Microsoft Details Music +Video Hub Changes In Mango

Microsoft today detailed the upcoming changes to Music+Video hub in Windows Phone Mango. Here are they,

• Better playback controls: The playback controls are bigger and are now aligned with the mini-playback control—so your thumbs always know where to go.
• Podcasts now included :You can already listen to podcasts on your Windows Phone. The catch is you  need your computer and the Zune software to actually browse and download them. In Mango, you can now do all this right on your phone (U.S. customers only).
• Better artist images: We found that the background artist images were sometimes too bright, which made some controls hard to see. Our  design team worked hard to find the right opacity for the images. The end result you’ll see in Mango has a great layered look and never interferes with the controls.
• More playback info: We’ve added the artist name to the  music player queue so that when you’re jamming to your new Smart DJ mix, you  know exactly what’s up next.
• More playback options: Tap the Repeat button a couple of  times and you’ll see the addition of a Repeat Once mode for those songs you just can’t get enough of.
• New playlist option: Yep, that’s right—you can finally create playlists on your device. Add a mix of whatever you want
  to your queue or start a Smart DJ mix and save it as a playlist.
• Better data management: In Mango, Zune Pass subscribers now see an icon on the phone when they’re listening to streamed music—so you always know when you’re consuming data.
• More video options: Last but not least, for videos, we’ve added a full-screen toggle and video scrubbing (where supported) so you have quick access to the parts of your videos you love most—features we heard you ask for!
• A DJ in your pocket We all have those moments when we want to listen to some music. But not just
  anything. We want tunes that fit the mood. A new feature coming in Mango called Smart DJ is designed to provide just the right mix. Smart DJ takes “seeds”—an artist, album, or song— and creates a music mix that’s similar using whatever songs it finds on your phone. If you have a monthly Zune Pass music subscription, Smart DJ selects from the millions of tracks available in the Zune catalog.
• Find stuff in Marketplace easier : Now when you start typing in the Marketplace search box, you’ll see search
  terms appear. Search results are also now organized by content type (apps or games, music, or podcasts). We make it even simpler to find what you want by indicating exactly what each search result is—artist, album, song, or playlist, for example. Marketplace search is also context sensitive. Start a search from the podcast Marketplace and you’ll land right into the podcast results pivot. Same goes for music.

That’s a good list of tweaks and updates for the Music+Video hub. I’m happy to see that Zune service is not going anywhere as rumored before. What do you think of these changes?

Source: Windows Phone Blog