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Filed under: Audio, iPod Family, Cult of Mac, Odds and ends

Take a chance on your friend's music with an 'iPod exchange'

The Ocala Star-Banner has an interesting story involving an 'iPod exchange,' where two of their reporters decided to swap iPod shuffles for a few days to get a taste for each others' musical interests. The key to their experiment, at least in their eyes, is the fact that they specifically used shuffles, so neither could scan through the library on the iPod or even tell what songs they were listening to; it was literally more about the experience of what music the iPod would serve up, rather than skimming through a simple list of artists and songs with which one could pass a musical judgement.

I'll save the dramatic results for your own reading, but the concept is an interesting one: in a world where we increasingly are keeping more and more - or perhaps the entirety -of our music libraries in our pocket, what would happen if you temporarily traded your collection with a friend, co-worker or that guy you just can't meet eye-to-eye with on [insert band here]? Could you gain a musical appreciation for your iPod exchangee? Or would you scratch them off your listening party list forever?

Filed under: Audio, Software, Productivity, Internet Tools, iTunes, Mods

iConcertCal updates with iCal exporting, better listings and more



This must have slipped under our radar back in March, but iConcertCal, the both clever and useful iTunes plug-in that scans your artists to find local concert dates, has updated to v1.2. In addition to "greatly improved" concert listings in both the US and UK, iConcertCal can now export calendars to an iCal format (note: this isn't exactly 'iCal syncing.' Hopefully that's on its way). For those shows that might still slip through iConcertCal's fingers, the plug-in allows you to edit its calendar and add shows you just gotta keep track of.

Also on the list of changes is the ability to chose which iTunes library to monitor for artists and show dates, an "easy way" to list shows from artists that aren't in your library and city + date venue info now placed in the header information. Amazingly, iConcertCal is still free and available for both Mac OS X and Windows.

Filed under: Audio, Internet Tools, Widget Watch

Widget Watch: OnTour - know when your favorite iTunes artists are in town

OnTour is a Dashboard widget that scans your iTunes library and offers concert notifications when the artists you actually listen to are coming to a venue near you. The widget uses OnTour.net to collaborate all this information, and links are provided to buy tickets, as well as to the iTS in case you need to brush up on your choruses. To top things off, the OnTour.net site itself provides even more links to discographies and Google maps for directions. Nice.

[via Lifehacker]

Filed under: Audio, iTS, Video, Widget Watch

Widget Watch: Check new releases by artists in your iTunes library with newTunes


Tired of browsing the (often late) New Release emails from the iTMS to find out whether an artist you actually care about has released a new album? Sick of adding an 'Artist Alert' for each of the hundreds of artists cataloged in your vast library? Well pound those keys no more, frustrated iTMS shopper, for the newTunes widget has arrived. This widget tells you when new music you actually care about has been released by watching for new and upcoming work from the artists already in your library.

Don't you love it when computers actually do the work for you, instead of creating more work for you to do? newTunes is freeware and can be had from Apple's Dashboard downloads section.

Filed under: Audio, iTS, Books and Blogs

'The Fader' magazine issue available free on iTunes


Who says the iTMS is just for music and videos? The Fader is a magazine that is "the definitive voice of emerging music and the lifestyle that surrounds it," and embodying that lifestyle they are: available now, for free, from the iTMS is their July/August 39 page summer spectacular in PDF format covering emerging music and artists. They even provide a non-iTunes RSS feed as well as a direct link to the PDF itself for all y'all who haven't hopped on the iTunes/RSS train yet.

How cool is it to see traditional media diving head-first into new distribution outlets like this? I know it isn't quite the first magazine to ever get PDF'd, but it's certainly the first to make it onto the iTMS shelves - and a fitting first, if we may say so.

[via MacMinute]

Filed under: Audio, Software, Cool tools, iTunes

Applescript for OmniGraffle to create graphical map of music taste

Another day, another slick new tool for graphically viewing artists in your iTunes library. OGMT (OmniGraffle Musical Taste) is an applescript that will generate an OmniGraffle file containing a graphical map of all of your artists, emphasizing the ones you play most.

For those who aren't familiar with OmniGraffle: it's a really popular and powerful app for diagramming and flow-charts. Using OGMT to create a functional, graphical map of your iTunes library sounds like a great way to gain a unique perspective on the music at the top of your list. Too bad I didn't bring any of my music home with me on the PowerBook over the break. Anyone care to give OGMT a try and post some thoughts?

[via Ranchero blog, image via DrunkenBlog]

Tip of the Day

Use Spotlight as a reference tool. Type any word in the Spotlight box and one of the top entries will be a definition. Click on it, and it will bring up the dictionary application to check the word in either the dictionary, thesaurus, Apple database, or Wikipedia.


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