Picto Synthesis

Music for inspiration, without the brainwashing of ads. More signal, less noise.

Support internet radios such as Radio Paradise - eclectic online rock radio or Radio Akasha

These radios, like many others, are under direct threat from the music industry to fall under the weight of a royalties system not adapted to an internet age.

The sad thing is that I had stopped buying music from the recording industry for years because of the album model and the lack of diversity available in stores. It is only with the advent of itunes, ipod and internet radios that I have started buying music again. And I am clearly not alone thnking along those lines.

Internet radios are a perfect way to find out about new artists. They can be segmented into the tiniet niches, each with their following. It is BECAUSE they are about music and not ads that people support them and listen to them.

When are the RIAAs of the world going to wake up and adapt instead of asphixiating themselves by trying to squeeze as much rofit as possible ? 

I discovered The Filter in one of those 'Top 10 software you can't miss' articles. At first, it seemed a little esotheric - would it really create a useable playlist from a sample of only 3 songs ?

After using it for a few months, I can say yes - it is working fine on both Mac and PC.

This little app has a tendency to 'forget' past settings from one update to the next, but this little problem is quickly forgiven. The playlists generated are far from the random choices of plain iTunes. The app relies on the choices of hundred of other users to make educated guesses of what other songs in your library are likely to match your initial selection.

The result is more diverse playlists and a re-discovery of a lot of lost tunes from your own library. 

And if you want to push the concept a little further, it provides you with options to share playlists and accept suggestions of music you don't even have. 

iTunes 7 is out, and it looks good so far :) .... a good occasion to add a nagging tip to this little collection.

As I was trying to keep my iTunes library synchronized between my desktop (windows) and my laptop (mac OS), I found it frustrating to have to delete and reload my library each time I did a backup.

Here is the correct way of doing this :

How to recreate your iTunes Library

Click on the details for a copy of the steps in case that article changes on Apple's website.

Continue reading "iTunes 7 and a tip to refresh of iTunes library" »

Found in a recent link from Slashdot to an entry of Phil Ryu's blog about the top ten most beautiful Mac OS X apps -  coverflow puts to a good use these neglected cover art pictures in your iTunes library and turns them into a fluid, intuitive interface to select albums you want to listen to. Now if only Apple would listen :)

To make it even more useful on my laptop, I decided to finally clean up the cover art in my iTunes library. After trying a few shareware, I found iPodSoft's Iart worked nicely to recover lost covers on windows. It allows recovery of images from multiple search engines (amazon, itunes, ...), creates a playlist for albums that do not have a cover (to search them manually more easily) and even recovers Lyrics :)

Update 09/12/2006: coverflow has been officially sold to Apple for inclusion of the technology in iTunes 7 ! now you don't have to have a mac to rediscover your cover art.

I made the mistake to keep my iPod for a few weeks in a jacket, with keys and coins... and no protection... while I was waiting to receive a Vajacases leather case. Needless to say, the scratches that ensued were as nagging as grain of sand under an eyelid.

It took me a while to find a good solution. Unfortunately, the local Apple Store was less than helpful. The generic product they recommended turned out to not be all that good at removing the scratches.

It took a little bit of search to finally come across the right product by accident. I tried a clean up kit from iCleaner and the results were immediate.

Instant new ipod :)

Standard disclaimer: Yes - I really bought this product and tried it. No - I do not have any relationship with them.

With all that hype surrounding it, it is easy to overlook a very simple reason that makes a service like iTunes so attractive.

iTunes is a Time Machine.

I spent a few hours (and dollars) going over their catalog, looking for particular albums and as I was coming across some unexpected titles, it hit me - there are so many songs I used to like and listen to years ago but never bothered buying because they were burried into albums with other titles I couldn’t care less about.

Now here they are, potentially available with a few clicks of a mouse. iTunes catalog may be limited (where are all those french artists I would love to listen to ?), but it already contains plenty of titles to make up for lost time.

A few links to better use your ipod :

• iPod Lounge - All things iPod. Featuring the gallery of iPods around the world. Where did your iPod go today ?
• SmartPlaylists.com - Explanations about the concept of smart playlists (really, just a wizard to build queries to the database created by iTunes). The site hosts examples of smart uses of these playlists as submitted by other users (such as creating playlists for backup purposes).
• iPod for windows - official support site from Apple.
• iTunes for windows forum - official forum for help about using iTunes for windows,

About a year ago, I received my first piece of Apple hardware.

The ipod was simple, slick and incredibly cool. I can’t remember the last time I have been that happy with an object like that. The ipod borders the status of piece of art. No wonder its followers are quasi religious about it.

Of course, it also has shortcomings. The chrome body takes about every finger-print imaginable. The screen is easily scratched. The harddrive skips when you run with it. The battery needs frequent stops to a power station (although this has improved a lot with recent firmware).

And last but not least, the simplicity of its design is a challenge itself after years of being used to complex options, panels and buttons. One of the first things I remember what I started using it was to ask ’how do I turn this things off ?’. The answer : you don’t. It turns off by itself when you stop using it.

Now, a year and a few scratches later, the ipod is still as loveable as it was the first time I took it out of its box, and as a way of celebrating this anniversary, Apple even thought about another surprise - the release of iTunes for windows.

Once again, it is love at first sight, but this time, with some Apple software. iTunes is simple, sleek and cool just as the ipod is. There is no menu to edit titles or album information - just click on it and edit. No ’search’ or ’go’ button - just type in the search field and the list of songs is filtered as you type. After years of Winamp, Sonique and MusicMatch, using iTunes is refreshing.

Now if Apple would release OS.X for PCs...