stoolpigeon's Journal: Google Music -Edited

Got a couple things to say. First of all, if you are a person who is really super serious about following the policies of every web site you visit, you live in Hungary and you want streaming music, you are hosed. I mean how crappy is that? I hopped over to Pandora the other day and it told me essentially, "Sorry, but not in your country." So I bopped over Spotify, feeling all continental and such, where it told me essentially, "Not in your country." Wow. Enter unblock-us.com. I'm not using that service, but someone with a lower rule following drive might.
 
So on to google music. It's not like Pandora. You actually upload your own music and then can play it back anywhere. Pretty sweet right? So here's one issue with it right off the bat. You don't get to effectively rate songs. You can give songs a thumbs up or a thumbs down - that's it. That is some weak sauce. Seriously. And thumbs down skips the song. If I didn't like it that much, it wouldn't be on my hard drive and I wouldn't have uploaded it. Frack. I need at least a 1-5 scale though I'd like 1-10 better. Then I can build playlists off that with some nuance. NUANCE google - do you hear me? No - but it's a beta (hah - it's from google and it's a beta) so I'll try shooting some feedback upward.
 
I'll give more info. on the service as I gain more experience using it.
 
Oh - they do give you music to add to your list for free. Just picked up a free song from Rise Against. AND - I've got two invites. You want one, get me a gmail address to send you an invite. Not in the US? Well there are ways - or suck it up and wait.

Moo

[Chacham]

thumbs down skips it that time. it will replay it.
and i use it all the time. great service.

Re:

[stoolpigeon]

That's interesting. I submitted a feedback form asking for more options than up and down. We'll see. I'd really like it if that had been included in the MP3 spec and files took their rating with them.

Welcome outside of the US

[jawtheshark]

Besides, Google Music? I guess by using your US Google Account you somehow magically got access, because I got: We're sorry. Music Beta is currently only available in the United States

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[stoolpigeon]

No - I get that too unless I get up to some hi-jinks. Same with Pandora, Netflix, Hulu and my mlb.tv subscription

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[jawtheshark]

Sweet, eh? How there is no world outside the US?

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[gmhowell]

If all the people who whine about not being allowed to participate in Pandora, Netflix, etc. outside of the US would build their own Pandora, Netflix, etc, instead of whining, the problem would be solved.

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[stoolpigeon]

I'm going to guess it is easier to work around the obstacles, as opposed to building a service and negotiating terms with the various content owners. Otherwise I would think something would be in place. Shoot, it took my wife like a week or two to find a service out of Russia that shows movies she can't see on Netflix yet.

I think what you see as whining is just a normal human reaction to being told, "No you can't have this, because of a boundary we chose to put in place based on where you live." There's no

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[jawtheshark]

Actually, I'm one of the consistent ones. I know it doesn't work, and I don't bother working around the restrictions. You don't want my business, you don't get it. End of story. The people who need to build this are the young engineers of the time, not the 30+ people like me. I'm too old for innovation. Besides, imitating the above services will get you sued.

Want Music and not in the US? Use jamendo.com [jamendo.com], which is run from Luxembourg.

ID3

[Captain Splendid]

From memory, the ID3 spec contains frames for both play count and rating, but nobody implements them.

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[stoolpigeon]

losers.

Oh wait, loosers. It would be so awesome if that was utilized.