Apple’s iTunes 9 Makes it Easier to Share, Organize
September 16, 2009
by Walter S. Mossberg
Apple’s iTunes program is one of the most popular software products in the world. The company says hundreds of millions of copies of iTunes have been downloaded, far exceeding the 220 million iPod music players it has sold. That’s because many people use iTunes to organize, play and buy music and videos on their computers, or to burn music CDs, even if they don’t own iPods or iPhones. Ironically, the vast majority of iTunes copies are on Windows PCs, not Apple’s own Macintosh computers, because Windows machines are much more numerous.
Last week, Apple released its ninth major version of iTunes — which first came out in January, 2001, before the iPod even existed — and I’ve been testing it. This release is the biggest overhaul of the familiar program in recent years, with improvements in the look and functionality of each of the software’s three main portions: the media jukebox, the built-in store and the synchronization features that move media and applications to and from iPods and iPhones.
In my tests, performed on multiple Windows PCs and Macs, iTunes 9 worked as advertised, and I found it to be less cluttered, more intelligent and easier to use than the prior version. It synced music and videos properly for me using both an iPod Nano and an iPhone. It’s available as a free download at apple.com/itunes.
To me, the two biggest new features in iTunes 9 are something called Home Sharing and a new, easier way to organize the apps on an iPhone or iPod Touch.
For years, iTunes users have been able to wirelessly stream music from nearby computers running iTunes whose owners chose to share their music. But Home Sharing takes this one step further, allowing users to actually copy the song files from one computer to another.
Right inside iTunes, you can simply peer into the shared library on another computer set up to allow this, and then select the song you want and drag it into your own library. It doesn’t delete the original from the other computer.
In my tests, this worked perfectly with music, as well as TV shows, movies and audiobooks, and it worked between any combination of my PCs and Macs. You can even configure Home Sharing to automatically transfer to your library new media purchased on another shared computer.
But Home Sharing has limitations. It only works with a maximum of five computers. These computers must be on the same local network, not connected over the Internet. And they must be the same computers authorized to play copy-protected media you buy from Apple.
With 75,000 apps available for the iPhone and iPod Touch, it has been easy to download so many that your device becomes cluttered, with numerous icons scattered among numerous screens in a manner that isn’t optimal. There’s a way to move them around, or delete them, right on the device, but it’s clumsy, partly because you can’t see all the screens at once, and partly because it’s difficult to move an icon from a location on one screen to another location several screens away.
The new iTunes lets you organize your iPhone's screen right on your computer
Now, in the new iTunes 9, when you plug in your device, the software displays an exact visual representation of your iPhone or Touch screens right on your computer, and allows you to rearrange them with your mouse. When you disconnect, the new arrangement is retained on the phone. It worked fine for me.
In iTunes 9, you also can create up to 12 automated “Genius Mixes” from your personal music library — essentially personal radio stations consisting of songs iTunes considers to be related, that play on and on. I enjoyed this feature, and found it generally made good choices.
There are also a number of small visual improvements throughout the program. In the jukebox, for instance, you can now locate all songs by a particular artist using a Column Browser — an optional left-hand column that lists the artists.
In the store, categories like music, movies and TV shows are now arrayed across the top, with drop-down menus for genres. The store also is generally better organized, with richer graphics, more white space and easier navigation.
A small touch of social networking, not exactly Apple’s historic strength, has been added to iTunes. From inside the store, you can post a link to a favorite title to either Facebook or Twitter, though this of course serves Apple by encouraging others to buy the title.
You can now buy special albums, called “iTunes LPs,” that attempt to replicate the experience of old vinyl albums by including lots of extra material. For instance, for one such title by the Doors, iTunes delivered to me liner notes, digital scans of old posters and set lists, plus photos and video interviews. Another, called Mayhem, by the singer/actor Tyrese Gibson, includes just one song, but also a vivid digital comic book with voiced dialogue.
However, these iTunes LPs take up a lot of space on your hard disk — about half a gigabyte each for the ones I tried.
Overall, iTunes 9 is a nice improvement on a much-used program.
Find all of Walt Mossberg’s columns and videos online, free, at the All Things Digital Web site, walt.allthingsd.com. Email him at mossberg@wsj.com.
Comments
I’m sort of surprised that Mossberg so easily gave the iTunes 9 music store a pass. This is the 9th version of a so-called “much-used program” and basic things such as alternate text pop-ups are still absent for text that doesn’t fit into columns of the iTunes Store – which is frequent considering album titles and artist names can run fairly long. Or even the basic ability to copy text from within the store? It’s like using one giant Flash-based application, but a really old version of Flash. And the plain white background with what seems like hundreds of thumbnails without significant visual separation feels unfinished or rushed.
Posted by Carlo Blackmore at September 18th, 2009 at 10:57 amI think it is high time that they incorporated ID3 tags, let alone ID3v2 ones. But they don’t really care about real music fans.
Posted by David Rothblatt at September 19th, 2009 at 10:16 amI cant believe iTunes9 cut the mustard for release. The organization of music and pod-casts when synced with the iPhone is all messed up. Need a patch ASAP!!
Posted by fix itunes9 at September 19th, 2009 at 6:55 pmUnfortunately, I found many functions were eliminated from the iTunes 9.0. The “print” function to print song listings by artist appears to have been disabled, as well as the “edit” (select all/copy/paste) function, which I used to copy album song lists to “lyrics”.
Posted by Nancy Fairchild at September 25th, 2009 at 7:34 amThere are many other irritating housekeeping bugs as well. Too many “bells & whistle” at the expense of the basics
Some very nice features as pointed out. Only trouble is when you lose features. The single item that has not come to the attention of reviewers is the removal of a shopping cart for music. You now have to charge your card for every song or purchase a gift card to yourself to all a single charge.
Sync capability is greatly enhanced including iphoto events which made iTunes 8 very difficult to sync with mobile devices for pictures.
Posted by Dale Scott at October 2nd, 2009 at 1:45 pmThe major problem with iTunes which the column doesn’t mention is that you cannot download music in a lossless format. This causes me to not use iTunes as a site to buy music from. I go to MusicGiants or Linn or Aix. I would much prefer to utilize iTunes but this is not available. I prefer to listen to the music as closely as it was intended to be heard.
Posted by Joshua Lerner at October 12th, 2009 at 9:55 am