The latest to get adjustments is Windows Media Player. Though not used in Windows 10, it’s a default in Windows 7 for video playback. Despite this, Windows Latest spotted plans to cut the metadata portion of the app. “Going forward, you may be unable to view information (metadata) such as the title, genre, and artist for songs, and the director, actors, cover art, and TV guide for movies in Windows Media Center and Windows Media Player,” explains a Microsoft support document.
Will Users be Impacted?
Microsoft claims this “doesn’t affect any major media player functionality such as playback, navigating collections, media streaming”. In fact, this is unlikely to have a large impact on many users. Windows Media Player will still be able to read metadata from content that already has it embedded. It’s only metadata that users need to grab from the internet that will be affected. This change won’t affect metadata users downloaded previously, either. Ultimately, Microsoft says “Only secondary features that require downloading of new metadata are potentially affected”. Further, it says it cut the feature after looking at customer feedback and usage data. This isn’t likely to be a deal breaker for Windows 7 users, given third-party alternatives, but we’re sure to see more changes across the OS as it begins its end-of-life cycle.
