July 14, 2008

On Linking To iTunes, Among Other Things

Jeff Atwood wrote a post a few days ago about iTunes; it’s called “iTunes is Anti-Web”, and I recommend reading it.

Now, the article starts out with a complaint about web browser links to iTunes, and in the end he really argues two things: number one, that links to iTunes are inconvenient and that this info should just display in your browser; and two, that having an integrated store is hostile to the user experience. I like his website, Coding Horror, and while I think he’s right on the linking issue, he’s dead-wrong on the Store’s integration with iTunes.

But let’s start with iTunes links, because frankly, they are pretty damn annoying. Having an external application start that I didn’t click myself bothers me, especially considering that most links to iTunes don’t forewarn you of that in advance. For a writer, an easy fix is to add something like “(iTunes Link)” before or after your actual link, and adapt that general idea so it fits with textual or image links.

Of course, not everyone does that (thanks alot!), and in a perfect world, an Apple-provided solution would work even better. After clicking on an iTunes link, a preflight page would read something along the lines of, “This page will open up the iTunes Store”, and then provided an “OK” button and “Automatically redirect” checkbox. Feasible, and doesn’t leave the bad taste of auto-launch in your mouth.

The best solution, however, would be an extremely simple track listing in your browser. I imagine a page like this:

(pardon the late-night Photoshop job.)

Now, second order of business: the iTunes Store experience:

It’s downright user hostile to demand installation of a special application merely to browse the store, and it is most certainly against everything the web stands for and was built on.

A core feature of the iTunes application— if not the most important one— is the integrated store, and the integration of it with your own music library. The one-click procedure from buying something to adding it to your library is ridiculously appealing to potential customers. Downloading individual songs from a website, opening up your Downloads folder and dragging the files into iTunes is actually too cumbersome for most people. Of course, Jeff Atwood knows how to do these things inside and out; what I don’t think he understands is that most people don’t.

The iTunes Store isn’t a part of your “regular” web experience; it uses web technologies, yes, but it’s inherently designed to be part of the iTunes experience. One-click buying, previewing, and account management all work seamlessly within the iTunes app, functions of what you do with music, and iTunes is the app you use for music.

Integrating the entire store into a web browser, besides the fact that it would mean compromising its feature base to work with older browsers, serves no advantage to anyone except to fulfill Atwood’s purist belief that all Internet content should remain in your web browser.

It’s funny when he uses words like “blasted” and “hostile” in the article, hyperbole that makes you take it a bit less seriously. Kudos for the AOL jab too, which is, you know, totally different than what iTunes does; AOL served as your application to the entire Internet, whereas iTunes fulfills a very specific need for it.