After turning on iCloud/iTunes match, my playlist was duplicated 2000 times

Thanks. What ended up working for me was letting the script run (36 hours) and also restoring the ipod that originally "caused" the problem.

I also think this is airplane mode related when I added a playslist while in airplane mode.

I had the exact same problem and solved it - no script no nothing. It was also caused by being in airplane mode and creating a playlist. Basically, I turned itunes match off on my ipod and iphone. I left itunes match on on my PC (you need to do this or it won't delete on the cloud) . I then put my mouse on one of the playlists and put a weight on the delete key (in this case i had a handy metal bookmark) - simulating me pushing delete over and over again. Alternatively you can just hold down the delete key with your finger but it will take a while. It took about 15 minutes to delete all of them (I must have had thousands and thousands) - definitely a lot faster than the automated scripts seem to take from what i've read. I then updated my itunes match library. Some of the playlists actually came back (but not nearly as long a list). I used the same procedure to delete them again (took about 1 minute). Then I updated. There was no more playlists. Then I turned itunes match on on my other devices and problem solved.

I also have had success in correcting this problem. My setup is an iPod touch, iPhone 4, and MacBook Pro. The error first occurred when I created a playlist on my ipod at work, whose wifi blocks access to iCloud. This resulted in 2000 copies of an empty playlist with the name of the one i created on both the iPhone and iPod, showing up as playlists that were available in iCloud but not downloaded to the device. It appeared on my Mac when iTunes Match updated when i bought some new mp3s (2000 empty playlists), and 2000 more each time I clicked "Store > Update iTunes Match". I eventually turned off iTunes Match on both devices, restored them to factory settings, backed up from the iCloud backups, and did not re-enable iTunes Match on either. (That last step is important - i did that the first time, and the playlists reappeared.) I used the Automator "Remove Empty Playlists" workflow (a godsend) to remove the copies on my Mac (only ~6000 total, so no need for the script), and then just left iTunes Match alone for a few days (3 days to be exact). I did leave iTunes Match on on the Mac, but did not try updating it. I synced my iPhone and iPod the non-Match way, loading up music through iTunes. My guess is that leaving match alone for a while let the server figure out what was going on, and remove the playlists from my iTunes Match library. Today, when I turned iTunes Match on on my iPhone as a test, the playlists were nowhere to be found. Thanks everyone for your help on this thread!

Restoring your device will allow you to get into the music app,if not, restore itunes match and your device.

If nothing is working for you i would suggest you get all your music in the cloud then ontoall the devices you want them on. Once finished switch iTunes Match off All your devices and wait for a permanent fix.

I've been having the same issue. I created a playlist on my ipad while I was not connected to the internet and when I reconnected to my network, it duplicated the playlist more than 20 000 times to my macbook and my iphone. I tried deleting the extra playlist but everytime I try, itunes crashes on me and I'm unable to restart it. Even after I turned off itunes match on all my devices,restored them all, restored my macbook, the duplicate copies of the playlist keep coming back. I spent two hours on the phone with apple care, went to the genius bar for two hours, exchanged emails with Itunes support and now, they have apparently sent my case to some other higher level department. Nobody seems to understand why the playlists are coming back even after Itunes Match is turned off. Not only that, it has corrupted my itunes library and they can't seem to be able to delete my library from their server. They are supposed to get back to me within 24 hours so I guess I'll just have to wait and see because I am completly out of ideas.

Can't you restore your iTunes library from a backup of before you turned on iTunes Match for the first time?

Hey people... I had the same issue 30k+ playlists were created. It is definitely related to airplane mode. I've edited an existing playlist in airplane mode with no issue, but if you create one and enter airplane mode shortly after all **** breaks loose. As someone mentioned earlier, the longer the flight the more duplicates you get.

I'm seeing everyone is fixing it differently.

For me this worked:

I created an applescript:

with timeout of (45 * 60) seconds

tell application "iTunes"

delete (every playlist whose name is "Holiday")

end tell

end timeout

This sets a timeout of 45 mins... If you have over 30k I suggest changing it to over an hour by substituting the 45 with 60 or whatever suits you.

You must change the name to whatever your playlists are named (mine were named all the same so it worked, if not checkout dougscripts.com [and yes you guessed it, mine were called Holiday: nothing like this to get you out of the Christmas spirit]).

After I deleted them I left it untouched overnight since I guess it replicates with the itunes match severs and takes some time.

Early morning I updated itunes match, manually, and this did it for me.

Hope this helps.

You can monitor progress with the following script in case they don't all go away.

tell application "iTunes"

countplaylists

end tell

I saved this scripts in the folder:

/Users/username/Music/iTunes/Scripts

If the folder "scripts" doesn't exist... create it.

Hope this helps.

Seriously? Apple hasn't figured out how to help this instead of having to go through some crazy deleting, updating, moving files, turning things on an off? Really? This is what we all paid $25 per year to do? To manage our OWN music? Hey Steve - where are you when we need you most? How about some real solutions instead of passing this off onto the Apple community to figure out and have to do manually. Is this the legacy? Figure it out yourself? Nice work guys.

New but related question... is anyone having problems syncing following this playlist fiasco? I've got my thousands of playlists removed now from iTunes PC as well as cloud (at least it seems that way because they're not coming back), but now my devices (ipad2, iphone4) can't sync. Getting "Sync can't start" errors. Have some seen sporadic reports, and nothing suggested has solved the problems, including resets, turning off cloud/match, etc.

Not sure if it's related, but the timing of problem start is the same.

I am having the same problem. To be honest this is more annoying than 10,000 playlists in my iTunes. I have restored both my iOS devices twice and they will not sync anymore.

not that i have a fix yet - but i can tell you what happened for me to do it. I tried to work around the no genius problem by turning off match, creating a genius playlist then turning match back on. Thats when it went haywire. Interesting that the genius playlist that i created went away (bc its not in the cloud i guess) but a couple of manual on the go playlists are the ones that i have tons of.

Maybe this will help the apple folks.

After exchanging numerous emails with the Itunes store support staff, they finally managed to reset my itunes match account. Stefanie, a customer support senior advisor was the one who talked to the right people about getting rid of all the extra playlists. Once they did the reset, I re-activated itunes match on the macbook, then the ipad and finally the iphone and everything seems to be working smoothly. I won't be creating anymore playlists until they release an update. It really seems that the best way to go about fixing this problem is to get them to reset your account. I can't tell you how many hours I spent on my own and with senior advisors on the phone trying to find a solution and nothing ever worked. Once Stefanie sent me the email saying my account was deleted, it took 2 hours and everything was back to normal.

This script:

with timeout of (45 * 60) seconds

tell application "iTunes"

delete (every playlist whose name is "<Playlist Name>")

end tell

end timeout

was great, and fast. It killed 6000+ playlist within 3 min or so.

Thank you.