MacShrine

Love Starbucks? Got an iPhone? Live in the USA? Then good, starting 2nd October they’ll be giving you free songs from the iTunes WiFi Music Store. They won’t just be any song downloads though, they’ll be “Song Of The Day” gift cards. These will be from 37 artists that are signed on with Starbucks’ Music label including Paul McCartney, Joni Mitchell, Joss Stone, Dave Matthews, John Mayer, Annie Lennox and Band of Horses. “Joker Man” by Bob Dylan will be the first song available to customers on October 2nd.

This will probably be the biggest news from the Expo Paris. Microsoft has today announced packages and pricing of their upcoming Office 2008 which will be released in January.

Office 2008 for Mac Home and Student Edition, which includes three licenses for Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Entourage will cost $150.

A $400 version aimed at professionals who use Apple computers, simply called Office 2008 for Mac, includes the same programs as Home and Student, plus the ability to connect to a Windows Exchange server.

A third version, the $500 Special Media Edition, adds features to the $400 configuration, including Expression Media, a program that helps computer users organize and manipulate digital photos, video and other files.

All three versions work on Intel-based Macs and older PowerPC machines when launched in January next year.

The Apple Expo Paris started today until the 29th. Erm, yeh, we did actually forget all about it. We’ll bring you any major announcements if anything happens.

When did this feature come? We just noticed it today! Pretty handy. It seems to be available in all iTunes Stores. Nice to see some Web 2.0 action.

We’ll make this quick as we’re mightily upset at how Apple is treating us Europeans. A press conference was held at the Apple Store here in London this morning and they announced the iPhone will finally launch here on 9th November via O2 for £269. As America, it’s only available on an 18-month exclusive contract. That’s all very well but what’s with the high price? Doesn’t Apple know we Brits expect to have the handset cost dissolved into our contract? Can anyone remember when they had to pay for a contract phone? Also no 3G? What is this.. 2001? And don’t even get us started on the pathetically overpriced tariffs. Screw you Apple. Sort this mess out. Fast.

We just discovered that there is a bug in the firmware now whilst playing with our new iPod classic and iPod nano. If you have the “Volume Limit” set on, play a song and then go play a game. When playing the game the volume limit will be deactivated and the song becomes much louder. When you quit the game it becomes active again.

Update: When we said “OS X” iPods, we meant the new range with the iPod touch which does have OS X on it. Guess we should clear the title up.

As reported earlier this week Apple is giving a $100 rebate to all consumers who purchased an iPhone prior to the price cut last week (August 22nd). If this applies to you then check it out. The credit can be used for any Apple Store and iTunes.

Nearly 4 years after purchasing Logic, Apple has finally updated the program today with Logic Studio 8 and Logic Express 8. They describe the new software as:

“From the fun and intuitive GarageBand to the all new Logic Studio, there’s never been a better time to be a musician on the Mac,” said Rob Schoeben, “For less than $500, Logic Studio transforms the Mac into the most powerful musical instrument in the world.”

Logic Studio is available now for $499. Logic Express is available for $199. This prices the software aggressively against similar software like Reason and Protools.

Apple is inviting UK media to a special event at its flagship London store on Regents Street next week. The event invitation says: “Mum is no longer the word”, and asks media and analysts to turn up at 10am on Tuesday 18 September for a press conference.

Nobody is quite sure what this is about but it’ll probably be some iTunes announcement for Europe or info about the iPhone launching in the UK.

Apple announced today that it has sold its one millionth iPhone. They said:

“One million iPhones in 74 days — it took almost two years to achieve this milestone with iPod. We can’t wait to get this revolutionary product into the hands of even more customers this holiday season.”

Those who purchased an iPhone before Wednesday’s price cut will get a $100 rebate to use at the Apple Store and online Store. Details will be published on the Apple site next week. We just feel sorry for those who bought a 4GB…

Apple today discontinued the 4GB iPhone and cut the price of the 8GB to just $399. This was due to intense consumer focus on the top 8GB model. They also announced that they will ship a firmware update later this month to provide iPhone users access to the new iTunes WiFi Music Store. Still no word on a release date in Europe or elsewhere.

Those who have an iPod touch or iPhone will be lucky enough to have access to the new iTunes WiFi Music Store. This enables users to buy songs on-the-go at any WiFi spot. It has the full catalogue of songs as the normal iTunes Music Store although it is not known if movies, TV shows and music videos will also be included - we think not.

• Thinner than the iPhone - only 8mm
• Same multitouch pinch & spread zooming controls as iPhone
• Same coverflow as the iPhone
• 3.5″ diagonal screen
• Wi-Fi 802.11b & 802.11g
• Home button
• Slide to unlock - same as the iPhone
• Sensor for auto-landscape viewing
• Safari - connect to the internet via WiFi
• YouTube via WiFi
• 22 hours audio, 5 hours video playback
• Shipping worldwide this month
• 8GB - $299
• 16GB - $399

• 80GB - $249
• 160GB - $349
• 40 hrs music playback, 7 hrs video playback
• Available today

• Incredibly smaller
• New colors: (RED), silver, light blue, teal & green
• Full Metal design
• New User Interface - includes Cover Flow
• Three games bundled - includes Vortex
• Video-capable
• 2″ screen, with brigher, QVGA resolution (320×240)
• 4GB - US$149
• 8GB - US$199
• 24 hours of audio playback, 5 hours video playback
• Shipping today
• Both models compatible with Nike+ running kit

I bought a song for $0.99 and I want to use THAT as my ringtone not buy the song again to use as my ringtone. Anyway - 500,000 songs will be available for this new “Ringtone Maker” feature in iTunes. A bell icon will be next to all the songs in iTunes compatible with this. They last for 30 seconds. Which again brings the subject of why we’re paying the price of a full song AGAIN for just 30 seconds? Did Apple think this one out?