RepTIDE

I submitted the following to the iTunes Feedback page. It will probably be ignored, but I figured it was worth a shot.

Over the years, the iTunes application has become a very large and all-encompassing media platform. It has become a “jack of all trades, and master of none.” As it has expanded to perform functions that it was originally not designed for (movie playback, device management, media store interface, etc.), it has become increasingly nonintuitive and the user experience has become increasingly frustrating. As a software developer, I propose that iTunes should be re-factored into a number of smaller applications with mostly orthogonal functionality, which attempt to “do one thing well.”

Read on for one proposed approach.

1. Remove all video playback, iTunes Music Store, and iPod/iPhone/Apple TV management functionality from iTunes so that it is essentially just a music player/manager, as it once was. It would retain the library management capabilities for music and audio podcasts only. It could retain the Internet radio functionality.

2. Rename “iMovie” to “iMovie Maker” and create a new “iMovie Player” application that combines the functionality of DVD Player and the video-playback functions of QuickTime Player and iTunes. Additionally, this would contain the library management capabilities for movies and TV shows (which should be stored in a separate folder under ~/Movies; not in the iTunes music folder.

Note: The QuickTime Player application should similarly be deconstructed and its functionality moved into other existing or new applications that serve a single purpose.

3. Create a new “Apple Media Device Assistant” application that integrates with the other “iApps” to synchronize content with iPod/iPhone/Apple TV, and make sure that this has the ability to manually manage content as an option to syncing. It should also support syncing content with “plain old folder” in the file system, rather than syncing with the user’s movie, music, or photo libraries (so that it can be used even if the user does not use the other “iApps”).

4. Rename the iTunes Music Store “Apple Media Store” and create a new “Apple Media Store” application to replace the iTMS functionality removed from iTunes. As with the “Apple Media Device Assistant,” this application should be able to interoperate with the user’s movie, music, or photo libraries, as well as operate independently of these libraries, storing purchased content directly to a user-chosen location in the file system. The user should be able to use any of these applications without using the others, if he/she chooses to do so.

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