I'm planning to start off with this new series of ideas for creating playlists of all sorts. But I'll focus mostly on the Smart Playlists in iTunes.
Here's one. You can create a playlist that automatically sorts highly rated songs that you haven't listened to in a long time. To get started, go to File -> New Smart Playlist... or press Ctrl+Alt+N. A dialog box pops up to ask you instructions for the playlist.
Change the parameters to match the following. To add a second instruction, like I have done here, just click the little 'plus' (+) button on the right.
Click the image for a larger view:
What I have told iTunes to do is to put in songs that are rated 4 or 5 stars. But out of those songs, only the songs that I have not listened to for the previous month are selected. You should change the date there to your preference (and of course, based on the time you are reading this article in). Also, I have limited the number of songs to 15, and you can change that. Hit OK and you're ready to groove.
I named it 'iLike but not iListen'. See? It's such an iName.
Want more ideas for playlists? Check out this new one.