Dear Apple:
Why is it that, despite having nineteen of the 44 albums Rush has released (basically every studio album and a couple live albums), I only just now found out they released another studio album last year? You have my entire library in iTunes, and I’ve checked the box in the prefs that says “share details about your library with Apple”. The play count on all of these tracks is high, and the skip count is low. It is not a big leap to make the assumption that I like this band, and will seriously consider buying new stuff from them. There are other bands or musicians that it’s pretty obvious I’m a fan of, too. I just found out Pop Will Eat Itself came out with a new album two years ago, for instance. Bought it within a few minutes of learning that fact.
Seriously, I’d love to have a feature where iTunes could look at my library and start telling me “hey there’s a new album by this band you obviously like” or “hey there’s a new solo project by a member of this band you obviously like” every once in a while. There’s a ton of data to mine here. Maybe a personalized tab in the store? Intermittent emails? You’ve done various attempts at music discovery, sure, but they’re aimed at “if you like these artists maybe you’ll also like this person” – you’ve done nothing on keeping me aware of new stuff by people I’m already into. I guess you assume I keep up with music news or something? That I actively seek out and subscribe to the mailing lists of artists I like? Hell no, that sounds like work.
You have enough data on my listening habits to hazard a reasonably good guess at what new albums will make me say “SHUT UP AND TAKE MY MONEY”. Why aren’t you doing this?
Love, Peggy.
edit.
Oh, wait, there IS such a thing. Hidden away obscurely: go to the store, find “my alerts” in the column of tiny “quick links”. And you can turn on exactly the kind of thing I’m asking for here. Though it isn’t smart enough to only show me stuff I don’t already have. Man can I just make this the front page of the music store or something? Because fuck telling me that Justin Timberlake has a new album, show me a bunch of stuff you think I will probably groove on.
Well, now I know, at least, and it’s turned on. Such as it is.