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Apple Aiming to Increase Music Library Matching Limit to 100,000 Tracks 'Before the End of the Year'
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HobeSoundDarryl
macrumors G5
I've been using iTunes Match since launch, and this year I decided to cancel it on the basis that there is too high of tendency for their matching algorithm to match my uncensored music with censored version of music. I've reported to Apple and have worked with their support staff to try and resolve the issue. I'm done trying, and Apple is unwilling to properly match my song or even provide me with the option to upload my uncensored track.
No thank you. I don't buy my music from places like WalMart because they censor all their music and I'm not going to pay Apple anymore to censor my music.
No thank you. I don't buy my music from places like WalMart because they censor all their music and I'm not going to pay Apple anymore to censor my music.
Its been an issue since launch and Apple doesn't seem interested in fixing it. The songs that iTunes Match have censored for me include half of a Korn album (Life is Peachy is a total wreck and unlistenable because of it) and Lady Gag Fame Monster. I'm sure there are other examples, but those were the tracks I even sent to Apple support so that they could try and improve their algorithm so that it didn't happen. Here we are...almost 4 years later and these problems still exist.
They do screw things up quite a bit. I actually had a really awful experience very recently where something just up and happened to my matched music. The "engineering team" at iTunes support got involved and were puzzled at the bizarre chain of events, and never did come to a resolution about it. I don't want to go into gruesome detail, but stuff was lost, and the original files were inexplicably gone from the home iMac. No one can explain it, least of all me. And the kicker was that I just knew the files had to still be there in iTunes Match, the links to those files were just gone from my iTunes app. Someone, somewhere had to have been able to flip a switch and put things back. But I never could talk to that special someone.
The library was so enormous that I hadn't been doing Time Machine backups — I kept a semi-annually updated backup disk in my work Mac Pro. Well, unfortunately, when I went to restore from that disk, I found that it had errors. So long story short, some stuff is gone, for good. And I can't help but think iTunes Match, with Apple Music mixed in and the new version of iTunes, had something to do with it. So anyway, I went and bought a new 6 TB drive for a new Time Machine backup that does include everything — everything that's left anyway.
The only good news is that the lost material was from my "not quite as important" library. And, as others have pointed out on this thread, I have enough to listen to. I'm have not and will not be touching my treasured, years-in-the-making classical library with iTunes Match, as much as I'd love to be able to access it anywhere. It's just too much of a risk.
By the way, when you call Apple support, they barely even know how to give assistance with the iTunes/iTunes Match/Apple Music questions these days. It doesn't help that they've basically removed the phrase "iTunes Match" from iTunes (depending where you look, it might be called iTunes in the Cloud). Go ahead, try to find iTunes Match terminology in the latest iTunes. They've essentially scrubbed it. The folks on the phone really don't know what to call things — and they kept trying to explain the difference between Apple Music and iTunes Match, and kept wondering why I had both in the first place.
What I really wanted to convey to them is that I've been using iTunes since Mac OS 9 days. I also have a Ph.D. in engineering and am no technical dummy. And yet I feel as though I can just barely figure out how to use the program properly these days, it's turned into such a Franken-app.
Here's an annoying little quirk that goes along with the censored version replacement. I bought the Shutter Island soundtrack album specifically for a mashup (available only with entire album purchase) of a classic Dinah Washington song with a modern classical piece by Max Richter. The album also contains the un-mashed-up version of the Max Richter instrumental. iTunes Match thinks the two tracks are one and the same thing (I guess because they are identical for the time intervals that the algorithm checks). And so I can't actually listen to that one track that I bought the whole album for through iTunes Match. And this is music that I purchased directly on the iTunes store.
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Umm, Google's Music Match is free and already offers 50,000 songs and Amazon Music Matching service offers up to 250,000 songs for the same $25 that Apple charges.
So, what would be so great about Apple offering only 100,000 songs for $25? Google Music Match also provides a higher quality audio for matched music.
So, what would be so great about Apple offering only 100,000 songs for $25? Google Music Match also provides a higher quality audio for matched music.
Yes.
The music gets updated but not TV or movies. If I stream TV programmes on my iPad, the play counts don't get updated on my Mac. Annoying. So I use a script to update them manually. Presumably, iTunes in the Cloud is dumber than iTunes Match.
Nice reply.
Apple need someone like you to properly catalogue their classical music in iTunes.
Blasphemy aside, I concur with your post, although I have found Match pretty reliable for the past year or so. Only have 6,000 tracks.
It's ridiculous that if you delete the Apple/iCloud cookies in Safari, it deletes metadata in iTunes! Apple need to rewrite iTunes from the ground up.
I don't listen to music with foul language, as a rule, so I don't have this problem.
I wrote an arsy reply to your post, and was about to edit it when it got deleted by the moderators—good decision.
Anyway, I was going to say: I don't listen to music with foul language, so I haven't come across your problem, but I hope Apple eventually fixes it. It's a shame they've lost you as a customer. It seems that Apple Music has really interfered with iTunes Match in a bad way.
Not only a re-write, but a re-imaging of the functions. They need to decouple all the accumulated detritus. Get the iOS app stores out of there. Get movies and TV shows out of there. As far as I'm concerned, get Apple Music and all its associated shtuff out of there (I understand some would debate me on this one). Put all those things into dedicated apps.
Now make iTunes what it was meant for. Speed it up. Give it the ability to handle larger libraries without corruption and the beachball of death. Let it do a better job with metadata editing. Let the search work well, like it used to. Let sidebar view be by default, if that's the way I like it.
The thing is, I completely understand how things got to the mess they are today. When the iPod was saving Apple's bottom line, it made absolute sense to make iTunes the iPod hub. And when they started selling music to fill up those iPods, sure, why not make that part of iTunes too. And when iPods could play games, and then watch TV shows and movies...well, yeah, I guess might as well add those things to iTunes too. And when iPhones were presented as being "the best iPods ever made," well of course you better make them work with iTunes just like all the other iPods do. And I guess might as well activate the iPhones there as well. And manage the iPhone backups. And then iPhones were opened up for app development, so... yeah, sure make an iOS store and glom it onto iTunes. And then everyone's streaming, so might as well throw a new Apple Music service in there... and podcasts... and home videos... and iTunes University!! Along with all the other stuff I'm forgetting (or repressing, more likely).
It's like a person with a gambling or drinking problem... they dig themselves into a grave one spoonful at a time. And I'm sure at each branch in the decision tree, it all seemed like a good idea (to someone). Eventually you just get so invested in your colossal folly that you double down on it.
The trouble is, mashing together 5 or 6 apps into one doesn't simplify. It doesn't make things easier, or better. It doesn't make things just work. It sets the stage for monumental screw-ups.
Let iTunes do what iTunes was meant to do, and offload the rest into focused apps for the other functions. That's where the solution lies. I don't know if Apple can do it.
There's a glimmer of hope. When Apple introduced the (Mac) App Store, and then iBooks, it didn't throw those things into iTunes. I know, the very idea sounds preposterous, but I honestly feel like there was a prevailing tendency at the time to just throw any possible new thing into iTunes. So maybe they will catch on one of these days, and mend their past missteps.
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Google is "free" only if you think your privacy is worth nothing.
I echo many comments urging Apple to redo its horribly flawed matching system. Avid users and music collectors like us won't bother with Apple Music seriously even if the 100,000 song max becomes reality until we needn't have to double-check the actual version of OUR songs that Apple decides to place in our cloud library. If my Amazon cloud music is always correct, then why can't Apple do the same? Just use the same method! Never a wrong match. I sympathize with Match users who've suffered through rampant match errors for years. Don't even get me started on Apple's telephone customer service reps who haven't a clue how to solve Apple Music problems. Save your time, and don't call. Just monitor the news and await introduction of the improvement we all desire.
This is EXACTLY what iCloud Music Library does.
I have tried... I have REALLY tried to work with iCloud Music Library. I can't. It took so many of my explicit songs and made them clean. I was on the phone with AppleCare for 1.5 hours.
Why Apple? Why do you need to scan it with what's in the iTunes Store? Why? So many of my songs have changed for the worse. Album art incorrect, clean versions and replacing my live or unfinished versions of songs with the iTunes version.
Hope they address this sooner rather than later. Apple Music playlist functionality is completely broken without being able to Match.
Really, Amazon matches EXACTLY all your songs no matter the variant... Come on... First of all, I doubt they actually would have 50% of all the songs I have, let alone match them. Must have a hell of a restricted collection to get a 100% match...
The limit has been the only thing holding me back from iTunes Match. This was promised by the iOS 9 launch.
Obviously you are muuuuch better at being condescending that at developing - if you are a developer, at all.
It's ONLY a 4x increase. What the heck are you talking about?
As others have already said, it might be related to laws or licenses. MAYBE capacity, but without published numbers, who knows. Interface? Search function? Converter? Give me a break.
I've been a developer since the mid-1980s, so I have much experience.
Look at something as simple as the Y2K problem. Where programmers used 2 digits for the year, so '00' could mean either 1900 or 2000. Adding just 2 digits took 6+ months of development work for 3-4 programmers. I experienced it and lived it, and helped many companies out with their issues. Of course, the madness that the media portrayed of 'planes falling out of the sky' was ridiculous, but there would be massive failures without our work.
Research any articles about it, and realize that just adding 2 digits and storing dates as 01-01-2000 instead of 01-01-00 was not the only thing that had to be done.
It's possible there might be a 16-bit issue (The highest number that 16 bits can store is 32,768). If something in the code is stored as a 16-bit number, every reference must be changed to a 32-bit number to fix this. And all those references must be found. This is just the tip of the iceberg.
