Feature description:
I would like something equivalent to the “speed dial” feature seen in YTM. It presents a 3x3 grid of familiar music, and tapping one will immediately start playback, as well as queue up tracks based on that initial selection.
Essentially, it’s an immediate front and center shortcut to give one song as an example for what you are in the mood for, then listen to that song, before being presented with more like it, but without being restricted to just favorites or a given playlist.
That is kinda how all music streaming services work, but!
What is displayed in the “speed dial” grid is not intended to be listened to together, instead the speed dial seems to attempt to include music that is as different as possible, so you have ACTUAL OPTIONS for what style of music you are in the mood for.
All overview rows that can be made to superficially resemble the speed dial feature of YTM, currently either play the songs in them in sequence, or do not present a varied range of choices. None seem to be able to present several distinctly different options, but which then lead to more music that is similar to the chosen option.
If I use a random favorites playlist, picking an entry will result in me only hearing favorites. If I use last played, I will only hear recently listened tracks, etc.
The closest I can currently get to an overview row that works the way I want, is to favorite only a small amount of very different music, then enabling “Favorite Songs”. Then, instead of tapping entries in it, I tap and hold a song to drag it to the shuffle option.
This results in a stream of music I am quite pleased with, every time, without simply playing just my favorites. That said, I would like to be able to favorite a large portion of my collection, and use favoriting for what it is intended.
“Random Songs” also works decently well, but is then “too” random. I would like the grid of songs to stick to songs that I am immediately familiar with at a glance (such as favorites, or songs with high playcounts), as that is a part of why it works.
Playlist rows cannot be tapped and held to shuffle based on a given song, otherwise they would present me with an easy way to use a playlist, instead of my favorites.
Problem solved:
When the “speed dial” feature was first implemented in YTM, I was impressed, because it solves an extremely common problem, at least for me.
I get stuck in loops of listening to the same thing, and streaming algorithms would home in on that one style of music so that whenever I’d go to play some, I’d be presented with more of the same.
With my personal library I have a similar problem, first because my collection used to be small, but now that it has grown very large, because most apps only offer to play personal music collections far too randomly (leading to jarring progression between songs), or by only sticking to a small subset of the tracks available, by favoring favorites, recently played, and such.
I have a massive amount of music I know I like, but seldom hear, because in order to avoid the far too random randomness of shuffling my entire library, I stick to a small subset of it. Only venturing out to listen to old favorites when I happen to think of them.
Brought benefits:
The endless play and personal mix features of Symfonium have already impressed me with their ability to maintain song progression, while also playing tracks from my library that I haven’t listened to in years.
I believe a front and center entry point to these features in the style of the YTM “speed dial” would be VERY neat. It would allow a user to instantly “set the mood” using a track they know, with just one tap after opening the app.
Using the “speed dial” in the YTM app was a delight, and I am already finding Symfonium capable of matching its ability to play a satisfying sequece of tracks.
It is merely that getting there asap when opening the app currently requires I limit my favorites to about a dozen tracks, as well as holding and pulling the initial track I want to hear instead of just tapping it.
I know it’s a nitpick, and I’ll be sticking with Symfonium either way, but I found the “speed dial” to be such genius UX that I simply had to bring it up.
Other application solutions:
YTM apps “speed dial” feature.
YTM also includes albums in the grid. I do not like this, as it increases the taps required to get music playing, defeating the point of a “speed dial” imo.
Additional description and context:
I made a playlist named “Instant Mixes” to show what this overview row could look like. Of course it could be made configurable to look however a user likes, just like existing overview rows, but I like the 3x3 grid of options that YTM uses.
It narrows down the number of choices to something that doesn’t induce choice anxiety, while being enough that a range of different music can be presented.
I also included a screenshot of what my current speed dial is on YTM. I like the title of the tracks being displayed over the cover art, but that is not a critical aspect. The point is that it displays categorically different tracks that are familiar, which lets you get to exploring new stuff but in a way that’s congruent with what you feel like listening to in a given session.
Screenshots / Mockup: