Since Apple's HomePod landed at home, there has been a noticeable increase in this household's music consumption. I find myself hunting for albums I think will sound great on the HomePod; showcase songs to flick on when friends are over to wow them. I've even adjusted weekend hangout patterns to play an album or two while I'm on the couch with the boyfriend, each silently lost in our own devices and screens. For something that triggered behavior change so quickly, it frustrates me to no end that I can't remotely recommend the thing to anyone.
Almost as useful as a mac's spinning beach ball.
I've always loved the notion of movie magic, and try whenever possible to make those sorts of magical moments with people I care about. Finding just the right song to put on while cooking together is just the kind of magic that HomePod doesn't want you to make. To get an isolated music experience, you must talk at Siri and awkwardly command this electric servant to fetch and hopefully play the right song. Alternatively, you can pick the song on your iOS device and choose to AirPlay sound to the speaker, locking the two apple products and making it really hard for you to try to then search recipes on sites with crappy ad banners that want to also project sound through the HomePod. I don't like phone calls and talking through a device at humans; I find talking solely to a device even more annoying.
This speaker has incredible sound quality, but a non-existent UI and a really limited set of UX choices really handicap it from being a must-buy. I want an app that lets anyone on the shared wifi network with the HomePod to be able to queue up music that is sourced from the HomePod and not parasitically AirPlayed from a device and blocking some of its functionality. When setting up AirPlay, you can at least see what was last being played on the speaker. Apple should give me a HomePod app or a new way to navigate the Music app wherein all music choices are saved and queued up on the speaker itself.
Right now the HomePod is a DJ with great gear that I need to talk to every time I want music. Make it easier (and quieter) for me to curate music to play from it and I'd be singing its praises left and right. No one wants awkward back and forth with their DJ at home.