From The Hip

Don’t go changin'

Turns out there may be some logic behind these iTunes 10 UI changes all the kids are talking about. Here’s some potential reasoning behind some of the more dramatic changes:

The Traffic Light

Perhaps one of the most visually un-natural changes is the vertical orientation of the window widgets. In fact this has been present in iTunes for a while. You may have noticed this arrangement when you accidentally clicked the orange, (or was it the green?) button, and the window would transform into the little floating control window. Then you’d try and guess whether it was the orange or green button which would return your window to normality. Turns out people don’t actually know what the orange or green buttons do on windows, let alone intentionally use them. Notice the one button people actually know and use hasn’t moved at all. The red close button is where it always was. So why change it at all, what does this new orientation buy? It simply allows the title bar, which happens to be huge in iTunes, to be shrunk by 20 pixels, without affecting function. Small change, but, in this case, significant gain.

True Colours

The next most obvious change is the draining of colour from the ever expanding source list. This element has grown dramatically over the years, adding Movies, TV Shows, iTunes U, Apps, Music Store, Genius, and most recently Ping. It had become a distracting conglomerate of various functions and shiny icons that any magpie would be proud to call home. By removing colour, it immediately becomes less distracting while browsing content. I think this change will take a little time to grow on people. I’m use to identifying and navigating parts of the source list by colour. Now I’ve got to learn to navigate via shape. Perhaps most interestingly, the removal of colour may actually result in a significant improvement in navigating around the source list, given the brain is a shape recognition machine.

The Icon

Radical, I know. Personally I’d probably prefer the rounded rect shape of iOS icons to the circle  (a la The IconFactory's Flurry sets). But other than that, it’s a nice upgrade from the boring and oh so dated CD:

(Image from: When Will They Update The iTunes Icon?)

People tend to be naturally resistant to change. Most of the initial reactions i’ve seen fall into the ‘this is different and therefore horrible’ category. I’m sure most all will come to like the changes over time, seems there are good reasons for them. 

Personally I’m glad to see change. After all, if there’s one Apple product which is in drastic need of radical change, it’s iTunes. 

Layton Duncan

UPDATE:

@Cabel pointed out the monochrome preferences toolbar icons, one thing I forgot to mention. These really should be returned to their former glory. They’re nice monochrome, but they’re much nicer in colour.