UsabilityBlog - Latest Comments in A Short Rant on the Lameness of iTunes

Re: A Short Rant on the Lameness of iTunes

Neil — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 17:49:53 -0000

Paul,

What is that checkbox that you mention that dupes all of your songs? I have been having a similar issue and wanted to check whether I had the same box checked.

PS Glad that you had a good time in China. Did you meet any of my co-workers from Lenovo?

Re: A Short Rant on the Lameness of iTunes

Paul Sherman — Wed, 28 Nov 2007 06:10:53 -0000

Good point, Jim. It's funny how our expectations (and in my case, my level of snarkiness) rise over time. Five years ago I would've been happy just to be able to get Windows Media Player to work. When I switched over to the iTunes ecosystem, I definitely became a bit spoiled. -PS

Re: A Short Rant on the Lameness of iTunes

Jim — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 20:42:01 -0000

Yup, iTunes' library management leaves something to be desired some of the time.

But I'm reminded of that old saw that "Capitalism is the worst basis for a society in the entire world... except for all the others." Or is that "Communism is the worst form of government in the world, except for all the others."

You take my point, I'm sure: we all have our favorite annoyance and pain points, but half of the stuff that you can do in iTunes you can't do *at*all* in other music apps. Show Duplicates. Folder structures for containing groups of playlists. A record of all your purchases. Sort Artist fields. I could go on for hours. Odds are good that few of the things being complained about are even doable in parallel apps.

We're not really bitching that iTunes does a bad job. We're bitching that they only got 98% of the way to perfect. We need to keep in mind what we're really complaining about: tiny pockmarks, where other apps have potholes and even sinkholes.