Let me echo pelago's plea. My only use of Panucci (and I have used it a lot) is precisely as a "Podcast and Audiobook Player" and as such, I load (long) audio files into a directory, listen to them once (in pieces over a few days), and then (usually) delete them. I like picking the next item at random after I finish the previous one. Playlists seem to be oriented for compiling lists of files to listen to as a group again and again. That is a different usage pattern and would be completely appropriate for a music player app. The requirement of putting a file in a playlist just to play it once and delete it seems out of place for a podcast player.

This usage pattern that Xerxes2 describes as "the only one I can think of that has gotten a bit worse" is _the_ reason for my using Panucci.

As pelago says, "the change to a playlist-orientated design seems to be more of a fundamental/philosophical decision". And you are quite free to make such a change. If you do so, I'd encourage you to call Panucci a multi-use audio player (or some such) rather than a podcast and audio book player to reflect the change in philosophy.

I don't begrudge playlists for anyone who wants them. And it's fine to have them as an option in Panucci. But my sense is that podcasts are generally a "listen once" sort of thing. So making playlists the primary (or only) way to bring up an audio file to listen to once is a little puzzling to me for a podcast player app.

I may be missing something and I confess that I have not upgraded because the previous behavior as pelago describes it fits my usage pattern exactly.

I have very much appreciated Panucci as a "listen once and throw away" podcast player. It's a fine piece of work. I hope to continue enjoying it for a long time.

My apologies if I have belabored this too long. The N900 was such a promising piece of hardware and I do appreciate all those who have labored long and hard to give it a life on the software side.