V outputs up to their TV and entertainment system, use an assistant (like AirPort Express) to set it up, and it's ready to play media they download/import on their computer/laptop/etc. elsewhere in the house.

No second whole computer in the living room. This is, essentially, an AirPort Express for video (and yes, I know it's not exactly like an AirPort Express, but its functionality in the context of video and the living room can be summed up that way).

There probably will be *some* advanced or interesting functionality, but it looks like this is more or less an appliance designed to play video content downloaded to iTunes on a remote computer via a Front Row-like interface. But yes, you will be able to add your own video content, since you can do that with iTunes now. The only requirement is that it be some format QuickTime understands.

Re:iTV

As yet, I have not seen anything telling us definitively whether or not we will be able to rip copys of previously purchased DVD's for playback on an iPod.

That's because it's not "legal" in many jurisdictions, including the US.

I wasn't saying that iTunes or iTV would do this; what I'm saying is that it's definitely going to be technically possible, and in fact it's possible right now, in one step, with tools like:

http://handbrake.m0k.org/ [m0k.org]

But it won't be iTunes itself that does it for you; you'll still have to rip it with another tool first, such as HandBrake. But you can then certainly import into iTunes, play via iTV, or put on your iPod (and you can put it into iTunes and sync it to your iPod today).

iTunes Browse-Album Mode

Use the scroll-wheel on your mouse to browse those albums. MMMmmmm, tasty!

Re:Another Settop Box

Interesting that they did a preview of a product they're not ready to formally announce yet. Rather uncharacteristic

It's been pointed out that the only reason most iTMS users would buy full-length movies online is so they could watch them on their TV set. Since DVD burning isn't an option (yet?), Apple had to announce their intended set-top box to give the movie announcement some real weight..................

Re:Another Settop Box

Interesting that they did a preview of a product they're not ready to formally announce yet. Rather uncharacteristic. I guess they feel their hand is being forced. Perhaps they're trying to steal thunder from Vista Media Center Edition or whatever it's called? You'd think they'd at least finalize the name, though. Really odd.

I don't think that's the case. What Apple appears to be doing is dropping a huge hint in terms of how they expect the whole downloadable visual media thing to work.

Before the announcement, most people were talking about "downloadable movies" in terms of watching them on iPods. This was seen by most people as completely ridiculous, even assuming a "video iPod" was just around the corner with a larger screen. So the talk moved towards the idea that perhaps you were supposed to watch the movies on your laptop, or hook up a video card to your computer that would pipe the output to a TV. These are all ugly options for various reasons, and they certainly take away from the idea of this as more than a gimmick.

Now imagine the year 2010. You have broadband in common with 95% of the country. You flop in front of the TV, and select the program you want to watch and watch it. The programs come from a variety of sources: free video blogs, CNN newscasts available on a subscription basis, serials available on a subscription basis, free sample pilots, plus movies you're either renting or downloading.

How are you doing this?

With the products Apple announced today (and some its already announced.) That's how. You already could buy TV shows from Apple. You can now buy DVDs, and (once Jobs and the studios work something out) the chances are that movies on a PPV basis will probably be available too. The other thing necessary is the TV, the whole "flop on the couch" thing, and that's iTV.

They couldn't have announced the products they did today without announcing iTV. The question isn't why they pre-announced the iTV today, it's why they announced the movie store today without the iTV being ready.

No movie burning? Meh

That was the make or break for me. I could deal with a $10 movie price as long as I could burn the movie to DVD and watch it on TV.

Without it - sorry, folks, but I'll wait.

Blow by blow?

Putting "Blow by blow" and "Steve Jobs" in one sentence really wasn't a good idea.

Lovely!

There's some much appreciated updates in iTunes, speaking for myself at least...the album art was something I had to do in external programs (Tag & rename for instance).

But, I've noticed the installer mentioned something about a "Software updater" (or equivalent in English) for iTunes & QuickTime - have they finally solved the full-install download for each version revision I wonder? I guess we won't know for sure until there's an update.

This is lame

I sort of assumed that when Jobs said you could transfer music between iTunes libraries using the iPod, he meant all of your music. Nope [apple.com].

Music and media not purchased from the iTunes store only syncs one way, from your computer to your iPod.

I know this is not new, but enabling this functionality for iTMS tracks only is a real dick move.

In the iFuture:

"Hey, you've got a bit of dust on your clothes"


"That's not dust! That's my ipod!"

Just downloaded a movie...

I downloaded The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy as a test.

- The movie is 1.22 GB, and downloaded in about 20 minutes on a 100 Mbps connection (Internet2).
- The movie was able to be played before downloading was finished, and could skip to anywhere in the content that was already complete.
- The content shows itself as being protected by "FairPlay Version: 2".
- The bitrate is 1.5Mbps.
- The framerate is 24fps.
- The audio on this particular movie is Protected AAC, stereo, 128kbps, 44.1kHz.
- The video on this particular movie is Protected H.264/AVC0 640x272 (Widescreen format, probably just 640x480 with the black bars eliminated).
- The video looks very good (indeed, "near DVD quality") on a high quality 20" LCD. (I'm not a "videophile", but this is absolutely more than watchable on a nice quality large TV or monitor, and I suspect most consumers would agree).
- The video can be played in QuickTime, and uses QuickTime Chapters for DVD chapters; chapters are also accessible in iTunes.
- The video file can be burned to a DVD, but you cannot burn the file as a video DVD.
- You can play the file on multiple computers (I *believe* up to three as opposed to five for music), or on an unlimited number of iPods (if the usage rights haven't changed with iTunes 7; I haven't looked through the terms - if someone knows this to be different please correct me. In any case, it's already less restrictive than Unbox).
- iTunes 7.0 requires QuickTime 7.1.3.
- Pretty much every movie I looked at was $9.99; some new releases were up to $14.99, but were cheaper if preordered.
- When used on a Mac in a media center configuration, or with the forthcoming iTV solution that will presumably be much like a video AirPort Express (and yes, I know it's not an AirPort Express, but it will probably act a lot like a AirPort Express functionally, except allowing the streaming of video to your TV), this will be a pretty compelling and vertically integrated solution for most consumers.

Shouldn't compare Microsoft MCE to Front-Row

Frontrow is Apple's weakminded copy of MCE that can't do recording. What you're referring to is iTV. iTV is far from "the most eloquent PPV system ever conceived", it's in fact a direct copy of Microsoft Media Center extender.

Aside from a few MC*Es and Microsoft employees, I am aware of nobody who has ever (or would ever) connect their PC to their television. The problem with Microsoft zealots is far worse than Apple fanboys. The Apple fanboys go nuts over Apple products, without doubt, and annoyingly so at times. But they know something that "works" when they see it. Microsoft zealots delude themselves into believing that something that doesn't work, doesn't have legs and is heading nowhere slowly actually has a chance of survival. It is a mysterious phenomena.

Front-Row is a product designed to be turned on and used with a remote with 5 buttons and no skills. The iTV (!!) box is designed and marketed to be plugged in to a television and used with no skills. It is also sold specifically to be attached to a TV to watch movies, it is not bundled into a general purpose PC guerilla marketing style by PHBs that mistakenly believe that once the user realizes he has a media center on his desktop that he will move his PC to the living room and attach it to his television.

In comparison, MCE is something that is really only owned accidentally by people who don't even know they have it (because it was bundled with their PC from Best Buy), it requires the PC to be near the TV rather than on a desk and requires the user to know how to configure it and operate it with some crazy 300 button remote control (exaggeration, but the point is clearly made). It would probably require a class to get a user comfortable with the relationship between and configurations of MCE and Microsoft Media Player (and the derivitaves such as Amazon Unbox). It really doesn't matter if MCE can do any of the things that Front-Row does (which it really doesn't because Microsoft doesn't use zero-conf [bonjour] and whatnot). The simple fact is, it is not designed or marketed in a manner that will ever be used that way by the common man.

To say that something *can* be done is not the same as saying that people *will* do it. You *can* write an assembly language CGI script library for publishing a Blog site. But I doubt you *will*...

Apple = Big Brother

I love that somewhat Orwellian slide that Engadget has from the presentation:

Apple is in your den
Apple is in your living room
Apple is in your car
Apple is in your pocket

What's next?

Strength Through iTunes
iTunes Through Apple

Apple Prevails

Re:Apple == Big Brother

I love that somewhat Orwellian slide that Engadget has from the presentation:

Apple is in your den

Apple is in your living room

Apple is in your car

Apple is in your pocket

What's next?

Strength Through iTunes

iTunes Through Apple

Apple Prevails

It's always like that. Apple is going along, brainwashing people. Things are great. And then when we are watching a Steve Jobs special event presentation on a giant screen in an auditorium some athletic chic from IBM comes running in and throws a big hammer at the screen. Bummer.

Dag Nabbit.

I wanna Core 2 Duo MacBook Pro
I wanna Core 2 Duo MacBook Pro
...
I wanna Core 2 Duo MacBook Pro
I wanna Core 2 Duo MacBook Pro

Perfect for the digital family

Movies/Shows/Music can now be shared between 5 computers, unlimited iPods and as many iTVs (or whatever) as you buy. It just makes so much sense for people with home & cottage to be able to bring a bunch of movies to the cottage without having to pack up DVDs. Once this moves up to HDTV standards (bandwidth is probably the only reason they haven't yet), then this could just end the format war before it started.

Also, you can backup movies downloaded from iTMS onto DVD, it just isn't a DVD-player readable format. So, they've even thought about that touch. Now just to decide how long to wait. Second edition? Third edition? It's always hard to tell with Apple products. Just when will they hit that sweet spot?

Smart, Apple, very smart!

The last time Apple did an iTunes upgrade, they added a minibrowser mode which would basically call home and tell Apple what you were listening to, so that the store would give you recommendations. There was a big hue and cry about the privacy concerns, so Apple changed that to be off by default, instead of on by default.

With iTunes 7, Apple will now let you get the artwork for your entire music collection, even if it wasn't bought from iTMS. This means that Apple has now given you a reason to willingly tell them about your entire music collection, effectively letting them get the information they want about your musical tastes. Very smart!

Baseless paranoia? Why, mod it up, of course!

When you try to download album art for a particular song, iTunes throws up a message box saying that they don't collect personal information. If you're the sort who thinks this is a bald-faced lie, then what's to stop Apple from phoning home the entire collection without any interaction on the user's part at all? Why wait for the user to request album art?

Student discount

Did the student discount apply to iPods? I'm almost 100% certain it did, but it seems it doesn't anymore. I was just looking at iPods last night...

Re:Yawn

A big part of the appeal of the Shuffle is that it had an integrated USB connector - you could use it to replace a USB flash drive and get an MP3 player to boot, without having to carry around a cable. Now you need a cable - a stupid proprietary one at that, not even a standard mini-USB connector.

I was happy to see the new Shuffle, until you pointed this out. Not because I want or need a USB flash drive, but because it's just less convenient. My girlfriend has one of the white Shuffles, and it's been great for mindlessly grabbing some music to take with us. I've always thought of it as a sort of sample syringe for music: You jab it into the laptop, it sucks up whatever's in there, and then you pull it out and you're good to go.

A dock isn't so bad if you have a desktop computer, but with a laptop that moves around a lot, it's suddenly a third component to keep track of, where you really only want two.

Gapless != overrated

I don't think you are getting it. In albums such as Dark Side of the Moon, The Wall, or Abbey Road, the songs segue into each other without any volume fade. Every time I listen to Pink Floyd on the iPod I feel like driving an icepick through my ears. The gap just ruins the experience for me. Gapless playback in indeed a very welcome addition, and the reason I will upgrade my 3 year old iPod. Normal, distinct songs on normal albums don't suffer through this. And the reason you hear about it in Slashdot is because geeks tend to like less mainstream music where nonstandard song structures are more prevalent.

Well, I've found a bug in iTunes 7

There is a problem with the scrollbars. OSX scrollbars can normally either have both arrows clustered at the bottom right, or one arrow on either end. The preference to change that is in the Appearance control panel.

But there is a third option, which you generally have to set via the terminal, for double arrows at both ends. This has worked in everything AFAIK until now. iTunes 7 appears to have the arrows at the bottom right by default, and only changes to the arrows at each end if that is set. It doesn't honor the double arrows at both ends setting, instead defaulting back to double arrows only in the lower right. And since it apparently doesn't use the standard arrows, like pretty much everything else, this is relevant.

This is pretty minor, but annoying, especially since if I couldn't have double arrows at both ends, I'd have single arrows at both ends, but since I won't change the global setting (since everything else still works with it), iTunes uses the double at one end arrows, which I hate.

New features

In addition to the great new gapless playback feature, one cool thing "power users" of iTunes might be interested in is that there is now a "Skipped Count" (and "Last Skipped") attribute in iTunes. This will be great for finding those overrated songs that you constantly skip without remembering to downgrade them to fewer stars. Smart Playlists everywhere rejoice!

CoverFlow

According to the website of the old CoverFlow.app [steelskies.com], they did in fact sell their software to Apple, and that's what's being used in iTunes 7. Good for them. I bet they're glad they didn't end up like Watson or, to a less extent, Konfabulator (though they did manage to get bought out by Yahoo!).

New shuffle cute but not a USB key anymore

The old shuffle had its USB interface built in, and you could use it as a USB key to take some data with you. Now you have to carry along a dock. This is less geek-friendly.

Upgrade your old videos?

So they increased the resolution from 320x240 to 640x480, very nice. But what about people who bought videos at the old resolution? Is there any way for them to download the newer version of those videos, or do they have to buy them again to get the higher resolution?

How Apple's iTV Media Strategy Works

RoughlyDrafted presents a closer look at Apple's announced iTV set top box, why it isn't ready yet, how it differs from existing products already on the market, and how it fits in with the company's online media strategy:

How Apple's iTV Media Strategy Works [roughlydrafted.com]

A Visual Comparison of CD, DVD, HD and iTMS [roughlydrafted.com]

Why Apple is Winning in Media Downloads [roughlydrafted.com]

The Apple iTMS vs Amazon Unbox Rivalry Myth [roughlydrafted.com]

Re:New shuffle

Best. Tie Clip. Ever.

Re:Just one thing

No [apple.com]. Moron.