Welcome to the MacNN Forums.

JKT · 06:12 AM

For you experienced iTMS users out there, when you buy an individual song(s) on iTMS and later decide to get the whole album, does the iTMS take into account that you already have an individual copy of that song when you click the "Add Album" button? Or do you end up with two copies of the same song?

TIA

chabig · Jun 18, 2004, 10:26 AM

Unfortunately it doesn't give you credit for the song you already purchased. You will end up with two copies of the same song--just like if you buy a single at the record store and then buy the CD later.

Chris

bradoesch · Jun 18, 2004, 07:01 PM

Let Apple know about it: http://www.apple.com/feedback/itunes.html

JKT · Jun 21, 2004, 08:20 AM

Well, that's a bit rubbish isn't it. Thanks for the replies. I am not overly impressed by the way iTMS works now I've had the chance to use it. It is OK, but seems to be greatly lacking in many ways. I even find browsing the artists is too long winded (e.g. why don't they break it down even further by including an alphabetic listing of the artists in each genre instead of having one huge list that takes forever to scroll through?).

Neo.cmg · Jun 21, 2004, 03:54 PM

Originally posted by JKT:
Well, that's a bit rubbish isn't it. Thanks for the replies. I am not overly impressed by the way iTMS works now I've had the chance to use it. It is OK, but seems to be greatly lacking in many ways. I even find browsing the artists is too long winded (e.g. why don't they break it down even further by including an alphabetic listing of the artists in each genre instead of having one huge list that takes forever to scroll through?).

I don't have the iTMS in front of me, but wouldn't such a search be performed by first browsing by genre which would lead into an alphabetical listing of artists specific to that genre? I don't personally use browsing too often, as by nature it's an inefficient time-waster. I normally have in mind a particular song or artist that I just search for to see if the iTMS has it.

Your original question is a good one however, and some feedback should be sent to Apple on the matter perhaps. I do know that you are given a warning that says something to the effect one or more of the songs have already been purchased, add to your shopping cart anyway? So, it does rely on your purchased music playlist somewhat. Though, it does seem likely that someone may purchase a single by a group, and later on decide they would like to purchase the rest of the album on which that single resides. In such a case it would be nice to see some credit applied to the album purchase price; though, the details might be a little harrowing. You purchase one song for a fixed amount, but even when adding up all the songs on the album, the album itself sells for less than the sum of all the songs if they were purchased individually.

I have another question, perhaps someone with some experience might be able to answer. If you elect to purchase one of the celebrity playlists, then are all the songs individually added to your purchased music playlist, or will iTunes actually add that playlist as one of your playlist with the celebrity name added for it's title? I imagine it would be a real pain to have to go and re-create the ordered song playlist yourself....

Neo.cmg

AKcrab · Jun 21, 2004, 03:55 PM

"One huge list"?
Have you tried using the "browse" mode?

I don't think I quite understand your issues with browsing the store...

chabig · Jun 21, 2004, 05:19 PM

why don't they break it down even further by including an alphabetic listing of the artists in each genre instead of having one huge list that takes forever to scroll through?

They do! You have to use the browse mode, as others have indicated. Select Music Store from the left pane, then click the browse button in the upper right corner of the window. After that it's obvious.

Chris

JKT · Jun 22, 2004, 06:09 AM

You misunderstand me - yes they are listed alphabetically, but as one huge list from A to Z per genre. What I meant is why don't they break it down even further by sectioning all A artists under A, B artists under B etc. ? The speed of browsing would be greatly increased.

The other major complaint I have about the store is that it is only really useful for buying songs that you already know... the 30s previews are effectively useless for making a decision on whether you would like to buy music you've never heard before. I forget which other download service it is (OD2 IIRC), but they started offering full previews for 1 pence a listen. Something similar in the iTMS would go a long way to helping you decide whether a song is worth buying or not, and also allow you to experiment a great deal more.

diskgolfking · Jun 22, 2004, 09:30 AM

Originally posted by JKT:
You misunderstand me - yes they are listed alphabetically, but as one huge list from A to Z per genre. What I meant is why don't they break it down even further by sectioning all A artists under A, B artists under B etc. ? The speed of browsing would be greatly increased.

The other major complaint I have about the store is that it is only really useful for buying songs that you already know... the 30s previews are effectively useless for making a decision on whether you would like to buy music you've never heard before. I forget which other download service it is (OD2 IIRC), but they started offering full previews for 1 pence a listen. Something similar in the iTMS would go a long way to helping you decide whether a song is worth buying or not, and also allow you to experiment a great deal more.

In response to the first part: is it possible to make a selection and type a letter to jump to the start of those? I haven't tried it - just thinking aloud

I can tell you that full previews for a penny will never happen. The reason is Audi Hijack. Sure you can lower the quality of previews. But if a preview is still acceptable enough quality to make a purchasing decision it will probably be good enough to listen to repeatedly.

But it doesn't matter to me since I haven't had a problem choosing songs based on a 30 second preview.

JKT · Jun 22, 2004, 10:59 AM

Originally posted by diskgolfking:
In response to the first part: is it possible to make a selection and type a letter to jump to the start of those? I haven't tried it - just thinking aloud

I can tell you that full previews for a penny will never happen. The reason is Audi Hijack. Sure you can lower the quality of previews. But if a preview is still acceptable enough quality to make a purchasing decision it will probably be good enough to listen to repeatedly.

But it doesn't matter to me since I haven't had a problem choosing songs based on a 30 second preview.

Yes you can type the letter, but that is not necessarily all that convenient when you are mousing around.

I guess it depends on what you are listening for in a song - my particular taste is (mainly) for good lyrics and 30s just isn't enough to get a grasp of what they will be like (especially if the first 20 of those are the intro...).

Another idea for improving the store... how about an iTMS radio station... plays the songs of the top 100 rated iMixes.

diskgolfking · Jun 22, 2004, 11:33 AM

Originally posted by JKT:

I guess it depends on what you are listening for in a song - my particular taste is (mainly) for good lyrics and 30s just isn't enough to get a grasp of what they will be like (especially if the first 20 of those are the intro...).

I know that sometimes the 30 second selections aren't carefully chosen, but it's very rare that a song will have the first 30 seconds of the song as the preview (at least in the music I have been shopping for).

Neo.cmg · Jun 22, 2004, 03:34 PM

Well, you have the song name and artist. If you are interested in whether the lyrics are any good, then why don't you get the lyrics from a website like lyrics.com, or something? A simple script would even let you grab the info right from iTMS, open your web browser, and find the lyrics for you at your favorite lyrics site. Coupled with 30 sec of the song, I would think this would be plenty to satisfy almost anyone.

Another tip for anyone with QT Pro. The music videos posted on the iTMS contain 128Kbps unprotected AAC sound track files of the songs for which there is a video. Since the videos can be extracted....free songs.

SS3 GokouX · Jun 22, 2004, 07:50 PM

The videos don't use 128kbps songs, they're more like 96kbps. At least the two I tested were. However the sample rates seem to vary. The first one I tested had a sample rate of 48KHz, the second was 32KHz.

Neo.cmg · Jun 22, 2004, 08:05 PM

Originally posted by SS3 GokouX:
The videos don't use 128kbps songs, they're more like 96kbps. At least the two I tested were. However the sample rates seem to vary. The first one I tested had a sample rate of 48KHz, the second was 32KHz.

The one I tested was 128kbps and 48Khz.

SS3 GokouX · Jun 22, 2004, 08:31 PM

It's official: the audio quality varies. Too bad I don't like any of the artists that have videos on the iTMS.

Gee4orce · Jun 23, 2004, 03:15 AM

Originally posted by diskgolfking:

I can tell you that full previews for a penny will never happen. The reason is Audi Hijack.

How does this work ? Does it duplicate my car keys, or just disable the immobiliser and alarm ??

(Worried Audi Driver)

JKT · Jun 23, 2004, 06:11 AM

Originally posted by Neo.cmg:
Well, you have the song name and artist. If you are interested in whether the lyrics are any good, then why don't you get the lyrics from a website like lyrics.com, or something? A simple script would even let you grab the info right from iTMS, open your web browser, and find the lyrics for you at your favorite lyrics site. Coupled with 30 sec of the song, I would think this would be plenty to satisfy almost anyone.

Yes, I could do that, but the whole point of iTMS is to make life easy for buying music... and although I mainly like buying songs for the lyrics, it (obviously) isn't the only reason. To me the 30 s just isn't enough for most songs to get a good idea of what they are like - especially as I want to experiment with groups and music I've never listened to before (or have heard the one good song on the radio but no others). When I think about it, a better way for Apple to do it, perhaps, would be to give you e.g. a 70-80% preview of each song rather than a fixed brief time period. This would also be much better for those tunes that last more than just 2 to 4 minutes.