angryvillagers

Play Music and the associated app have received an update, some good news in the changelog for users and one piece of news that has angered the mob. Let’s get on with the good news first;

  • New ‘Manage downloads’ place that lets you see everything that you’ve downloaded, view the total space taken up by each item, and remove the downloads from device
  • Redesigned widget that’s resizable from 4×1 to 4×4
  • New 1×1 ‘I’m Feeling Lucky’ widget
  • You can now undo tracks removed from playlists and the queue via swipe

Add a few minor bug fixes to this and you’ve got a nice little update, some cosmetic changes and functionality additions that have been on the wanted list for heavy users for some time.

Then we get to the dark side of the latest update to the Play Music service, people who regularly change devices or (in the case of many of the Ausdroid Team) review devices and link them to your Play Music account are in for a shock. In the settings page for Play Music, right above the list of Authorized devices you’ll see

Manage My Devices
Your Music library is accessible from any computer, as well as up to ten devices. You can deauthorize four devices per year.

I took the time to investigate this and in the last 12 months I have linked, used and deauthorized 9 devices that were review units. So I now have the option of either;

  1. Not linking my Music to review devices
  2. Only doing this with “flagships” so I get the full experience as a daily driver
  3. Carry 2 phones while reviewing a device
  4. Downloading music onto review devices instead of using the service I pay for!
  5. Some other option I haven’t thought of yet… But I’m open to practical and polite suggestions

I understand that not everyone suffers this dilemma; but even for a relatively modest user of Android who enjoys having the latest toys, it’s no out of the realm of possibility that someone may change a half a dozen devices in a year. So with this in mind, I need to say that I’m confused Google, Why?

What’s your theory on why the limit of authorized devices has changed?

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