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BuzzVoice comes to the iPad
Back in October we wrote a very positive review of the impressive BuzzVoice app for the iPhone and iPod touch. BuzzVoice reads you stories from over 1500 blogs and plays them back in various ways. The playback sound amazingly natural allowing you to choose a male or female voice, or both. You can create a personalized Playlist or BuzzCast. A Playlist is built by choosing the sources that you are most interested in, and they appear in the app along with a general category. So if you wanted to hear the latest stories from TUAW, you'd put it in your Playlist and tap the TUAW topic. A BuzzCast is a bit different. It's an app generated podcast. You decide on the content and each day it will appear in your iTunes library allowing you to hear it on any iPod, iPhone (within the app), or even on your computer. BuzzCasts can be as long as 30 minutes long. Here's the problem: creating a BuzzCast or Playlist required you to log onto the BuzzVoice site to choose your favorite content. To get the full function of the app, you needed a computer nearby, and were required to jump back and forth between the computer and the app. Here's the solution: this complexity is going away courtesy of the BuzzVoice iPad app currently under testing. The full functionality of the web site will be built into the new app.. Correction. The BuzzCast feature is still only available through the web site.
Macworld 2010: Moodagent has synced over one billion songs
In December we reviewed Moodagent [iTunes Link] a wonderful music app that puts you in control of creating Genius like playlists of your iTunes library. On release it didn't recognize about 20% of my library, but now, after analyzing over one billion songs, I find it to be about 95% accurate, and getting better all time. I spoke with Richard French, the CEO of Syntonetic Inc., the parent company of Moodagent, who gave me an update on what's in store for the app and if you like it now, you're going to love it in 3 - 6 months. On the front burner is an iTunes plug-in which has been the most requested feature. I can easily see this completely replacing Genius playlists by putting you in the drivers seat when using iTunes on your computer. I asked about the possibility of importing Moodagent playlists into iTunes and found that it's going to be difficult since the easy way would by necessity stomp all over some Apple proprietary code, but it's not impossible and it's going to happen this year. It will just take a lot of work and time. Another upcoming feature is integration of social networking so you can share your playlists on Facebook, Twitter and all the usual suspects. The limit of a 25 song playlist will eventually be raised, which would be my first request. This will is also on the drawing board and will be gotten to eventually. It was interesting to learn a bit of how Moodagent works. Recent musicology graduates in Copenhagen sample songs during syncing and process them through 50 expert filters adding to the songs that Moodagent recognizes. They constantly work on improving the filters to make Moodagent more accurate. There is no tagging going on behind the scenes. Moodagent is a great app now but after my discussion, I can see it being incredible about half a year from now. I can't wait.
Moodagent: Going iTunes Playlists one better
Moodagent [iTunes Link] (free for now) puts a new spin on the iTunes Genius Playlist system. Instead of leaving it up to Apple to give you category based Genius Playlists, Moodagent, gives you some control over what songs will appear in a 25 song customizable playlist of your music. You are given 5 colored bars, each with an icon representing an aspect of music. The symbols didn't make much sense to me, but by hitting an info button, I found that the icons represented, in order: Sensual, Tender, Joy, Aggressive and Tempo. I could have used a full explanation of what they meant by Aggressive and Tempo, but trial and error gave me a rough idea. By increasing or decreasing the size of each of the bars, a 25 song Playlist is created, complete with cover art icons, that can be played or saved for later recall. Increase or decrease one or more of the bars and the playlist instantly changes, so if you like a playlist, it's a good idea to save it before changing anything. Once saved, a tap will play your chosen playlist. When saving, you are also given the opportunity to title the playlist any way you like, with the first song being the default title. Another way of making a playlist, again similar to the iTunes Genius playlist, is to select a seed song to base the list upon. Choose one song and then adjust the bars to tailor the list to your liking. When first loading the app, you run a sync that indexes all the music on your iPhone/iPod touch running OS 3.0 or better, with their server. My iPhone has about 2100 songs on it and syncing took about 10 minutes. When done, I was told that it couldn't sync about 750 songs. This wasn't surprising since my tastes tend toward the arcane, but there's a solution for that. You are asked to download a Moodagent Profiler application that, as does iTunes Genius playlists, upload anonymous information from the iTunes library on your computer, which is assumed to have more music on it than does your mobile device. This information is used to expand the Moodagent database. After running the Moodagent Profiler on my roughly 6100 song Macbook Pro iTunes library, which took over an hour, I re-synced Moodagent and this time the number of songs that couldn't be synced reduced to 149. So why didn't it find 149 songs?
Uncharted 2 tests experimental MP playlists this weekend
In an attempt to keep that fresh, new game smell on Uncharted 2, developer Naughty Dog will be implementing some "experimental" changes to the game's online multiplayer modes this weekend. First, a new playlist comprised solely of Plunder matches will be introduced into the mix -- a filter that the community has been requesting since the game first launched. Second, for this weekend only, all players' health will be reduced to 65 percent. It's a side effect from the game's "Crushing" difficulty setting, which the developer thinks could ramp up the speed and intensity of multiplayer firefights. Naughty Dog is asking for feedback on these temporary changes, so if you're not a fan (or, alternatively, if you're a superfan) of the new playlist or diminished health capacity, drop a comment on the studio's blog.
Exporting all of your playlist names to a text file
The ability to sync albums artists didn't exist prior to iTunes 9.0. My workaround to sync albums was is to create album-based playlists with the following nomenclature: artist - album. This has also made it easy for me to burn CDs of albums, as I could just navigate to a playlist and click on the "burn" button. If you manage your iTunes library like this, and would like a way to export your playlists to a text file (to share your album collection with your friends and whatnot), then the Playlist Names to Text File AppleScript may do the trick for you. To install the script, first download it and then place it in your [username]/Library/iTunes/Scripts/ folder. After running the script, you're presented the option of whether or not you want to save a text file with the names of all the playlists (and folders) in your iTunes library. Playlist Names to Text File is available as a free download on Doug's Scripts site, though I'm sure Doug will certainly appreciate any donations. 2009 for me wasn't very musically exciting. To make up for lost time, I'll be embarking on a journey to listen to 52 albums in 52 weeks during 2010. But I can't do this without "a little help from my friends," who'll be reviewing my album list and make some recommendations.
5 Smart Playlists to help you manage your iTunes library
Smart playlists have been a feature of iTunes since version 3.0 (circa 2002), and they provide a means for you to create automatically-updated playlists that fit a certain criteria. For me, they serve as a hands-off way to stay up-to-date on my latest music and Podcasts, as well as a repository for a certain genre of music. To create a smart playlist, click on "File" and select "New Smart Playlist" (or you can use the command-option-n keyboard shortcut). If you want a playlist that contains only holiday music, you could specify that the playlist include all songs with either the "Christmas" or "Chanukah" genre tag on it. Because smart playlists auto-update, you needn't worry about adding songs to it: as long as the track's tags meet the criteria, it is automatically included in the playlist -- unless, of course, you choose the "limit to" option, which limits the the tracks in the playlist based on your choosing. Read more for five of my favorite smart playlists, as well as criteria for how to create them. Share
World of WarCrafts: Flickpainting and a playtime playlist
World of WarCrafts spotlights art and creativity by WoW players, including fan art, cooking, comics, cosplay, music and fan fiction. Show us how you express yourself; contact our tips line (attention: World of WarCrafts) with your not-for-profit, WoW-inspired creations.In the wake of the torrential magnificence of the cosplayers at BlizzCon and Dragon*Con in recent weeks, we're going to dial back the sheer creative force this week. Let's catch up with more humble creative efforts with a new take on an old favorite (yes, it's another take on fabric painting) plus a playlist of WoW machinima and songs designed especially as an accompaniment to your playtime.FlickpaintingSerthida of US Bloodhoof-H sent us yet another fresh take on Sugarrat's wildly popular bleach shirt. Serthida has created a bandana, but the approach works equally well on tees and other fabric.
Playlist Alarm Clock, drift off and wake up to custom soundtracks
Be sure to check the end of this post for details on your chance to win a free copy of Playlist Alarm Clock! We covered Chilli X last year, with their release of the successful iPhone to-do application, "Done" (iTunes link), and again with myCal, their app for creating custom calendar wallpapers for your iPhone lock screen (be sure to check out the free, user-generated wallpapers they're making available). They've been pretty quiet for a while, updating and tweaking Done (now at version 1.7), handling an App Store rejection of their own, and working on a newly-released app: Playlist Alarm Clock. Playlist Alarm Clock is not necessarily a new or novel idea, but it's well-implemented. It's an iPhone app which allows you to create playlists, one for falling asleep and one for waking up. You can configure the length of time the sleep playlist will play, and how long it will take to fade out, as well as a fade-in time for the wake-up playlist. Setting times and fades comes down to a couple of taps, and adding songs to the playlists is done with a familiar iPod interface with full access to your library and playlists. If you're generally drowsy in the morning, you're covered as well: the snooze time can be configured to five, ten, fifteen or thirty minutes and is just a groggy tap away. As is often the case, there are a few things I'd love to see enhanced. First, a night mode, ala the excellent Night Stand (iTunes link), which would let Playlist Alarm Clock function more appropriately as an always-on clock. Currently, the time display is large and easy to see, but the brightness of the interface is not ideal for bedside use. Second -- and this is really my only other complaint -- removing songs from the playlist doesn't seem to be an intuitive process. Accidentally tapping the wrong song during playlist creation seems to be a pretty permanent blunder, requiring a do-over of the playlist creation sequence. Beyond that, this app does exactly what the wrapper says, and I'm looking forward to falling asleep tonight to some favorites of mine, and hopefully not jarring my wife into a bad mood when my personal idea of "wakeup" music fades in. Playlist Alarm Clock is $1.99US in the App Store. However, Chilli X is offering TUAW readers a chance at one of 10 free copies. All you have to do is submit (in the comments) your ideal playlists, one for falling asleep, and one for waking up. Be creative, be funny, be brilliant ... Chilli X will choose their favorites winners will be randomly selected next Thursday and promo codes will be sent to the winners. Here are the rules and a link to the legal statement: Open to legal US residents of the 50 United States and the District of Columbia who are 18 and older. To enter leave a comment listing your choices for sleep and wake playlists. The comment must be left before Wednesday, July 22, 11:59PM Eastern Daylight Time. You may enter only once. Ten winners will be selected in a random drawing. Prize: Promo code for one copy of Playlist Alarm Clock (US$1.99 value) Click Here for complete Official Rules. Good luck!
Sensor-laden kokoro adjusts playlist to match the rhythm of your heart
We've got to say, we're guessing both Survivor and Prince would approve here, as this is easily one of the most impressive uses of a heart rate sensor yet. Anaid Gomez Ortigoza, a bright young lass at NYU, has whipped up what she's calling kokoro, which translates into "the heart of things" in Japanese. Put as simply as possible, this prototype project allows for iPod playlists to be shuffled depending on one's current heart rate; if your heart is pumping some kind of fierce, the device will likely cue up a little M83, and if you're at rest, you just might get to hear a smooth jam from the likes of Copeland. Don't believe us, though -- hop on past the break for a demonstrative video.[Via talk2myshirt]
iTunes 101: Use smart playlists to limit size
Want to make an iTunes playlist that will fill your iPod, without making one that's too big to fit? With an iTunes Smart Playlist you can do this and much more. In this Mac 101 tip I'll show you how.Start by making a new Smart Playlist by selecting File > New Smart Playlist (or hold down the option key and click the gear that appears in the bottom left hand corner). You can select what you want from the drop-down menus in the middle section. For instance, I chose "Genre ... is ... Rock," but you can choose any of the options you want. Check the box next to "Limit ..." and type in how much storage your iPod or iPhone has, then select "GB" or "MB" from the next drop-down menu for Gigabytes and Megabytes. You also should make sure the "Live updating" checkbox is checked. When you're done, click OK. You then need to make sure that you sync this and only this playlist to your iPod by going to your iPod (under devices) > Music, and select "Sync Music," and "Selected Playlists." Then put a check mark beside the playlist you just created. Re-sync, and you're done! Want more tips and tricks like this? Visit TUAW's Mac 101 section today.
New Call of Duty 4 playlists in the works
In his latest report from Infinity Ward HQ, community confidant Fourzerotwo brings word that the Call of Duty 4 battlefront could see some changes soon. No less than eight new multiplayer playlists are in development, of which four are currently being tested, and at least one can pass through the servers without a patch: Hardcore Headquarters. But we're taking a keen interest in another playlist, Hardcore Ricochet, which turns teamkillers' attacks against them. It's like we're rubber, they're glue -- whatever they shoot, bounces off us and ... burrows deep into their treacherous guts!Peep the full descriptions and statuses of all the planned playlists on Fourzerotwo's blog.[Thanks, Michael]
Halo 3 Double XP Weekend: Legendary Brawl
The Double XP just keeps on coming doesn't it? This week's Halo 3 flavor playlist is known as Legendary Brawl and is a ranked free-for-all playlist that requires the new Legendary Map Pack. While that is a bit unfortunate, most out there bought this pack now that the first one is now free (basically six maps for $10). Since the playlist is both ranked and every man for himself, Bungie notes that it'll be a good opportunity to finish off your achievements. The twelve man games are online now, and will be until 2am Pacific time on Monday.[Thanks to everyone who sent this in!]
TUAW Interviews Christopher Breen
Christopher Breen knows a thing or two about iPods, iTunes and the Apple digital media ecosystem. We asked him about the limits of the newly-enabled Apple TV purchases, HD content and the fragile-yet-sexy Macbook Air.Also available on: YouTube, Metacafe, DailyMotion, Blip.tv and Crackle
Workaround puts auto-playlist back on Zune
Just days after a clever Zune owner figured out a way around the "three-play rule," another has found a method for restoring auto-playlist functionality -- sort of, anyway. As you know, this feature vanished with the introduction of Zune software v2.0, but apparently, getting some semblance of it back doesn't take a whole lot of effort. All you have to do is create an auto-playlist in Windows Media Player, save said playlist as an M3U file and watch your Zune handle the rest. Head on over to the read link for all the details, but don't uncross your fingers for Microsoft to bring the official version back in the not-too-distant future.[Via Zunerama, image courtesy of SelfHack]
iPhone 101: Browser-based playlists
Call me fickle, but sometimes I don't want to hear any of the music I've got on my iPhone. What should I do when I'm away from my computer, itching for new music? Create a browser-based playlist.The Internet Archive is a tremendous source of streaming music files (among other things) that play just fine on the iPhone. Here's how to set things up. Create a new bookmark folder in Mobile Safari. I named mine "Rock." Navigate to the Internet Archive, and find some music you'd like to listen to (I chose Smashing Pumpkins) The Flash player at the top of the page will not work, but scroll down to the botto and click either of the "Mp3" files A new page will open to play the file Click "Done" at the top of the page, then touch the menu bar Add a bookmark to the file to the "Rock" folder Done! Add as many links as you like, and you've got a web-based playlist of tunes that aren't hogging storage space.
TUAW Tip: View all items in iTunes 7
One of the things that has been bugging me since updating to iTunes 7 is the inability to see all my content at once; podcasts, video, audio and PDFs-all of it. While I normally don't need to see all my content in a single view, certain tasks, such as when I'm trying to get a feel for how much media I have on my machine, can't be completed without this ability. Luckily for me, macosxhints has posted a stupidly-easy workaround for this conundrum by way of a custom smart playlist. All you have to do is create a smart playlist with the condition set to show all media greater than 0 megabytes, and sha-zam! You've got that olde-timey functionality alive and kickin'.
Playlist's Plays of 2006
Every year the fine folks at Playlist compile the best 'Plays' of the year, and this year is no different. The Plays of 2006 give a nod to the new iPod nano as the best iPod, and list the best items in: Headphones and speakers Cases and car accessories Home Audio products Head on over and see if you agree with the editors of Playlist.
iLive ICR6806DT
The iLive ICR6806DT is a horribly named new iPod alarm clock/speaker system. It can be set to wake you up using the music on your iPod, or via a more pedestrian alarm like the built in radio. As you can see it also includes a remote so you can pump up the jams from across the room (if that room is located somewhere in the late 90's that is; I'm so out of touch with the kids).$99.99 gets you an ICR6806DT in your choice of black or white, that is compatible with all models of iPod (including the shuffle).[via Playlist]
Ask TUAW: What's your favorite Smart Playlist?
While browsing Doug's AppleScripts for iTunes and Smart Playlists.com last night for some ideas on how to make iTunes do my bidding, it dawned on me that these handy tools of automated music wrangling might make for a great Ask TUAW discussion. After all: who doesn't love music, and who doesn't love sharing their tips for better working (or music listening) bliss?So what say you, TUAW readers? Do you have a smart playlist and a killer rating system for the perfect party soundtrack? Or perhaps a smart playlist that helps you keep track of which music you need to burn and back up? Feel free to lay it on us and share your smart playlist ninja skills with the rest of the class.
iPod.iTunes: powerful library synchronization
iPod.iTunes offers 8 different ways of synchronizing your iTunes library and playlists between both devices, giving you powerful control over what files are moved where and how. All formats are supported, including MP3, AAC, protected AAC (iTMS purchases), Audible books, and video files. PC-formatted iPods are compatible, and all metadata such as your song ratings, play count and album art are preserved in the transfer. This is a great utility for anyone in need of an easy method to clone an iPod, keep iTunes libraries on different Macs in sync or simply back up your iPod's library if it's the only place you keep all your media (Apple sadly doesn't provide a way of doing this).Check out the full list of features of everything iPod.iTunes is capable of. Another handy trick this app performs is that it can live and run directly from your iPod, in which case your registration ($35 USD) travels with you. A demo is available from crispSofties.
