'iTunes Match' Allows Both Streaming and Downloading of Music

[basesloaded190]

I think it's going ot be one of those things that people will be on the fence about, they'll try it out and then find it very difficult to live without.

Totally agree. For $25? Seems like a no brainer really.

 

[grfxboy]

Will it work with Apps?

So, apps like Nike+ that access the music physically on the iOS device... will the music files in the cloud be seen by these apps?

 

[bmk]

I hope they figure this out. While 59,000 songs is far above average, it is not that unusual. I have about 52,000 after getting rid of duplicates. 25,000 seems pretty low for anyone over 35 that bothered to rip their CDs/records. Certainly for anyone interested in this service.

Well, if one says there are approx 12 tracks per cd that means you have nearly 4,500 cds, and at, say, 10 bucks per cd, that's around 45,000 dollars you've spent on music. Sound like a lot to me - if every one of those 52,000 tracks is legit, of course. I'm not saying that there aren't people out there with massive (legit) record collections, but you'd have to think that apart from djs or musicians, not many people spend that much money on cds and that if they have upwards of 40,000 tracks a lot of it will be from torrent sites.

 

[rhett7660]

I'm not sure about that. With an digital copy, you still have something that is yours, just like with vinyl. I think people still want to see that they "own" something they pay for.

Also, there is an emotional attachment to music and movies. I think half the reason people buy television season DVDs is to say, "that's my favorite show" as sort of an expression as that DVD sits on their shelf.

And there's also the threat that the media goes away if it's in the "cloud". Am I going to risk losing my copy of my favorite album and trust that to Apple or Amazon? I wouldn't.

Maybe I am reading this differently. But doesn't iCloud just scan and use the music that matchs yours? The only stuff that is upload, not removed from your computer, are songs that are in currently not available in the cloud.

Nothing is taken from your computer. You still have your media.

I agree with the physical, to a degree. I have been ripping all my music to digital and I have no plans on going back. Having my entire library at my finger tips is huge. No discs to carry around etc. However I still have them. I rip them at the highest possible bit rate and then store them away. I still buy a lot of media but I also find myself buying a lot of mp3/aac files from amazon and apple.

I can't wait for this now that "Streaming" is an option!

 

[RoelJuun]

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this service will only be interesting to match and level up the quality or your tunes. I tried having all my music in one of my WD world edition and streaming from my house wifi and itunes was freaking slow and "skipping" tunes is not something I want

So I can imagine the same over internet. Also, I don't think ppl will do it with their ipod/iphone over 3G costwise. After all, only americans have unlimited plans on their phone

Unlimited data plan in Holland here, you're not alone. And we have coverage too.

 

[Icculus]

I've spent a lot of time making sure my music library has the exact album art, proper tags and everything else in line, even changing genres for some songs. That being said, I'd hate to sign up for this service and then once all is said and done, the iCloud version of my library isn't as perfectly arranged and categorized as my hard copy of the music library I put together.

I am in the EXACT same boat! I really hope iTunes Match/iCloud will keep the same metadata from local iTunes > the cloud....anyone beta testing this have any insight on this?

 

[Ulf1103]

So, if I store al my music on an external HDD, and I do the iTunes match,
plug the HDD out, I'll be able to listen to my music without the files on my MBP itself
Nice, that's a space saver (In my case 16GB )

 

[PeterSharp]

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Unlimited data plan in Holland here, you're not alone. And we have coverage too.

Unlimited data plan in UK as well. HSPA+ Fast and great coverage.

 

[sclawis300]

Does anyone else think there will be some sort of limit to the laundering of the illegal music? Maybe lets say, after you have created your initial library in the cloud, next year it changes to only allow itunes purchases to be added to your icloud library? I am not sure there would be a way to do this without excluding legally purchased CDs that you rip.

 

[T-Bone]

Did anyone answer the question about whether you can delete stuff? Based on how the app purchase history works, where you can't delete anything, I'm assuming no. Which would be a dealbreaker for me. I have WAY over 25k songs and if I can't take stuff off in order to put new stuff on, I'll just stick with my 2tb drive full of music.

Also - I'm guessing the people who claim that Apple won't increase the storage size on their iDevices don't play any games on them. Some of the newest ones are up to a gig in size. That can fill up a 32gb iPhone pretty quick when you add photos/videos/etc. My iPhone has over 20gb of just apps, and I'm really hoping for a 64gb iPhone this fall.

 

[TimeMachine86]

Well, if one says there are approx 12 tracks per cd that means you have nearly 4,500 cds, and at, say, 10 bucks per cd, that's around 45,000 dollars you've spent on music. Sound like a lot to me - if every one of those 52,000 tracks is legit, of course. I'm not saying that there aren't people out there with massive (legit) record collections, but you'd have to think that apart from djs or musicians, not many people spend that much money on cds and that if they have upwards of 40,000 tracks a lot of it will be from torrent sites.

Well, i'm 45, buying CDs (maxi single or albums) since day one of their existence. Had lots of vinyls before bought again on CD when time came. I need physical support, so yeah i BUY my cds. I have more than 25'000 tunes for sure.

I still buy CDs a lot.

I guess people my age who just needs music everyday have lots of tunes too.

It's just normal ! 30 years of passion makes a lot of tunes !!! I'm not musician or djs ... I ' m just hungry of music and when i like someone i like to follow the artist even if some records are not same quality !

But yeah, of course, people like us won't be the majority of youngs who just buy a song to listen to 10 times and forget about it cause the new hit is on the radio already.

Once again, we are the people who so needed the iPod Classic and can't get apart of their music :L

I hate to choose. Love to travel with all my music and listen what i want according to my mood ...

So iTunes Match will be a bless... But i just hope they will allow to pay "more" for more songs on the cloud !!!

 

[Artey]

Does anyone else think there will be some sort of limit to the laundering of the illegal music? Maybe lets say, after you have created your initial library in the cloud, next year it changes to only allow itunes purchases to be added to your icloud library? I am not sure there would be a way to do this without excluding legally purchased CDs that you rip.

Well the limit is 25,000 songs. So once you laundered that amount you'll have to buy songs on iTunes if you want to use them with iCloud I suppose.

Or did that 25,000 limit only apply to what you can actively store in the cloud that couldn't be matched to songs already available in the itunes library?

 

[kurosov]

OK, importnat questions for me are:

1. Will match songs shuffle/play automatically or will i have t choose to play a specific artist/song to play it.

2. If so, can the above feature be turned off to prevent stuttering in sketchy data areas.

3. Can apps access match songs the way they can locally stored music?

4. Why still no Last.FM scrobbling built in? (off topic i know, but i WANT)

5. When are those of us in the UK going to get our hands on this service, if ever?

1-3 can be answered by Devs and i am sure they are interested in No.3 themselves.

Edit:

Almost forgot

6. What will match do with our lossless files? replace them with the "iTunes +" files? give access to download/stream those + files only while letting us keep our lossless on the local machine? would we get duplicate songs when deciding to download such a song on our device THEN sync the lossless version using the standard method later?

lots of questions on that topic alone.

 

[TheJasko]

Well the limit is 25,000 songs. So once you laundered that amount you'll have to buy songs on iTunes if you want to use them with iCloud I suppose.

Or did that 25,000 limit only apply to what you can actively store in the cloud that couldn't be matched to songs already available in the itunes library?

I'm pretty sure to remember the keynote introduced also larger packs, something like 10$ for the next 25000 songs. Not sure though

 

[dumoon]

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The Beatles are an Unknown Artist

That was my first thought as well! WTH?

 

[beany boy]

I think it's time to start getting excited!

 

[phpmaven]

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What exactly does this service offer that I can't already do with an app like Audio Tap? I paid $1.99 and I stream everything from my computer to my iPhone over 3G or wifi. I can even create playlists. It works perfectly.

I'm just not getting that this service will do anything I haven't already been doing for ages, that is, avoid ever needing to sync music to my phone and just streaming all 20,000 or so songs from my computer.

Am I missing something here?

Yes. Just off the top of my head, you don't have to have a computer running iTunes and server software or screw around with a router to setup remote access. Also, the quality of the streaming will be much better than any home server streaming tracks over you home Internet connections could be. I haven't used Audio Tap but I've used similar services and it can be problematic. I've had more than one case when I was on vacation and my home server locked up and I was unable to access my music. Add to that the ability to download higher quality tracks than you currently own as well as having an online backup of all of your music.

That's just a few things I can think of. I'm sure there are many more reasons others can add.

 

[sam250]

Well the limit is 25,000 songs. So once you laundered that amount you'll have to buy songs on iTunes if you want to use them with iCloud I suppose.

Or did that 25,000 limit only apply to what you can actively store in the cloud that couldn't be matched to songs already available in the itunes library?

The 25K applies to all the songs in your iTunes library. It didn't scan to see what was purchased through iTunes and what wasn't. Started iTunes match, over 25k window popped up, and that's it. Need an old-timer/music-hoarder/filthy-pirate plan!

 

[scoopex]

3 Three UK ALL IN ONE plan gives you free unlimited use of Spotify premium for the length of your contract which seems much better than this effort from Apple.

 

[shingi70]

Looks Good. I was worried that their wouldn't be streaming and that this would be a 3g deal only. I guess can go ahead and get a Ipad or ipad 2 now.

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The 25K applies to all the songs in your iTunes library. It didn't scan to see what was purchased through iTunes and what wasn't. Started iTunes match, over 25k window popped up, and that's it. Need an old-timer/music-hoarder/filthy-pirate plan!

From what I hear the Songs bought/gotten from itunes don't count to a number. I guess that good for us who get music from itunes with a small amount from other places.

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The 25K applies to all the songs in your iTunes library. It didn't scan to see what was purchased through iTunes and what wasn't. Started iTunes match, over 25k window popped up, and that's it. Need an old-timer/music-hoarder/filthy-pirate plan!

From what I hear the Songs bought/gotten from itunes don't count to a number. I guess that good for us who get music from itunes with a small amount from other places.

 

[AaronEdwards]

Well, if one says there are approx 12 tracks per cd that means you have nearly 4,500 cds, and at, say, 10 bucks per cd, that's around 45,000 dollars you've spent on music. Sound like a lot to me - if every one of those 52,000 tracks is legit, of course. I'm not saying that there aren't people out there with massive (legit) record collections, but you'd have to think that apart from djs or musicians, not many people spend that much money on cds and that if they have upwards of 40,000 tracks a lot of it will be from torrent sites.

Not only that. But a person who would have bought 59,000 songs and then digitalized them all to keep them on his or her computer, would such a person, with that kind of interest in music actually convert them into a format worse than what Apple offers? And would that person then be willing to downgrade his listening experience?

Also, lets say that it would take 1 minute per track to rip and covert it, and that number is way too low, then it would have taken that person 41 days to rip and covert those songs...

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I'd say, that 99.99%+ of the people with a digital music library beyond 25,000 tracks have downloaded most of it.

 

[bpaluzzi]

3 Three UK ALL IN ONE plan gives you free unlimited use of Spotify premium for the length of your contract which seems much better than this effort from Apple.

No it doesn't. It gives you 2 months or 3 months, depending on the promotion.

 

[TimeMachine86]

Not only that. But a person who would have bought 59,000 songs and then digitalized them all to keep them on his or her computer, would such a person, with that kind of interest in music actually convert them into a format worse than what Apple offers? And would that person then be willing to downgrade his listening experience?

Also, lets say that it would take 1 minute per track to rip and covert it, and that number is way too low, then it would have taken that person 41 days to rip and covert those songs...

----

I'd say, that 99.99%+ of the people with a digital music library beyond 25,000 tracks have downloaded most of it.

99.99 ? GEEE , then I'm the 0.01 ?????

I dare you find one downloaded song in my library ????

Go in a music shop, you'll find passionnate people who still BUY Cds or Vynils ...

and well we don't have Mac since yesterday ... iTunes has 10 years .... Yeah it takes time to rip all cds / or Dvds but we don't have ultimatum ...

and with my Mac Pro , ripping one cd take less then one minute PER CD !!!!, so where's the deal ????

and yes sir , we dont always listen to music in our living room, do you know cars, iPod when you listen to music in bed ?

And why would someone who really love music download crappy MP3 ?

AAC is good quality ... Loseless too !!! So where's the problem with wanting all our CDS ripped ????

I always want my tunes encode with the best AAC possible !!!!

So yes once again , over 25'000 is a lot .... people at 20 years old can't reach this ... obviously !!!!

I'm 45 and i feel offended when someone call me a thief when i bought every of my cds or dvds !!!

yeah sorry i dont drink or go out every day ... my money is not spend in vodka or beach vacation or whatever.... So i may have spend 35000 dollars in CDs in my entire life but yeah its my life and if Apple propose me to pay 50 dollars a year to have them on iCloud ... where's your problem ????????
stay with your 25'000 ... no one will force you to get a higher plan !!!

GEEE !!!!

 

[Lvivske]

So, if I store al my music on an external HDD, and I do the iTunes match,
plug the HDD out, I'll be able to listen to my music without the files on my MBP itself
Nice, that's a space saver (In my case 16GB )

Yeah, this is terrific.

I just wish it was 320kbps playback.

I have a SSD and space is at a premium on there....but its also my audiophile setup and I don't want to downgrade my entire library just to save pricey gigabytes

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99.99 ? GEEE , then I'm the 0.01 ?????

I dare you find one downloaded song in my library ????

Go in a music shop, you'll find passionnate people who still BUY Cds or Vynils ...

and well we don't have Mac since yesterday ... iTunes has 10 years .... Yeah it takes time to rip all cds / or Dvds but we don't have ultimatum ...

and with my Mac Pro , ripping one cd take less then one minute PER CD !!!!, so where's the deal ????

and yes sir , we dont always listen to music in our living room, do you know cars, iPod when you listen to music in bed ?

And why would someone who really love music download crappy MP3 ?

AAC is good quality ... Loseless too !!! So where's the problem with wanting all our CDS ripped ????

I always want my tunes encode with the best AAC possible !!!!

So yes once again , over 25'000 is a lot .... people at 20 years old can't reach this ... obviously !!!!

I'm 45 and i feel offended when someone call me a thief when i bought every of my cds or dvds !!!

yeah sorry i dont drink or go out every day ... my money is not spend in vodka or beach vacation or whatever.... So i may have spend 35000 dollars in CDs in my entire life but yeah its my life and if Apple propose me to pay 50 dollars a year to have them on iCloud ... where's your problem ????????
stay with your 25'000 ... no one will force you to get a higher plan !!!

GEEE !!!!

English isn't your first language, is it?

 

[Ulf1103]

Yeah, this is terrific.

I just wish it was 320kbps playback.

I have a SSD and space is at a premium on there....but its also my audiophile setup and I don't want to downgrade my entire library just to save pricey gigabytes

That's exactly what I was thinking...
I'm gonna buy a BBP with ssd, (128GB) so saving space is very necessary...
But will they downgrade if your songs are at 320kbps?