As in the pictures below, I want to have a login page at first. After a user logs in, he goes to the homepage, which is fully customizable. To customize, a user clicks “My Account” and goes through customization. He can define what he wants see on his homepage, define position, size and number of boxes ( “Top 10”, “New Releases”, etc.); number of elements each box displays and view/scroll options. He can turn on or turn off recommendations as well as the “Music You Might Love” section. The system recommends songs/albums based on previous purchases, whereas, “Music You Might Love” based on top songs in predefined genres.
Human-Computer Interaction @ IU 
November 10, 2008 at 12:29 pm
I like the sketch in the sense that the first thing that you see is the center, which is recommended music. There is also a section to the left that is similar to the recommended section, which is also good because it is still near the center and based on the user needs. This sketch is similar to my idea because I tried to put the most important links at the top of the page as well. You have a couple more than I do, but the idea is still the same which I thought was important because they are user centered. The only question I have about your sketch is are the boxes for the tops songs, new releases and top movie rentals supposed to stay in that area and then you use the arrows to view the rest of the content in the box, or would you have it open and the uses would have to use the scroll of the entire store? Other than this question, I like the design a lot.
November 10, 2008 at 4:57 pm
Those boxes are not expandable, however, if a user wants to see the whole list of the items, he can click the title, which is the link to the list of all top songs or new releases. The boxes display as many items as you define in preferences and a user can set vertical or horizontal scrolling as well.
November 17, 2008 at 8:17 pm
I like the idea of asking the user for their tastes (assuming it’s a one time thing)
About the login concept, iTunes runs under the assumption that you are the sole user of the application in that PC. So is it really necessary to have that? Also how may times have you quit a webpage just because it requires you to create a user id?
November 17, 2008 at 8:45 pm
1) Millions of people have to use iTunes and I reasonably think that anyone could take 5 minutes to create a lifetime account;
2) It is the Store, involving money transactions, so why not require users to login to prevent others from using his iTunes Store account? I could add another checkbox “Remember me on this computer” though, if typing in a username, along with a password everytime, is a pain.