HomePod Gaining Handoff Support, AirPods Get Audio Sharing Feature

[MacRumors]

Apple at WWDC 2019 today announced that the HomePod is gaining Handoff support, allowing users to place an iPhone near the HomePod to hand over music, podcast, or a phone call.

Apple also announced that AirPods are getting a new Audio Sharing feature, allowing users to share a song or movie with a friend with just a tap.

Article Link: HomePod Gaining Handoff Support, AirPods Get Audio Sharing Feature

 

[Mick-Mac]

I just purchased at HomePod for the first time on a Memorial Day sale and after setting it up with my iPhone I tried saying "Hey Siri, play this_artist (or that_artist)" and absolutely nothing worked. It turns out that my entire music library is comprised of CDs that I've purchased and ripped during my life (literally thousands of dollars worth) and this miserable HomePod lump can't play any of it because I'm not additionally paying Apple extra money in the form of Apple Music or ITunes Match or whatever. I've was dumbfounded to learn this! I can't even play my own music on HomePod - WTF!!
I was going to return the thing over the weekend but thought I'd wait until this Apple Event to see if they grew a brain and enabled this feature. I don't believe it was mentioned during the presentation but I might be wrong. Does anybody know?

 

[t0pher]

I just purchased at HomePod for the first time on a Memorial Day sale and after setting it up with my iPhone I tried saying "Hey Siri, play this_artist (or that_artist)" and absolutely nothing worked. It turns out that my entire music library is comprised of CDs that I've purchased and ripped during my life (literally thousands of dollars worth) and this miserable HomePod lump can't play any of it because I'm not additionally paying Apple extra money in the form of Apple Music or ITunes Match or whatever. I've was dumbfounded to learn this! I can't even play my own music on HomePod - WTF!!
I was going to return the thing over the weekend but thought I'd wait until this Apple Event to see if they grew a brain and enabled this feature. I don't believe it was mentioned during the presentation but I might be wrong. Does anybody know?

you can play music from your iphone, ipad or mac and have the output as the HomePod. not sure you get voice activation that way though but you could also play music that way from mix/soundcloud, youtube etc.

 

[ipedro]

Fantastic! I can’t count the times I’ve been enjoying a playlist on my HomePod but have to go out and the only way to take it with me is to save the playlist, then open Music on my phone and find my place in the playlist.

Not only does handover fix this, the physical act of “picking up” or ‘dropping off” what’s playing by putting your iPhone near the HomePod is ingenious. This is pure Apple on display.

 

[Mick-Mac]

you can play music from your iphone, ipad or mac and have the output as the HomePod. not sure you get voice activation that way though but you could also play music that way from mix/soundcloud, youtube etc.

I'm coming at from the perspective of my wife who also has her phone containing all of her music. If she has to go into the settings and select the homepod as an output device for airplay and then hit the play button she'll just blow a fuse. That makes the homepod just become an expensive and more cumbersome BlueTooth speaker. This method does not allow Hey Siri so this is still an epic fail for a user like me who has already fully paid for his music and is just plain unwilling to pay Apple again for it. There is no technological reason that my use case couldn't work, it just doesn't make any more money for Apple so they shut me out. Shame on them.

 

[FierceCorgi]

This is great, a feature I've wanted for a while. I wonder if it could also be added to tvOS - hover iPhone near an Apple TV to transfer the playing over to it? I vaguely recall using that mechanism to transfer over connection information from iPhone to Apple TV during initial setup.

 

[ipedro]

I'm coming at from the perspective of my wife who also has her phone containing all of her music. If she has to go into the settings and select the homepod as an output device for airplay and then hit the play button she'll just blow a fuse. That makes the homepod just become an expensive and more cumbersome BlueTooth speaker.

That’s not how AirPlay works. That’s not at all how it works. You don’t have to go into settings to select your HomePod as a speaker.

Whenever you’re playing music, hit the AirPlay button in the playback controls and choose your HomePod. It’s also in Control Centre.

As for playing your own music, that requires iTunes Match. It’s a service to get your music into the cloud. If you purchase Match, you can convert your own library to listen to it anywhere like Apple Music, even if it’s not downloaded to your device.

 

[Mick-Mac]

That’s not how AirPlay works. That’s not at all how it works. You don’t have to go into settings to select your HomePod as a speaker.

Whenever you’re playing music, hit the AirPlay button in the playback controls and choose your HomePod. It’s also in Control Centre.

As for playing your own music, that requires iTunes Match. It’s a service to get your music into the cloud. If you purchase Match, you can convert your own library to listen to it anywhere like Apple Music, even if it’s not downloaded to your device.

I think I'm fighting a pointless battle against you. I have ripped music not available on iTunes Match and I don't want to pay Apple again for my music and I can't use Siri for that music I have and it'll require extra steps for my wife to play the music when it's supposed to "Just Work". I continue to say that there is no reason at all my use case couldn't have been made to just work, but a decision was made to extract money from me in order to realize the full potential of HomePod and I object to that. I'm just going to agree to disagree with you - you and I are thinking on different levels.

 

[ipedro]

I think I'm fighting a pointless battle against you. I have ripped music not available on iTunes Match and I don't want to pay Apple again for my music and I can't use Siri for that music I have and it'll require extra steps for my wife to play the music when it's supposed to "Just Work". I continue to say that there is no reason at all my use case couldn't have been made to just work, but a decision was made to extract money from me in order to realize the full potential of HomePod and I object to that. I'm just going to agree to disagree with you - you and I are thinking on different levels.

It is a pointless battle because you don’t understand how things work. I mean, you thought that you had to go to Settings to change the speaker.

And you’ve made clear that you don’t know how iTunes Match works either. It first tries to match with a song in the existing iTunes library and if there isn’t a match, it uploads it to the cloud. I have songs that I recorded at concerts myself that I listen to on my HomePod.

What’s worse than not understanding something is being too stubborn to realize that you’re out of your depth and won’t listen to others trying to explain it to you.

 

[keating]

But can I set an alarm with music or radio instead of a chime??

 

[theNatest]

It is a pointless battle because you don’t understand how things work. I mean, you thought that you had to go to Settings to change the speaker.

And you’ve made clear that you don’t know how iTunes Match works either. It first tries to match with a song in the existing iTunes library and if there isn’t a match, it uploads it to the cloud. I have songs that I recorded at concerts myself that I listen to on my HomePod.

What’s worse than not understanding something is being too stubborn to realize that you’re out of your depth and won’t listen to others trying to explain it to you.

To add on... I have a large music collection from years of ripping, collecting... just pony up the $15 MRC for a family subscription and let your music and choices curate new music into your rotation you wouldn’t have otherwise discovered.

You can’t just put one leg into this ecosystem - jump on in it’s worth it!

HomePods throughout the house to AirPods, Apple Watch out the door is amazing.

 

[ipedro]

To add on... I have a large music collection from years of ripping, collecting... just pony up the $15 MRC for a family subscription and let your music and choices curate new music into your rotation you wouldn’t have otherwise discovered.

You can’t just put one leg into this ecosystem - jump on in it’s worth it!

HomePods throughout the house to AirPods, Apple Watch out the door is amazing.

If he doesn’t care about any music other than the music he has, then Match is just $25 bucks per year. That’ll give him access to all of his own music anywhere, on all devices, including his HomePod that he’s complaining about.

 

[Mike MA]

Radio support actually is the killer feature for me that was announced yesterday. Great addition for people not doing music streaming but rely on their own library.

 

[ipedro]

Radio support actually is the killer feature for me that was announced yesterday. Great addition for people not doing music streaming but rely on their own library.

Yeah, that totally stood out to me too. I love Apple Music for its ability to just know what I’m in the mood to listen to but sometimes radio comes in handy for talk shows, news and sports. With 100,000 radio stations available, it’s pretty much guaranteed that you’ll find your local stations.

 

[KrispE00]

There is no technological reason that my use case couldn't work, it just doesn't make any more money for Apple so they shut me out. Shame on them.

The technological reason that it won’t work is that your music is on your computer and not in the cloud. It’s the same reason you can’t play all your music on your iPhone if you haven’t manually put it on there.
Just spend the 6.8 cents/day for iTunes Match.

 

[ipedro]

Now, where are all the sky is falling people who insisted that Apple was going to abandon and discontinue the HomePod just because they we’re putting Apple Music on other speakers?

As expected, Apple can strategically make Apple Music available everywhere to compete with Spotify while also offering their own premium, native solution to listening to music in an Apple type experience.

I’m fact, putting Apple Music on Amazon Echo will actually help sell HomePods. A lot of people have Echos already. Making Apple Music available there, keeps them on Apple Music rather than moving to Spotify if it were the only option. Eventually, those people will build brand loyalty to Apple Music and will want better sound and a native Apple Music experience.

 

[axantas]

I just purchased at HomePod for the first time on a Memorial Day sale and after setting it up with my iPhone I tried saying "Hey Siri, play this_artist (or that_artist)" and absolutely nothing worked. It turns out that my entire music library is comprised of CDs that I've purchased and ripped during my life (literally thousands of dollars worth) and this miserable HomePod lump can't play any of it because I'm not additionally paying Apple extra money in the form of Apple Music or ITunes Match or whatever. I've was dumbfounded to learn this! I can't even play my own music on HomePod - WTF!!
I was going to return the thing over the weekend but thought I'd wait until this Apple Event to see if they grew a brain and enabled this feature. I don't believe it was mentioned during the presentation but I might be wrong. Does anybody know?

You are - like me - in the wrong department here. I would love to have a HomePod setup here, but as it is not capable to PLAY my locally stored music, it is as useless to me, as it is to you. (I know, it streams it from the iPhone...)

As for now, there are some 3-5 radiostations available, none of them of my country, so the support of TuneIn goes into the right direction.

But it remains a purely streaming loudspeaker with limited functions. You have to have a second device, that streams the music to the HomePod - or an Apple server, that does the same thing.

I will stick with my Sonos setup for quite a while I think, because it just does exactly, what I want it to do. It has its own database, reads MY music from a little server, plays song X in version Y (not Z) and not the streamlined iTunes match version, Apple wants me to listen to. I know, I can make it play all my music from iTunes on my Mac, but I do not want to have that machine running all the time.

You are right, Mike MA there is no technical reason, your use case could not work. Apple does not want you to use the HomePod that way.