Apple Music Replay misses the purpose

The worst month of any Apple Music person’s life has been, for the previous few years, December. Do not combat me on this — I’m certain you’ve all had different dangerous issues occur to you in different months, however we should agree that December blows.

That’s as a result of December is the month when the cultural phenomenon that’s Spotify Wrapped takes over the web. It takes over Twitter, it takes over Instagram, it takes over TikTok, and a few foolhardy souls even publish it on Facebook. For customers of Apple Music (myself included), it’s like being denied a seat on the cool youngsters’ cafeteria desk. Everywhere we go, we’re surrounded by Spotify Wrapped. We can not escape Spotify Wrapped. And but, we can not take part. We’re compelled to watch.

Until this 12 months. This 12 months, Apple Music readied a correct Spotify Wrapped competitor referred to as Replay. (Replay has technically been round since 2019, however it was once simply, like, playlist stuff.) The statistics it exhibits you aren’t as in depth or attention-grabbing because the deluge of fascinating and Instagrammable info that people get from Spotify, however irrespective of — you get the fundamentals like high songs, high artists, and high albums. Reader, I used to be ecstatic after I heard about this. I ascended. December was, once more, a month made for me.

Except, there’s an issue. The drawback is that Apple Music Replay just isn’t simple to share. And for that motive, it misses what makes Spotify Wrapped such a cultural phenomenon.

First and foremost, there isn’t any abstract. You know the extremely helpful card that each — and I imply each — Spotify person shares summing up their high tracks, high songs, high genres, and minutes spent listening? Apple Music simply doesn’t have that. If you need to share near as a lot info as Spotify customers are sharing, you’ll have to dig by your Replay and get particular person screenshots of all these sections. (Apple Music doesn’t have a style class.)

But that will get into one other drawback, which is that Apple Music Replay is introduced in actually the least screenshot-friendly format doable. Your high artists and high songs are listed first in slideshows of 5 (which means you scroll by them and see one after the other) after which in lengthy lists of 10. The 10 don’t match on a screenshotable web page. You can get, at most, the highest seven, however the image makes it fairly clear that you just’re solely getting a part of the record.

There is a technique to get a barely neater screenshot (it isn’t practically as visually interesting or effectively laid out as Spotify’s presentation, however it does exist) of simply your high 5 artists and high 5 songs, however that is actually buried. The technique to discover it’s to go to the Top Artists or Top Songs slideshow, click on by the complete slideshow, and it’s there on the finish. I requested each Apple Music person I do know, and none of them had discovered this display screen on their very own as a result of none of them had bothered or needed to click on by that slideshow when there was additionally only a record they might learn.

I perceive that these are small complaints to be making within the grand scheme of the world. But I believe what they communicate to is that Apple Music Replay just isn’t optimized for the use case that has made Spotify Wrapped such a cultural phenomenon: social media sharing.

Music is a large a part of our lives. It performs in my ears for vital parts of my day. It frames the whole lot from my commute and exercises to my toothbrushing routine. But I do not know what the general public in my life hearken to everyday, even these I’m very near. I’m fairly certain most of these folks don’t know what I hearken to (and I’m fairly loud about my desire for Okay-pop). Spotify Wrapped doesn’t simply record issues. It paints a sure image of a person, of their moods and tics and anxieties — of the best way they view the world.

Spotify Wrapped isn’t about music — or at the very least not solely. It’s about connection. It’s a technique to share basic components of our lives and ourselves. It’s a technique to discover issues in widespread and a brand new technique to come to know the folks we love.

Apple ought to be making an attempt to repeat Spotify right here. Wrapped is a legitimately thrilling and helpful product. That’s seemingly why so many different audio manufacturers, from YouTube Music and SoundCloud to actually Pocket Casts, have taken a whack at it. Wrapped is barely a think about one month, however yearly that I’ve to take a seat by it, I’m barely extra tempted to modify to Spotify. I actually suppose Apple will save customers if it may create a cultural product that actually measures as much as Spotify’s. But that product must be higher wanting, higher summarized, and simpler to share. That could also be an unlucky actuality, however it’s a actuality nonetheless.