Google Play Music App Bug - Wiping Cached Music Stored on SD Cards; Google is Working On it

[dgstorm]

There is a disturbing bug with the Google Play Music app. Basically, cached and stored-for-offline-playback music in the Google Play Music app is vanishing every time a user turns their phone off or reboots it. The one thing the problem has in common from device to device is a microSD slot, and occurs if you use the external SD card storage in the app. This is how Google tracked it down, and is working a fix for the problem.

Here's a quote with the contents of a reply from a Google tech support rep to the person who first reported this problem,

I want to first apologize for the information we provided to you about the issue with subscription tracks being deleted from the SD card. After reviewing your case details, it looks like the previous agent you spoke with misunderstood the issue that you're reporting. We have taken immediate actions to address this which should prevent a situation like this from happening in the future. Again, I deeply apologize for not accurately understanding the issue you were experiencing and for not providing you with the correct information on the issue.

I'd like to first explain how music is stored for offline listening. Music files that are downloaded to a device (phone or tablet) are only downloading a cached version of song's file, not the actual .mp3 file. This is done to help minimize the amount of space that the downloaded music takes up. This is also implemented to curb abuse of the subscription service as the download music is only accessible through the Google Play Music app for that device and account. This means that a user wouldn't be able to download music to an SD card and then take that SD card and use it on a different device as the music is chased to that device and account.

With that said, music that has been downloaded for offline listening, either to the internal storage or SD card, should never be deleted without the user initiating the deletion. This is an actual known issue with this service. The good news is that we are aware of this issue and are actively working to get it fixed. Thanks for your effort in submitting those logs earlier, which helped make us aware of this issue.

Is this a problem that any of our members have experienced?

Thanks for the tip, @leeshor!

Source: AndroidPolice

 

[LoneWolfArcher]

Who has music stored locally on storage?!?! (Says the guy that still has a grandfathered unlimited data plan!)

 

[Jonny Kansas]

You know, I never noticed. Haha! I stream a lot from the app, but haven't downloaded tracks in quite some time (except for the ones that I'm currently playing or have JUST played that it caches temporarily.)

And I'm not on unlimited data any more.

 

[bazar6]

I download whole playlists so I don't have to stream them on data. Didn't affect me though since the N6 doesn't have a SD slot.

 

[johnomaz]

I only download playlists when I know I'm going to be in bad reception area while driving. That has been a total of zero times but I'm sure one day it'll happen.

 

[94lt1]

I don't use Google play music..but I have had some music bought from amazon, mysteriously disappear from my devices..
I keep 2 devices with the exact same music on them and it happened with both...not related to this I don't think

 

[Jonny Kansas]

The big question here is, does it actually wipe the files from the sd card, or can it just not see them there? Could potentially clog up the cards of people who do heavy downloading if they've got multiple copies of the same cache file.

 

[Jonny Kansas]

This bug is claimed to be fixed in the latest update.