As good as the new Playing Now Popup (PNP) is, I still find the Taskbar Icon Popup to be useful, because it is an easy fast swipe to open and reach its control buttons or temporarily glance at the full UI with a mouse hover. Which raises the question - how about adding features of the Taskbar Icon Popup to the PNP:
(1) Add an option to open the PNP nearby to the Taskbar in response to hovering over MC's Taskbar Icon (instead of opening the Taskbar Icon Popup)? Presumably this would only work when the MC UI is open or minimized (?). Otherwise depend on <CTRL>+i shortcut. I'm not sure if Windows allows such an action; if not, add PNP to Taskbar Icon's RMB context menu.
(2) Add a mouseover target area on the PNP which temporarily opens the full MC UI, like the Taskbar Icon Popup does now, and which sticks if the PNP is LMB clicked there.
(3) Improve upon the Taskbar Icon Popup by having the PNP mouseover open a temporary live copy of MC's UI.
(4) Allow two customizable copies of the PNP, one that only responds to a Taskbar icon mouseover, and one which behaves as currently with the <CTRL>+i shortcut (allow different skins and locations). Alternatively, add an option to the PNP which enables it to also open in response to a Taskbar Icon mouseover (again, I'm not sure if Windows allows this type of action - if not, add PNP to Taskbar Icon's RMB context menu).