How Genius is Genius?
September 9, 2008 | 3 Comments
Today Apple made some waves and refreshed all of their iPods and dropped iTunes 8 onto the intertubes. Considering none of the “announcements” were surprises due to Apple’s new lack of leak plugs, I was ready to try out the Genius feature before I knew that I could. Did you follow that? I hope so because I’m not going to try and re-write it. Anyway, the Genius feature is pretty good, pretty intuitive and puts together a nice playlist based on the selected song. It couldn’t, though, put together a playlist based on the Dr. Horrible soundtrack. Oh well.
But this isn’t going to be a review of iTunes 8 and the Genius feature. It’s a look at the name itself. I’ve got a huge problem with it. Other sites around the web are arguing over Apple’s use of the word “funnest” in their new iPod marketing, but I think the use of Genius is a much bigger mistake on Apple’s part.
Anyone who has ever walked into an Apple Store knows that the word Genius is not new to Apple. Apple uses the word to describe it’s tech support people. Computer broke? iPod showing the sad face? Go see a Genius at your local Genius Bar. Makes sense considering a genius should know what to do. Apple has effectively branded the word genius to demote support for your Mac. Now, with the launch of iTunes 8, they are telling us that it also means something that can pick songs for you. I mean, it’d be stupid to walk into the closest Apple Store, wait in line, and then ask a Genius to recommend some music for you. But maybe that’s what Apple want’s us all to do.
I might be looking too much into this, but I think Apple is making a mistake here. The iTunes feature could have easily been called something else leaving the Genius moniker for the support folks at the local store. What do you think? Did Apple make a mistake using the word Genius or am I just overreacting? Let me know in the comments.
My Celebrity Playlist
July 23, 2008 | 0 Comments
I’m not an actual celebrity; I don’t even have a Wikipedia page. But after reading Alton Brown’s Celebrity Playlist I got to thinking that if I were some kind of celebrity and Apple did happen to come calling, what would I put on my list? I spent the last month (yes it’s been exactly one month since I started this post) compiling a list of ten songs from my library of nearly 7,000. Behold, in stunning blog glory, my celebrity playlist:
- Song: The Load Out/Stay
Artist: Jackson Browne
Album: Running on EmptyThe song of life on the road and wanting to continue playing after the show is over. I really like the lyrics and how the song shifts into Stay by the Four Seasons. Too bad it’s not available on iTunes.
- Song: The Wino and I Know
Artist: Jimmy Buffett
Album: Living and Dying in 3/4 TimeMy celebrity playlist would not be complete without something from Buffett. I’ve been a Parrothead for at lest a decade and while I celebrate the entire catalog, a playlist calls for a specific song. The Wino and I Know has been my favorite song by Jimmy Buffett and his Coral Reefer Band since the moment I heard the first riff. It’s got fun lyrics, a killer bridge, and a sound that just draws you in. How can you possibly go wrong?
- Song: The Skies Won’t Fall
Artist: Foundation
Album: FoundationFoundation is a solo project by Ann Beretta frontman, Rob Huddleston. While Ann Beretta is upbeat and at times hard core, Foundation is soft and acoustic. It’s really hard to pick one song from the only Foundation album in existence (2001’s self-titled debut) but The Skies Won’t Fall is just as good as any. The song showcases the bands smooth sound that just demands to be repeated over and over again. According to Foundation’s MySpace page a new album is in the works which is very cool news!
- Song: Where the Streets Have No Name
Artist: U2
Album: Joshua TreeIf there is a song that speaks of more hope I don’t know about it. Someday we’ll find the place where we can take shelter from the poison rain. No matter what crap we go through, there is always hope for something better. For me, it’s where the streets have no name. Bono captures that ultimate hope in this wonderful song.
- Song: When Your Mind’s Made Up
Artist: Glen Hansard & Marketa Irglova
Album: Music From the Motion Picture ‘Once’I’ve talked about Once before. The movie is incredible mainly because the music is so good. The song that is brought up every time the movie is mentioned, the one that won them the Oscar, is Falling Slowly. In my opinion, which is what makes up everything I write here, that’s not the best song in the movie/soundtrack. When Your Mind’s Made Up is nothing but pure passion and emotion on the part of Glen Hansard that’s translated to the listener. In the film, Glen and Marketa have finally saved up enough money to record. This song grabs the attention of the sound guy and shows the world (and themselves) that they really have something to be proud of. They’ve made it; they’ve done what it takes to chase their dreams. What’s happened in the past doesn’t matter and what will happen in the future is irrelevant. All that matters at that moment is the music.
- Song: Blinded by the Light
Artist: Manfred Mann’s Earth Band
Album: The Roaring SilenceOriginally written and released by Bruce Springsteen but made popular by Manfred Mann, this song has some of the most intense lyrics ever written. Written about Springsteen’s early career, it’s like a crazy trip through dive bars in Jersey complete with very strange characters and situations.
- Song: Move Away and Shine (In a Dream)
Artist: Tim DeLaughter (The Polyphonic Spree)
Album: ‘Thumbsucker’ Original SoundtrackI’m pretty sure The Polyphonic Spree is a cult. I remember seeing them on Conan years ago dancing around in their colored robes playing instruments and hitting beach balls in the air. That’s pretty cultish. Though, just because they are a cult doesn’t mean they can’t make really, really good music. Like another song on this list (that’s what they call a teaser) it’s impossible to listen to anything The Polyphonic Spree does without being put into a good mood (which might be how they get people to join their cult). This song was, more or less, the theme song for a little indie flick that I couldn’t tell you about if I tried. The song, however, is much more memorable. Don’t be afraid to break your comfort zone, get out there and shine. How can you not like that?
- Song: Call Me, Call Me
Artist: 菅野よう子 (The Seatbelts)
Album: BlueIn case you didn’t know, I’m a geek. I dig the internets, video games, and yes, some anime. One such work that I am especially fond of is Cowboy Bebop. It’s a short, 26 episode series about a group of bounty hunters who are forever broke in the year 2071. Call Me, Call Me plays during the climax of the series and wraps up one of the main characters story lines. It’s such a happy and sad moment that is heightened by the emotion in the song. One of the few songs The Seatbelts do that are in English, Call Me, Call Me is about looking for someone long ago lost, and hoping that they’re alright; something all of us can relate to.
- Song: Along for the Ride
Artist: Mates of State
Album: All DayMates of State is an interesting band. It consists of a husband and wife who play the drums and keyboard respectively. Needless to say this produces a very unique sound. They’ve been featured, of all things, in an AT&T commercial and in a prior post here. The first time I heard Along for the Ride was at a concert on Election Night 2004 in Tallahassee. They played the song with fellow touring group Bishop Allen. Like most of their music, it’s a fun, upbeat, song that is hard not to like.
- Song: Walk of Life
Artist: Dire Straits
Album: Brothers in ArmsIt’s pretty impossible to hear this song and not be put into a good mood. I rediscovered this song after watching Space Camp with some friends a while back. I regret forgetting about it in the first place. It is now my ringtone and every time I get a phone call my coworkers start humming. It’s one of the most contagious songs out there. Good thing it’s a pretty good one.
There you have it, my ‘celebrity’ playlist. Like something here? Don’t like something here? Just want to argue about it? Let me know in the comments below.
Juno Digital Copy is Blogtastic!
April 19, 2008 | 2 Comments
One of the things announced at MacWorld that excited me was Fox’s digital copy. Applications like Handbrake and Mac the Ripper have enabled people to copy DVDs to their hard drives for years. The argument for this process has always been fair use. However RIAA and the MPAA would beg to differ and have you spend money on a DVD and a digital version from a vendor like iTunes. With Fox’s announcement it became very easy and unquestionably legal to copy Fox’s movies to your hard drive. I’ve been itching to try it out since January and finally there was a Fox release that interested me enough to give it a whirl.
Once I put the disc into my computer I was greeted with a simple menu with one icon reading “Double-click to transfer movie to iTunes.” So, I double-clicked. (Note there is a little more involved process for Windows. I don’t know what it is, but I’ll call it the Windows Penalty.) After double-clicking iTunes opened and read the dick and pulled up the code entry page. I typed in the code, as found in the DVD case, and iTunes communicated with some distant server and agreed that it was OK for me to have the digital copy. After that it was on like donkey kong.
I was presented with this “Thank You” screen. It’s a very similar screen to the one shown when you purchase a movie from iTunes. I thought it odd it said my movie was now downloading considering it was really just being copied from the DVD. Note the recommendations in the image. Their all great movies, except for Kissing Jessica Stein which I’ve never heard of.
It took about four minutes to transfer the roughly 1 GB file from the DVD. Again, interestingly enough, while it was transferring the movie was considered a ‘download’ by iTunes. Once fully transfered, Juno appeared in the ‘Movies’ tab of iTunes, as well as the ‘New Stuff’ playlist.
At native size the quality of the picture is quite impressive. It was solid at full screen on the 24″ iMac, though the DVD version would be preferable if watching on a screen that large. On both the iPhone and a 5.5 gen iPod the picture is clear. Pictures of all the different versions are included below for your viewing pleasure.
Overall the process was extremely easy and produced some pretty quality results. The Digital Copy version of Juno was $2 more than the Standard Edition, but it also came with swanky Dancing Elk High School t-shirt. It’d be nice if more studios got on board with the Digital Copy and finally put the fair use debate to rest.
Native Resolution
The iTunes’ Have It
December 4, 2003 | 3 Comments
Today the third round of law suits were sent out by RIAA (the Recording Industry Association of America) to people who illegally share internet files online. So, on this note I thought that I would review one of the products available to help download music legally.
The program is Apple’s iTunes — an all in one audio center so to speak. The program is freely downloadable from Apples website (http://www.apple.com/itunes/). Ironically, iTunes look is much like that of KaZaA’s and it functions much in the same way. iTunes stores all of the music files on your computer (in all formats) into its Library, a form of play list. You can then play your library as you could with any audio programs — features include random, repeat, etc. The first thing I noticed that I really enjoyed about iTunes is the ease of searching through your library. It’s quick, seamless, and extremely functional. For instance, a quick search for “Jimmy Buffett” in my library shows that I have 148 songs, 10.5 hours, and 732.5 MB’s of music by the one and only Jimmy.
Another cool feature is the ability to create sub play lists. For instance, I can create a play list by singling out all the songs by Buffett and then save it. The cool thing is that if I were to add more of Jimmy’s music to my library in the future, my “Jimmy Buffett” play list would automatically update itself. These sub play lists also can be set so that iTunes picks, say, only 25 songs from a set search criteria, or a maximum of 80 minutes total play time which will come in handy later.
Now, you may be wondering how I got all that Buffett music on my computer and don’t worry, because I didn’t download it. iTunes allows you to import (or rip) music off of CD’s and adds them to your library. Unlike Windows Media Player, iTunes allows you to encode your music in numerous formats including MP3. This is how all that Buffett music ended up on my computer. iTunes’ importation is pretty quick. Importing a 3.5 min song into MP3 format at 160 kbps takes only about a minute (though this was using an external USB 1.0 CD drive so with a faster drive comes faster encoding).
iTunes also has a built in CD burning program that is extremely simple to use. You just select the songs you wish to burn, or, if you have set up a play list with a maximum of 80 minutes like I mentioned above then you select the entire play list, and hit the burn button. When you hit the button, a panel opens up revealing the true “Burn” button as well as opens up your CD-RW drive. Just put in a disc and hit the Burn button and bam, iTunes does the rest.
But what about the main point of downloading iTunes, you know the ability to download music legally? Well, I have tested iTunes and give it my approval, for the most part. You search iTunes’ database of music from inside iTunes itself. Their collection is extremely large spanning all genres of music as well as audio books. You can preview songs by double clicking them; you can read reviews of albums and, in some cases, watch QuickTime music/concert videos. Once you set up an account (which is free) you can purchase music whenever you please. Songs cost $0.99 plus tax (or $1.02 here in Florida) and whole albums start at $7.98. Not a bad price to pay. Once a song/album/audio book is purchased, it automatically downloads into your specified music folder. Download time depends on your internet speed and computer. Here on FSU’s LAN a 3.5 minute song took approx a minute to download.
Here’s the catch, all music downloaded from iTunes is in a format called AAC which stands for Advanced Audio Coding which Apple says is better then MP3. AAC is basically an MP4. Though, AAC files only seem to be able to be played on iTunes. Windows Media Player could not open the file. The AAC file is also protected so that it cannot be re-encoded as an MP3 file. The other catch is that it doesn’t seem that Nero Burning Rom is able to burn an AAC file onto an audio CD so you are forced to use iTunes’ built in burning program.
All in all I would say that iTunes is a pretty good program and a way to get music legally. Other options are available including BuyMusic.com which offers songs at $0.79 cents each, though they are in Windows Audio format and have some pretty weird usage restrictions. Wal-Mart has reported that they will be opening an online music store shortly and Microsoft is throwing their hat in the ring early next year. Though, considering iTunes was the first into the market and has the largest library, I’m going to stick with them. So, here’s to downloading music legally!