Books I've recently read and recommend!
I've been reading up on what Apples new iTunes Plus means to the consumer. Before you switch your preference to always download iTunes Plus formatted music you may want to check out some of the articles below that outline some privacy concerns.
The title says it all, CBS has purchased the last.fm social music networking site for $280 US million in the largest UK-based Web 2.0 acquisition ever.
It's the "in" thing! Everyone's doing it. Rarely do I jump on the bandwagon and follow others in a "community wide" blog post but I figured why not this time. I've had a few cups of coffee and sitting by the fire has me in a compliant mood.
The single of the week on the iTunes Store is a cut from the Shiny Toy Guns latest album. Le Disko, is a catchy, get up and dance track infused with bits and pieces of many musical genres. I purchased the record several weeks ago and definitely recommend folks check it out. Why not start by downloading the free single of the week. You do like free stuff right?
It's December which means it's time to break out the Christmas tunes and get into the holiday spirit. I have several hundred Christmas tunes in my library and to keep them from playing during "Party Shuffle" sessions throughout the year, I de-select the check box by each track. Well, it's time to select these boxes so the tracks will be played as iTunes progresses from track-to-track. But who wants to individually select hundreds of check boxes? Not me. Today I discovered you can control-click (command-click on Mac) one check box in your track listing and all check boxes will be affected. Since this affects all the tracks you are currently viewing, you may want to create a smart playlist with just the tracks you wish to modify.
I blogged about last.fm a few weeks ago. I've recently discovered the ColdFusion group (http://www.last.fm/group/Coldfusion/) which allows you to see what types of music all your ColdFusion peeps are listening to these days. If you are on last.fm, join the group. If you aren't on last.fm why not get started today! Feel free to add me as a friend once you do join.
I recently blogged about my affinity for last.fm. While browsing around the site this morning I noticed they are looking for a Java developer to work on the last.fm back-end, a PHP developer to work on the actual Web site, and a graphic designer to work on the last.fm site. They're also seeking a smart C++ developer who will be responsible for working on their client tools. You can check out the job postings here (http://www.last.fm/about/jobs/). Now, if we could just get them to power the site with ColdFusion!
Reading through Macworld yesterday I discovered a cool Web site geared towards music lovers and Mac users. Last.fm combines social networking features like friends and neighbors lists with music charts surrounding the artists, albums, and tracks you listen to. How does it work? You download one of last.fm's Mac applications that connect your iTunes library to the last.fm servers. As you listen to music the apps submit track data to your last.fm profile on its Web site. The site keeps track of all the music data submitted from its users and records the information in various charts throughout the site. You can browse your own music charts by artist, album, and track to get an idea of your listening habits overall or by week or month. Want to allow others to see what you are listening to? No problem, you can publish your own charts on your blog or Web site (see the new pod I've added on my blog to the right).
Not only can you peruse your own listening charts you can view the charts of your friends, neighbors, and other last.fm users. This is a fantastic way to discover new music from people who have the same taste as you. Last.fm also allows you to stream any music stored in its database. As you browse your friends and neighbors music just click on the appropriate links to stream tracks to your browser. Listening to others music also adds the tracks to your own charts so you can find them later.
I'm just getting started using last.fm, but so far it's very cool. If you join the site feel free to add me as a friend (http://www.last.fm/user/trajik210). Happy listening!
iTunes version 4 introduced the ability to share your music library across your local network using Bonjour, Apple's zero-configuration networking technology. To set up sharing you simply access the Sharing preference pane, determine if you want to look for shared music yourself, and then configure what playlists (or your entire library) you want to share to the outside world. You can also set up a shared name for your library that will be shown to all viewers as well as whether or not a password is required to access your music. Just below all these settings is a message indicating how many users - if any - are connected to your library.
That's all well and good but I want to know what people are listening to. With a bit of clicking you can get this more specific information. First, you need to launch Apple's Activity Monitor (/Applications/Utilities), a program that lists all the running processes on your mac and various details about those processes. Next, find the iTunes process highlight it and click the Inspect button in the toolbar (or press command-i). In the process detail pop-up box that follows select the Open Ports tab and scroll to the bottom of the text window. Listed here is information on any user connected to your shared library and what they are currently listening to. Remember, just because someone is connected does not necessarily mean they are listening so keep this in mind.
Anyone reading the Music category of this blog knows I'm a big fan of music and how it's used in television and movies. A few weeks ago all the major television networks ran primetime ads showcasing cuts from their season premiers. One in particular caught my attention - ABC's. The ad showed scenes from several of ABC's shows including the already popular Grey's Anatomy and Desperate Housewives, and brand new shows like Six Degrees, and The Nine. What caught my attention however was the music chosen for the ad. The song was upbeat, catchy, and made me want to get up and dance. And considering I don't dance - at all - that's saying something.
I immediately began looking for the song and was surprised to see the artist was Rob Thomas. With Matchbox Twenty Thomas had some huge hits like 3 AM, Unwell, and Push, but his solo work has yet to compell me to lay down any cash. I'm still not hip on his solo work, but his track used in the ABC promo - Streetcorner Symphony - is definitely worth the $1 in the iTunes Store.
Switchfoot has released their latest single Dirty Second Hands and after a few listens I'm really disappointed. I've bought Switchfoots last two albums Nothing Is Sound and The Beautiful Letdown. The Beautiful Letdown was an absolutely fantastic album where every track had it's own uniqueness and sound. Following that album, Nothing Is Sound was released. It had some good songs like Stars but I found I wasn't really listening to the album much at all. Dirty Second Hands seems unpolished, almost like they wrote a few songs and stitched them together to form one track. It just seems chaotic with no real musical balance. I do like the guitar riff at the beginning which is also interspersed throughout the entire song. Check it out for yourself and see if you like it.
