Apple announces iTunes Match music service for $24.99 per year

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  • Reply 141 of 172
    nim81nim81 Posts: 16member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by ameldrum1 View Post


    Has anyone seen it confirmed anywhere that Apple will actually replace the existing (non-iTunes 128k) tracks in your iTunes library with 256k AAC versions?



    (It seems clear that the versions that download from iCloud to other devices will be 256k AAC... but I'm interested in my main iTunes library itself)



    If so, given that replacing 128k tracks with 256k tracks will likely approximately double the space required for an individual's iTunes library, I wonder how this will work. I have iTunes library saved on a separate partition that is not 2 times the size of my current iTunes library...



    Also, replacing all the 128k tracks in my library with 256k tracks would mean about a 60GB download. That's a ton of downloading...



    From what I'd gather the original file will remain on that device and iCloud will sync the 256k AACs to your other iCloud devices. I just wonder whether there will still be an option to download as 128kbps files to your iDevices, I have this option ticked on iTunes at the moment so I can get more tracks onto my phone.



    Another thing I'm wondering about is whether there will be a web-based interface for the music.



    I haven't seen mention of web services for any of iCloud... you'd have to presume that the web versions of the MobileMe services will carry into similar ones on the new iCloud surely? If so it would be logical that there will also be a way to get access to your iCloud music from a web browser?
  • Reply 142 of 172
    lilgto64lilgto64 Posts: 1,147member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Gwydion View Post


    No, there is not a 5GB limit, the limit is 25.000 songs



    The Website and the KeyNote mentioned 20,000 songs - as an example - not a limit - http://www.apple.com/icloud/features/



    and since I would think that the expectation is that only a small fraction of your 20,000 tracks will not match the 18 million track catalog - then only a portion of what you have will need to be uploaded. (content creators of course are a case where lots of local tracks will not match the Apple library - or maybe they will offer a way for those who create music independently to offer their tracks for sale).



    The 5 GB limit is mentioned for mail and photos etc - not sure how that fits in the picture for music - or free iCloud vs $24.99 a year option.
  • Reply 143 of 172
    nvidia2008nvidia2008 Posts: 9,262member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by nim81 View Post


    Another thing I'm wondering about is whether there will be a web-based interface for the music.



    I haven't seen mention of web services for any of iCloud... you'd have to presume that the web versions of the MobileMe services will carry into similar ones on the new iCloud surely? If so it would be logical that there will also be a way to get access to your iCloud music from a web browser?



    Hopefully the web browser access for iCloud will be available and rewritten as well. We'll see.
  • Reply 144 of 172
    overlordoverlord Posts: 59member
    What happened with the song after a year if I pay iTunes Match only for one year?
  • Reply 145 of 172
    jlljll Posts: 2,713member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by lilgto64 View Post


    The Website and the KeyNote mentioned 20,000 songs - as an example - not a limit - http://www.apple.com/icloud/features/



    On the bottom of same page you linked to: Limit 25,000 songs. iTunes purchases do not count against limit.
  • Reply 146 of 172
    tallest skiltallest skil Posts: 43,388member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Overlord View Post


    What happened with the song after a year if I pay iTunes Match only for one year?



    What happens to your car if you don't make your payments?



    This is even a question for you?
  • Reply 147 of 172
    technotechno Posts: 737member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by iReality85 View Post


    I understood it to be both, but more so the other way around. If it were simply "access to the matching process," why is it a reoccuring yearly service? Seems to me to be a back door way of implementing a subscription service. I have a hard time believing the RIAA would easily agree to allow pirates to exchange thousands of songs for completely legitimate ones, free of charge (at $25 a year for thousands of songs you've pirated, that is essentially free). Something has to give somewhere. As I understood it, Matching keeps those songs in the iCloud, and from the iCloud you can push songs to any i-devices (even back to the PC where the pirated music originated from). However, once the Matching service expires, I'd imagine your playback access is cut off across all your devices- i.e. not just the service, but the goods too. This would be devious of the RIAA, hoping that unsuspecting pirates will delete all their pirated music (the hard copies) after they Match using iTunes in the Cloud. Then Apple and the RIAA has the pirates hook, line, and sinker. Either pay to continue using the music which is now cloud-based, or lose access.



    Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong on any of my interpretations on the iCloud service, but I think this will be how it plays out.



    Yes a lot of questions remain. It will be interesting to learn what happens to your original music files. Are they replaced by the iCloud versions? Or are the iCloud versions only pushed to the iOS devices and never write over the originals on your computer? I just cannot imagine that a users original songs are replaced or upgraded or granted amnesty or whatever you want to call it. I think that the iOS devices are merely seen as receivers in a sense. Besides the obvious issue of pirated music being laundered, the potential for problems with overwrite errors in a user's library is just too disastrous.



    John the Pirate pays the $25 to launder all of his boot music and then cancels his membership. Does he get to keep all of his fresh cleanly tagged music? Or does he now lose the right to listen to the replaced songs. Neither scenario makes sense. I can only imagine the Texas lawsuits that would arise from that.
  • Reply 148 of 172
    lilgto64lilgto64 Posts: 1,147member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by JLL View Post


    On the bottom of same page you linked to: Limit 25,000 songs. iTunes purchases do not count against limit.



    gotta read the fine print.
  • Reply 149 of 172
    lilgto64lilgto64 Posts: 1,147member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Tallest Skil View Post


    What happens to your car if you don't make your payments?



    This is even a question for you?



    A better analogy here would be you have a car - regardless of whether you are making payments on it or own it outright or stole it - you contract for an annual fee with a company to provide maintenance - they will come out and put air in the tires and change the oil and put new tires on it - what happens in that case when you stop paying - do they come out and take the oil out of your car and take the tires off?



    In other words - what EXACTLY - are we actually paying for - as in precisely what rights do we have to the content that is resident on our personal device after the service fee is no longer paid?



    I would not expect to see content I have on my local hard drive (and backed up to a network device) to be removed. No more access to new matches and no cloud copy of my non-matched tracks surely - but shutting off access to the Match service is not quite the same as ending a subscription service such as amazon streaming where you never own any rights to any of the content except as it is playing provided you have a current subscription - and the moment you are not authorized then you cannot see any content (at least that is how I am guess in works, never having using it myself).
  • Reply 150 of 172
    overlordoverlord Posts: 59member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by lilgto64 View Post


    A better analogy here would be you have a car - regardless of whether you are making payments on it or own it outright or stole it - you contract for an annual fee with a company to provide maintenance - they will come out and put air in the tires and change the oil and put new tires on it - what happens in that case when you stop paying - do they come out and take the oil out of your car and take the tires off?



    In other words - what EXACTLY - are we actually paying for - as in precisely what rights do we have to the content that is resident on our personal device after the service fee is no longer paid?



    I would not expect to see content I have on my local hard drive (and backed up to a network device) to be removed. No more access to new matches and no cloud copy of my non-matched tracks surely - but shutting off access to the Match service is not quite the same as ending a subscription service such as amazon streaming where you never own any rights to any of the content except as it is playing provided you have a current subscription - and the moment you are not authorized then you cannot see any content (at least that is how I am guess in works, never having using it myself).



    You gotcha!
  • Reply 151 of 172
    gwydiongwydion Posts: 1,083member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by lilgto64 View Post


    The Website and the KeyNote mentioned 20,000 songs - as an example - not a limit - http://www.apple.com/icloud/features/



    and since I would think that the expectation is that only a small fraction of your 20,000 tracks will not match the 18 million track catalog - then only a portion of what you have will need to be uploaded. (content creators of course are a case where lots of local tracks will not match the Apple library - or maybe they will offer a way for those who create music independently to offer their tracks for sale).



    The 5 GB limit is mentioned for mail and photos etc - not sure how that fits in the picture for music - or free iCloud vs $24.99 a year option.



    2.Requires iOS 5 on iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4, iPod touch (3rd and 4th generation), iPad, or iPad 2, or a Mac computer with OS X Lion or a PC with Windows Vista or Windows 7 (Outlook 2007 or 2010 recommended). Limit 25,000 songs. iTunes purchases do not count against limit.
  • Reply 152 of 172
    rattlhedrattlhed Posts: 155member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by macslut View Post


    For those complaining about the lack of streaming, you can stream from iTunes to your iOS device using the free app and free software AudioGalaxy. It's really easy to use. Look for it in the iTunes Store.



    I just started using Audiogalaxy after Jukefly and (mysteriously) Zumocast also quit working. I've been very happy with it. It's free, easy to set up, and so far is working flawlessly. I listen to music all day long at work, and never know what type of music I'm going to be in the mood for, so I really like have access to ALL my music, not just what I synced on my phone a few days back.



    The only thing I don't like about it or any other current streaming service is that you have to leave you home computer on if you want access to streaming out of your MP3 library. Not a huge deal, but I would prefer to have my home PC off all day while I'm at work, yet still have access to my entire library of music. I was hoping this new iCloud service would read your MP3 collection, then make all your song available from the iCloud, not your own home PC. Then you could access everything and save a little $ on your power bill.



    If Amazon.com would make an iOS app for their cloud service I'd be all over that, but I think I can keep dreaming there!
  • Reply 153 of 172
    benicebenice Posts: 382member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Superbass View Post


    I've ripped a lot of CDs to 320 kbps. Does this mean my music will be downgraded to 256 AAC in the iCloud? Should there be a checkmark and box for that on AI's informative box? Because with Amazon and Google, my higher-quality rips won't be downgraded. Also, I'd bet money that google's service will allow the FLAC format, which will never exist in the iCloud.



    And shouldn't the informative box also tell us that if iTunes doesn't find an exact match to your CD rip for whatever reason, it will also be uploaded, just like Google and Amazon, and therefore your collection might also take "weeks" to upload?



    All very good questions. I don't want my music downgraded or changed to AAC in the process, with the only consolation being that my original copy on the mac is likely, for now, to stay unmodified by the cloud.
  • Reply 154 of 172
    benicebenice Posts: 382member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by rattlhed View Post


    I just started using Audiogalaxy after Jukefly and (mysteriously) Zumocast also quit working. I've been very happy with it. It's free, easy to set up, and so far is working flawlessly. I listen to music all day long at work, and never know what type of music I'm going to be in the mood for, so I really like have access to ALL my music, not just what I synced on my phone a few days back.



    The only thing I don't like about it or any other current streaming service is that you have to leave you home computer on if you want access to streaming out of your MP3 library. Not a huge deal, but I would prefer to have my home PC off all day while I'm at work, yet still have access to my entire library of music. I was hoping this new iCloud service would read your MP3 collection, then make all your song available from the iCloud, not your own home PC. Then you could access everything and save a little $ on your power bill.



    If Amazon.com would make an iOS app for their cloud service I'd be all over that, but I think I can keep dreaming there!



    Isn't that exactly the idea here? It is all available from the cloud, not your home PC, so my understanding is that once its done the inital scan all the songs are available to you on the phone and with your computer off because the songs are coming from their data center.
  • Reply 155 of 172
    asdasdasdasd Posts: 5,686member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by benice View Post


    All very good questions. I don't want my music downgraded or changed to AAC in the process, with the only consolation being that my original copy on the mac is likely, for now, to stay unmodified by the cloud.



    If you want the original on the iPhone you can sync with iTunes. Then you don't need to download the iCloud version.
  • Reply 156 of 172
    walshbjwalshbj Posts: 864member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by AppleInsider View Post




    "Here?s how it works: iTunes determines which songs in your collection are available in the iTunes Store. Any music with a match is automatically added to your iCloud library for you to listen to anytime, on any device. Since there are more than 18 million songs in the iTunes Store, most of your music is probably already in iCloud. All you have to upload is what iTunes can?t match. Which is much faster than starting from scratch. And all the music iTunes matches plays back at 256-Kbps iTunes Plus quality ? even if your original copy was of lower quality."



    Does anyone actually have more detail on this? Apple pushes the matched files to all your devices? Including your computers?



    Does it move your original files? What happens when you don't pay the next year?
  • Reply 157 of 172
    phlophlo Posts: 1member
    I'm curious about a couple of things: Are your iTunes preferences going to be mincemeat; something that you'll have to go back in and reset? And what if I have a favorite MFSL pressing of an album like, say, "The Wall". Will iTunes Match replace it with the U.S. version they have in the store? Or will I have the option to use mine?
  • Reply 158 of 172
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Phlo View Post


    I'm curious about a couple of things: Are your iTunes preferences going to be mincemeat; something that you'll have to go back in and reset? And what if I have a favorite MFSL pressing of an album like, say, "The Wall". Will iTunes Match replace it with the U.S. version they have in the store? Or will I have the option to use mine?



    so the quality isn't good on the icloud? I have really old CDs from my parents who have the 1st Bob Dylan, Beatles, etc releases before all this remastered crap. Never bothered to buy the remastered ones. Will they update my songs? Also how do they know which ones I stole and which ones I bought? I mean I have had a mac since 2005 but have been ripping CDs since 2000. I have about 15,000 songs. Most of which was when itunes had that cool hack where you basically can take every song off a computer on your network. Worked wonders in College. I went from 2,000 songs to 10,000 in no time.
  • Reply 159 of 172
    samdavissamdavis Posts: 5member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by yensid98 View Post


    For some reason (probably issues with the music industry) Apple is not delving into music streaming. Frankly, I don't find streaming that helpful anyway. What I really want is the music iCloud support announced today for movies and TV shows. That way, I wouldn't ever have to worry about backing up any of those large files. I'd just re-download when I wanted to re-watch. Hopefully that's in the works.



    I don't really understand that though. If they can allow you to download anything from their servers (once it's matched) as many times as you'd like, then they can stream it.



    If they offered that, I wouldn't even think about Google Music or Amazon Cloud Player anymore. There will never be an iOS app for either of those services, but both of them allow for streaming, and both of them are super clunky on the iPhone. Apple would kill 'em if they allowed you to stream those matched songs, again for $25/yr or maybe $10 extra (I dunno), from the comfort, familiarity, slickness, etc., of the "baked in the OS" iPod app.



    Seems like a no brainer. But now we've got three separate services that are all lacking in some way (well they have Android apps but I won't be purchasing an Android phone anytime ever) and I was almost sure that Apple were ready to knock the competition out with their offering. It's pretty much useless to me w/o streaming.
  • Reply 160 of 172
    I wonder if there will ever be any features that facilitate sharing of the songs you upload (the ones that do not get matched by existing iTMS content). So, if I have my original music on my mac, and it gets uploaded to iCloud, can I authorize a friend to listen to it?



    I'm curious about how sharing any document in iCloud will work, actually.
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