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Music Services: Google Play (and All Access)

Part two in the online music services reviews. Today, it is Google Play and its All Access “Subscription” service.

In 2011 when Google announced Play and their music service, my hopes were high. I was an early adopter (from when you needed an invite to join Gmail), and I assumed Google would rock this. You could store your music in their services, and play it anywhere. Up to a whopping 20,000 tracks.

It seemed awesome. So I downloaded the sync application for both my personal Mac, as well as my PC. In about a week, all of my library was on the Google service.

Of course, there were wrinkles. If I synced something from both iTunes, and from my PC, one was in .m4a, and one was .mp3. One would think Google would know this and not duplicate the album/track.

You would think wrong.

You would think that they would have some facility to view duplicates, and allow you to clean them up.

Again, you would think wrong. So to clean your collection you have to manually delete the albums.

Early on, the quality of their streaming was sketchy. There were glitches aplenty. Hitches, drop outs, and freezes, all plagued playback. Google relied on their HTML5 wizardry, and their back end cloud infrastructures. Regardless of their technical prowess, there were plenty of glitches, and other things that detracted from listening enjoyment.

In 2013, Google launched the “All Play” streaming on demand service to counter Spotify. I tried it (and even paid to subscribe for a few months). Like the rest of the Google music experience, it was clumsy, and plagued with glitches. In my initial attempt to ditch Spotify, I gave it a good run, but Spotify’s application and streaming quality slaughtered Google.

In 2015, Google upped the number of tunes you can store on their site to 50,000, but alas, I have moved on.

As an avowed Apple disciple, you might be tempted to passing this off on fanboyism. However, I did buy a Nexus 7 tablet, to give Android in its purest state a try. Google Music on that device was just as clunky to use.

There is an app for the Chrome browser that helps navigate, but it still doesn’t match the performance of Spotify.

(“Google Play Music icon” by Source (WP:NFCC#4). Licensed under Fair use via Wikipedia – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Google_Play_Music_icon.png#/media/File:Google_Play_Music_icon.png)

June 17, 2015
Quitting Facebook (at least temporarily)

When this goes live, I will have been a full week of not being on Facebook. Last Tuesday, I decided to do a drastic thing, to deactivate my Facebook account.

It isn’t the first time I had done this. Back in 2009, not long after I joined Facebook, I deactivated my profile. That time, I held out 8 months before peer pressure caused me to turn it on.

In the intervening time, it is astounding how much the web now relies on Facebook as an identity verifier, authentication path, and collector of all sorts of personal data.

I had paved the way for this for some time. By adding logins to things like Goodreads, and Strava (among many other sites where it is just easier to connect via Facebook). But it wasn’t easy. There were dozens of places where I linked my identity to Facebook.

Of course, over the last 5 years, I had built quite a cult of personality on Facebook. An outspoken atheist, with a wickedly sardonic sense of humor, I collected like minded friends. It was almost a challenge to see who could post the most outrageous things.

That said, Facebook was taking over more of my life. I probably spent 2 hours a day combing my feed, and looking for new, fun things to post. Checking email? Quickly hop over to FB. Finished a document at work? You guessed it, check Facebook.

Even standing in line for the grill at the cafeteria, using my iPhone to check Facebook.

It was an addiction, as much as coffee or nicotine. More than a habit, it was an obsession. Did my friends “like” the latest snark? What rude douchebag politician said what?

So I deactivated my account. It is sad, Facebook has on the deactivation page a list of some of your top friends, and how they will miss you. Really pouring on the pity-party.

But I didn’t go to the trouble of deleting the profile (I understand that actually deleting the profile requires you to deliver a Kidney and half your liver to Mark Zuckerberg), so I am sure I will go crawling back.

But for now I am on a break.

I am still on Twitter, so please hit me there @ganders2112 if you miss your snark.

June 16, 2015
Kindle Unlimited

I have a kindle, and I enjoy it. I haven’t always had a Kindle, I started as a Sony reader fan, and then an iPad user, but I succumbed to inevitability, and bought a Kindle.

I like it. I do prefer a eInk reader to a tablet, and today, you have to work really hard to live in this space and not use a Kindle.

I buy lots of books. Most are just throw-away pulpy fiction that I enjoy reading. Like the Doc Savage series (modern), or The Destroyer series. Mostly they are a couple of bucks, I enjoy them and delete them from my Kindle.

I have also borrowed a couple books via the Prime lending library. I wish I had something to say about that, but really, it is trivial to borrow, read, and “return“. Very uneventful.

Now I am struggling with joining Kindle Unlimited. Looking at the books included, much of the pulpy fiction things are there. So it would probably save me a few bucks (but not much, and I rarely spend more than $10 a month on those throw-aways.

But the convenience of Unlimited is tempting. Grab a book or 5, and try them. If they suck, you aren’t out any money.

The ethical qualm is how little of that $10 goes to authors. You have to read some percentage of the book for them to get any money, and the fee paid to them is low. Why should I care?

Good question. Unlike the average Slashdot user, I don’t subscribe that the near zero marginal cost of an e-book means I should pay pennies for it. I know how much effort it is to write, edit, and package even an e-book. I believe that the written words are the value, not the paper, ink and distribution costs.

Herein lies the problem. Kindle Unlimited appears to be a bad deal for authors. They are pressured to participate, but, like Spotify, the amount of subscriber or advertiser money that trickles to them is minuscule.

I prefer to spend the few bucks, have more of that go to the authors, and hopefully, they will continue to write things I want to read.

So, while Kindle Unlimited seems awesome, and a great deal, I will continue buying books, as I believe that will help the authors make a living, and thus not have to go back to a day job to put food on the table.

coda

Yes, I still use Spotify. However, I have bought many albums based on things I have found there. I find that if I really enjoy (read: replay songs) an artist, I will buy their album(s) to help support them.

June 15, 2015
Music Services – Amazon Prime

Part one of a series on music services, I will start with Amazon Prime.

Back when iTunes music store was top of the list, and sold DRM encumbered tracks, Amazon opened their music store, selling un-protected MP3 files. Turns out that this was more than a sharp stick in Apple’s eye, but the lever by which the music publishers lost the ability to demand DRM on music sold.

But, it did begin the nascent Amazon sales of music. I bought some from Amazon at the time, not for any particular reason, but to have a variety (and let’s be honest, Amazon makes it so damn easy to impulse buy, that it was inevitable that I bought some tracks from them.

side note: Some music was not available for purchase on MP3, in particularly Racer-X, so I continue to buy my CD’s from Amazon.

Fast forward to today. Amazon Prime is their “club” where you get free 2 day shipping, access to a borrowing library for the Kindle, Video streaming (with a really weird set of movies and shows), and ahem, access to their prime collection of music.

It didn’t really dawn on me until way late that you could listen to music like Spotify, on demand. Yeah, I am a bit dense sometimes. But I do it now, and there is even a decent PC application (and a web application for other platforms, as well as Android and IOS applications for phones/tablets).

The positive is that unlike Spotify, you can download the MP3 files to your computer and keep them. Cool. The is quite a selection of Prime music available, from a large chunk of the Jethro Tull catalog, to some obscure albums from Journey and The Outlaws (just from my tastes), you can put together playlists that will satisfy. Also there are “radio” stations that are really more like curated playlists, so you can get an effortless listening experience.

There is a downside though. To find the Prime music you look for the “prime” logo in the store. That means that you get pay to play, next to free tracks. You get your hopes up that a Led Zeppelin album is free, but alas, it isn’t.

One feature of Amazon’s offering is “AutoRip”. If you buy a physical album, and they offer it as an MP3 download, the downloads are added to your collection automatically. This is really cool, as if you buy the reissue Led Zeppelin vinyl album, while you are waiting for it to arrive via their 2 day shipping, you can enjoy listening to it on your computer or phone.

And this is not just for new purchases, since Amazon has records of all the music you bought, from the way back time, they go and automagically add those old tracks to your music. Imagine the surprise when the two Stratovarius albums I bought in 2005 were in my list.

The last time I contemplated ditching Spotify, and seriously looked at Amazon, they got low marks for streaming glitches. It was surprising to me that the company with the AWS and ECS infrastructure to handle Netflix, and be the largest cloud computing platform could suck so bad at media delivery and streaming. However, they have gotten their act together, and a few weeks of heavy usage, I am happy to report virtually no glitches or issues.

Summary

Amazon is a strong contender. Spotify seems to beat it in selection, and no need to differentiate the paid versus free tracks. But, as a service, and included with the Prime account that I am going to use anyway, it is a winner.

Next up: Google Play

June 14, 2015
Music Appreciation – Beggar’s Banquet

Recently, I blogged about a seminal Rolling Stones Album, "Let it Bleed". I was of the opinion that if you needed only one Rolling Stones album to accompany you to a deserted island, it was the album.

One of my FB friends, Joe Palmer offered up the predecessor of the 1969’s Let it Bleed, the 1968 album "Beggar’s Banquet". So I took his advice, plopped down some hard currency and bought the re-mastered vinyl.

Wow. Starting with Sympathy for the Devil, a killer "must have" track, the album is chocked full of kickin’ tunes.

So, if you are headed to a deserted island, and you are told you only can have one Rolling Stones album, kick that person in the nads, and take both "Let it Bleed" and "Beggar’s Banquet". You don’t need that negativity in your life.

June 13, 2015
A CEO steps down, and I should care

Yesterday afternoon, it was announced that Dick Costolo was stepping down as the CEO of Twitter. The NY Times, and virtually all my media alerts posted about this “event”

Excuse me if I don’t give a shit. A fabulously wealthy individual, who will likely not ever need to clip coupons, will give up his role at the top of Twitter, a mindless time waster (yes, I am aware of the irony of this automatically posting to Twitter) because he didn’t have luck in continuing its meteoric growth, and that the attempts to monetize were not run away successes.

Of course, he will remain a member of the board of directors, so he isn’t exactly frog-marched out the door. Color me surprised.

People have this concept that CEO’s are omniscient and omnipotent beings. But the truth is that the team that surrounds the CEO (often hand picked) is the key to strategy. Of course, looking at all the shuffling of the senior ranks, it isn’t clear that Dick had a good plan.

Of course, one of the articles I read (nb: almost threw up reading) was how the interim successor, Jack Dorsey had a luxurious beard that would attract the confidence of “mommies” (what the fuck is that demographic?)

Don’t get me wrong, I use Twitter, and it has been an effective way to learn and share experiences within the product management community, but if it disappeared, the world wouldn’t end.

(Perhaps I shouldn’t be listening to kick-ass Steppenwolf tunes when I write.)

June 12, 2015
Is life no longer worth living?

I wrote back in March about a life changing event. Having the gout. It sucks. Talk about white privilege diseases, and Gout is top of the list. But the doctor said it would return.

One of the things they say causes flare-ups is beer. Sweet, wonderful, hoppy beer. Apparently, the puric acid is the culprit.

After the major flare up (that about crippled me for 4 days) I swore off beer for a couple of months. Actually, all alcohol. Then three weeks ago I succumbed to the nectar of the goods, malted barley beverages.

I had some minor discomfort, so I backed off. Then the last weekend, I had two 12-oz bottles (A Lagunitas Sucks ale), and two days later, major flare up. I missed the early indicators, so I couldn’t take my preventative medication (which is pretty gnarly, I need to remember to NOT take my statin when I take it).

So, it looks like I am off of beer forever.

Life may not be worth living.

June 12, 2015
To the asshole who was exit lane surfing

Yes you, the black BMW who dove in behind me on the exit lane for Lawrence expressway from 280N this morning. Traffic was already moving briskly, 55mph or better, but you had to get a few car lengths further up

After you honked at me in my wife’s Rav4, I made sure I kept it a reasonable exit speed. Because often it backs up onto the freeway there, and I have seen some doosey accidents there, I take a little caution.

So, yeah, fuck you.

June 11, 2015
eBook Evolution

I have written about ebooks a few times in the past. I started in 2008 with the Sony E-Reader, and then moved on to an iPad in 2011, and then to the Kindle in 2014. As a lifelong, heavy reader, books have always been a significant part of my life. The eBook and reader has been a godsend. Yet, all is not perfect in the reader world.

Being a long time e-reader user, an early adopter, and several technology nodes along the way, the challenge is that I have books from multiple vendors, in multiple formats, and that complicates life.

Sony was the first stop in the path to an e-reader. It started using proprietary Sony only formats. Yet, as the technology evolved, and Amazon become a powerful player, Sony books ended up being in protected ePub format. Moving them was trivial using Calibre, and they remain in my library.

I later bought a second generation iPad, about the time that Apple launched their bookstore. I have to admit, that the reading experience on the iPad with the Apple application was/is outstanding. However, the protection that Apple uses for their books is not removable, so you are limited to using the iPad or now the iBooks application on the Mac to read them. That would be OK if I always used my iPad to read, but alas, I prefer to use an e-ink reader (no distractions, a better immersive environment.)

All was well until the second Sony reader began to die. Its battery always sucked, and I ended up replacing it less than 18 months after buying it. However, even with the new battery, it really never lived up to the quality or performance of the original reader I had from Sony. Bummer.

I could have turned 100% to the iPad, but at its core, I still prefer the e-ink based readers. However, at this time, late 2013, the battle was over. There were some also rans, the iPad, or the Kindle.

So I took the plunge, and bought a Paperwhite kindle (wifi only, without the ads). As much as it pains me, it is now a damn good reader, and the Amazon book ecosystem is solid. Huge selection, reasonable prices, and a painless purchase/access process. It really just works.

Of course, the Amazon format files are protected (again, it is trivial to remove this protection).

The integration with Calibre is excellent, and converting my extensive collection of ePub books to .mobi format for the Kindle is trivial.

One thing is for certain, the only loser here is printed books. It has to be a special book indeed where I buy a dead tree version.

So, like much of my digital life, I have many epochs of detritus, collections spanning multiple technologies. Don’t get me started about my music collection (Amazon, Apple, Google Play, and my ripped CD’s).

June 8, 2015
Why I don’t Watch Sports-ball Games

Thursday I got a hankering for some Pizza for lunch, so I hit the local Round Table Pizza and their buffet (yep, I felt like pigging out, so nyah!) Of course, there were TV’s on in the dining area tuned into various games.

The one that had audio turned up was a Baseball game. Oakland A’s versus Detroit Redwings or something (note: I do know that is a hockey team).

I have never really been a big fan of sports on the ‘tube. Yes, I will watch a game once in a while, but I really don’t look forward to the weekends to sit idly watching game after game. I can’t remember the last time I tuned into ESPN (and in fact, if you could drop ESPN, and my wife wouldn’t disown me, I would banish it from my cable lineup).

Back to the broadcast I was watching. Baseball is a fairly slow paced game. You don’t have rapid fire pitching, so there is plenty of dead air time between the batters and even within an “up”, so the sportscasters feel the need to fill the dead time with inane blathering. They just say the lamest things, sometimes weaving in statistics, or weather, or what some player did 5 decades ago.

It isn’t just Baseball, watch a telecast of a football team, and you get the same mindless drivel. These sports casters are often retired players, and the banter that they do reminds you that while they may have gone to college, they certainly weren’t scholars. The ‘expert‘ panels at half time in football make me stabby.

I am sure this will draw some hate.

June 7, 2015