For anyone “lucky” enough to have tried Google Wave, you may recognize some of these complaints from users who were asked by Google to list some of their dislikes. Since the image is a little hard to read, I will list them from most common to least common (and may have some comments to add):

My friend/contacts don’t have accounts

I must say that it’s quite annoying to not have many contacts in Google Wave, but I’m not even sure that I would use it any more if I did. Without notifications, either instantly or via email, I just find it very inconvenient. Being a limited preview, it’s natural for early users to not have many friends using Wave.

It’s too slow

Can’t say I’ve really experienced the slowness, but I imagine to someone who’s trying to use it as an instant messenger that would be quite annoying.

Other, please specify

I wish it was an application, or at least behaved like Facebook Chat, in the sense that IT lets me know when I’ve received a response. Also, you can get Facebook chat through IM clients like Adium. Also, it feels like no matter where I click, I’ve begun a reply or new thread. So annoying.

It crashes too often and is buggy

Considering it’s still a preview, this is to be expected. Again, I haven’t experienced this.

I’d like read only waves so people can’t change my content

This drives me CRAZY! Although I can see the need for people to edit other peoples’ messages, it should be evident that someone else changed the content. Also, there should be a way to turn off the ability to do so.

I already have too many information sources to check

Yup. At some point we’re going to have to be content with using a few means of communication/socializing. It’s already out of control, and this only stands to make it more hectic. Let’s hope it eveolves into something WORTH using, in order to justify having yet another information source.

Scrolling up and down

Really? These people aren’t already accustomed to doing so, on websites and in emails?

Not enough features I want

Ditto. One of my first questions was “what does it do?”. Sure, it’s a preview, but let’s hope it becomes a little more exciting in the future.

Managing the amount of information that is in my Wave inbox

I also find this kind of annoying. It just doesn’t feel user-friendly.

No extensions, gadgets, robots that are relevant

I’m hoping this will change as further development takes place, but as of now there just isn’t much to do. Even the file uploading is disabled. Bleh.

Keeping up with the unread Wave messages

This is also pretty tiresome, to be honest. Sure, there’s the playback feature, but who wants to sit through all of that. It’s hard to know the actual order that things were written. The test waves that people create are one giant mess.

Live typing – don’t like how other people can see what I’m writing

I can see how this would create problems for many horrible typists, and second-thought-ers who don’t think before beginning to write. Other than that, I don’t see it as a huge fault. On the other hand, what benefit does it add?

My own typing displays too slowly

That may be a downside of showing your typing to others. I’d rather see what I’M typing rather than others’ as-they-type-it words.

Too hard to learn how to use it

Upon first glance it seems a little unclear what exactly a person is supposed to do. I’m a pretty geeky and computerly-proficient person, and even I wondered what the heck I was doing. There are videos that can help, but who really wants to do that? Especially if they have any of the above complaints.

If you’re feeling a little down about the economy, or H1N1, or winter’s approach have no fear! Inventor Lauren McCarthy has a solution. It’s a hat that rewards you for smiling. Well, it more accurately punishes you for NOT smiling. So the reward is that you DON’T get stabbed in the back of the head. Check it out:

Nothing makes ME happier than looking like a Smurf that works at a call center, WHILE having my skull poked!

As you can see, the Artist is on the left and then the name of the song to the right of it. Yes, the columns are labeled incorrectly, but that is FAR less irritating than having the song title displayed first. And no, I did not simply change the ID3 tag to have the title and artist switched. That would be a solution but with thousands of songs, nobody would want to go through that process.

UPDATE: It turns out that this script just changes the ID3 tags. LAME!

The Answer

This won’t work with Windows, but it definitely works with Mac. Here’s a link to an AppleScript:

Doug’s AppleScripts for iTunes

Installation Instructions

iTunes Scripts for Mac OS X. To install AppleScripts for iTunes on a computer running Mac OS X, follow these steps:

*    Quit the iTunes application
*    Locate and open the iTunes folder in the Library folder in your Home folder
*    Inside this folder, create a new folder named “Scripts”
*    Place the script files in the newly created Scripts folder
*    Launch iTunes. An iTunes Script menu displaying the script collection will now be available in the menu bar

iTunes Scripts for Mac OS 9. To install AppleScripts for iTunes on a computer running Mac OS 9, follow these steps:

*    Quit the iTunes application
*    Locate and open the iTunes application folder
*    Inside the iTunes application folder, create a new folder named “Scripts”
*    Place the script files in the newly created Scripts folder
*    Launch iTunes. An iTunes Script displaying the script collection menu will now be available in the menu bar