what genius is good for

So I like the Genius feature in iTunes and on my iPhone. I like the UI, I like how it removes all thinking from making a list of things to listen to when "Shuffle" just isn't enough, and in a meta way I particularly love how they created a little feature ladder from "Playlist" to "Smart Playlist" to "Genius Playlist." (Of course, a glass-half-full type could interpret that to mean that any playlist that I create myself is a "Dumb Playlist," but I digress...)

Anyway, based on my recent Genius experiences, here are two things that Genius is explicitly good for:

1. Only every once in a while throwing in a Vampire Weekend song. Genius knows that there's no way I could listen to the entire Vampire Weekend album in one stretch (lest I suffer an acute attack of the twees). But a single track shuffled Genius'd in once every 100 tracks can be sort of enjoyable in a "wow what a cute song!" kind of way.

2. More than every once in a while tossing in Broken Social Scene's "7/4 (Shoreline)". Somehow that track is ending up on almost every playlist Genius creates. Thanks, Genius!

Oh, and I was happy to see that the Remote app was updated for Genius support. Now I can be a Genius from my kitchen...if not in my kitchen.

Comments

[Doug]

It keeps adding in Anthems for a Seventeen Year Old Girl by Broken Social Scene to my "Genius" playlists, despite that being the only track of theirs I own. People used to claim that Shuffle had its own moods/preferences, and were proven wrong, but I'd be willing to say that Genius has a couple bands it likes a little more than others.

[Michael Sippey]

File under "evil genius:" someone at Apple really loves Broken Social Scene and deliberately tweaked the algorithm to put more BSS into people's heads.

File under "evil genius, part deux:" bands / labels could *pay* to have their stuff inserted into playlists more often.

Paging Pandora...

[Chris Ernest Hall]

Woah... I just checked my latest genius playlist, and out of a 100 songs, it had "7/4 Shoreline", the only BSS song.

[sarah]

+1 to BSS conspiracy theory -- it puts 7/4 into every genius playlist I make.

[Andrew Anker]

Hey, we saw Vampire Weekend yesterday at the Treasure Island show and they were good. We also listened to the album on the way to the show and on the way home from the show. And it was good. On behalf of Columbians and non-twee types everywhere, have fun with your Canadian faux rock conspiracy theories.

[Michael Sippey]

Thanks for chiming in, Vampire Weekend lover! By the way, I think you left your cardigan in my office. I'll try to remember to drop it by.