Well, after a bit of a c*ck up this morning with an early release iTunes Match has finally gone live internationally!

I have just signed up and created my "low bit rate" playlist.

It is currently on step 1 of 3, i.e. "Gathering information about my iTunes Library".

That is before it moves onto matching and then finally uploading (I presume any it can't match).

I have a "low bit rate" playlist which has the conditions... Less than 256kbps and shooing as either matched or purchased on iCloud. Once the matching is done I can then delete the entire playlist and iTunes will update them all to 256k AAC (or whatever) format and it'll also mean that it get's rid of all those scratches and skips that have been burnt from the CDs into my library. (They are very annoying and I will be glad to get rid of them).

I'll keep you posted as to how it goes.

(Currently 50% of the way through "gathering information")

Last time I looked, over a third of my collection wasn't available on iTunes anyway. That said, I have 100% of the ripped stuff on CD behind me, so I can rip them at a higher bitrate, if I need to, the vinyl is not ripped and over 90% of that isn't available on iTunes.

That said, I don't really listen to music these days, I just don't seem to have the time or be in the mood, it just tends to give me a headache.

Well, this morning there was a problem and it asked me to log out and back in to my account.

Did that and in the same time it took to get to 50% of step 1 yesterday it had already done 50% of step 2 this morning.

Also, when I left for work it had matched 1600 songs that were in my "low bit rate" playlist. i.e. below 256kbps and replacable by iTunes match.

If you sign up for it, then cancel it at a later date, do you loose all of the higher bit-rate tracks?

I don't imagine so as they are on your computer.
I'll have a looky.

Currently downloading 1750 songs from iCloud

Yay!

Cool, well I've now downloaded all my songs from iCloud at 256Kbps and synced them all to my iPhone

Signups gave been pulled. Stories in various tech blogs, plus the option to sign up no longer appears in my copy of iTunes.