Ars Technica is reporting that Apple is in the midst of expanding iTunes Plus to include indie labels and to drop the price of all iTunes Plus songs to $0.99. Apple will keep the old “protected” songs at $0.99. It is said that the price drop is a response to Amazon’s new MP3 Store which has been very popular since it’s launch 3 weeks ago.
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.
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.
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.
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?
Apple announced today that they have sold over 3 billion songs through the iTunes store. Apple last hit 2 billion songs little over half a year ago in January 2007.
Graph courtesy of Jeffrey903 at MacRumors
Just got this sent in and makes a nice change from rumors about hardware updates! Apparently… Beyonce’s contract with Sony is coming to a close this December and Jay-Z will be free from Def Jam this year as well. So the story goes that they will be forming their own label together with Apple. Jay-Z will also bring artists he signed to DJ such as his other girlfriend Rihanna, song recycler Ne-Yo and Kayne “I can sample” West.
Apple today released iTunes 7.2 via Software Update which brings support for “iTunes Plus” tracks (DRM-free) as announced by Apple last month. You will also be able to upgrade any tracks you’ve previously bought if they’re from EMI or any other participating music labels for $0.30 each. Apple also added Paul McCartney’s music to the Store.
Carrie Underwood’s performance of The Pretenders “I’ll Stand By You” debuted at number 6 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart on Thursday. The song was performed at last week’s American Idol “Idol Gives Back” television show. In addition to Underwood’s success, the top three selling music videos on iTunes are also from the “Idol Gives Back” show.
Apple today announced that EMI Music’s entire digital catalog of music will be available for purchase DRM-free (without digital rights management) from the iTunes Store worldwide in May. DRM-free tracks from EMI will be offered at higher quality 256kbps AAC encoding, resulting in audio quality indistinguishable from the original recording, for $1.29 per song. In addition, iTunes customers will be able to upgrade their entire library of all previously purchased EMI content to the higher quality DRM-free versions for $0.30 a song. iTunes will continue to offer its entire catalog, currently over five million songs, in the same versions as today - 128kbps AAC encoding with DRM - at the same price of $0.99 per song, alongside DRM-free higher quality versions when available.
Apple today revealed “Complete My Album”, a new feature for the iTunes Storethat allows customers to turn their individual tracks into a complete album at a reduced price by giving them a full $0.99 credit for every track previously purchased from that album. Customers have up to 180 days after buying the individual songs from any qualifying album to purchase the rest of that album at a discount: someone who has bought three $0.99 songs from a $10 album, for example, can buy the rest of the album for $7.02 - saving them both the need to re-purchase tracks they already own as well as the time needed to download them again. The feature is available across all currently active iTunes Stores worldwide and automatically creates a retroactive 180-day offer for any singles purchased by customers before today.
Apple confirmed on Thursday that Sony will join the iTunes Store with several new television shows. “News Radio,” “Till Death,” the original animated version of “Spiderman,” “Starsky and Hutch” and “Charlie’s Angels” will all be available for purchase from the store later today. Sony joins some 60 other channels already available on the iTunes Store including NBC, CBS, ABC, A&E, Spike, Fox and TLC.
Apple today released iTunes 7.1.1 via Software Update…
“iTunes 7.1.1 addresses a stability issue and minor compatibility problems in iTunes 7.1.”
Apple has released QuickTime 7.1.5 and iTunes 7.1 via its Software Update pane and on the Web. Apple says: “QuickTime 7.1.5 delivers numerous bug fixes and addresses critical security issues. This update is recommended for all QuickTime 7 users.” With iTunes 7.1 you “can now enjoy your favorite iTunes movies, TV shows, music, and more from the comfort of your living room with Apple TV. iTunes 7.1 also supports a new full screen Cover Flow and improved sorting options to let you decide how iTunes should sort your favorite artists, albums, and songs.
Courtesy of “Broo2″ at Flickr.
Update: Seems this was a joke, an employee swapped the “iPod and $15 iTunes” offer with the “Zune and headphones” one.
Apple plans to open up protected music and movies content bought from the iTunes Store. Apple is expected to make two announcements, possibly as early as this week - the first will be to allow streaming of protected AAC content via USB; the second will be to licence its Fairplay DRM to the company’s “Made For iPod” licencees. The expected announcements could signal a move on Apple’s part to take some of the sting out of its Fairplay DRM which has come in for a great deal of criticism over recent months.
Beginning today, iTunes has added more than 100 movies from Paramount Pictures priced at just $9.99 including “School of Rock,” “The Italian Job,” “Mean Girls,” “Zoolander,” “Coach Carter,” “Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events,” “Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life,” “Chinatown” and “Breakfast at Tiffany’s.” US iTunes Store only.
The Register is reporting that Apple’s iTunes has suffered from a collapse in sales revenues this year. Secretive Apple doesn’t break out revenues from iTunes, but Forrester conducted an analysis of credit card payments over a 27-month period. And this year’s numbers aren’t good. While the iTunes service saw healthy growth for much of the period, since January the monthly revenue has fallen by 65%, with the average transaction size falling 17%. Forrester revealed some fascinating details about iTunes purchasing habits. Some 3.2% of online households (around 60% of the wider population) bought at least one download, and these dabblers made on average 5.6 transactions, with the median household making just three a year. The average transaction per household was slightly under $3.
As expected, Apple today launched the iTunes Store in New Zealand. Most songs are priced at NZ$1.79, music videos at NZ$3.59 and most albums at NZ$17.99. So which other countries can we expect it to launch in?
The New Zealand Herald is reporting that Apple may be due to give an announcement on the launch of a New Zealand iTunes on Wednesday. They wrote: “All we’re allowed to do is let you know that it’s an interview with a senior Apple person and that that person will be making an announcement.” However, Apple’s Sydney-based Australia and New Zealand public relations manager, Fiona Martin, denied it was iTunes being announced. She remained staunch in her refusal to comment on products that were not on the market. “What happens with everything we launch, we let you know on the same day,” she told TimeOut last month.
Update: As expected, Apple has launched the iTunes Store in New Zealand.
As we reported last week, Apple has finally released a fix for iTunes. Version 7.0.1 should fix most, if not all, bugs and nuisances from iTunes 7. It is available online or via Software Update.
iTunes 7.0.1 addresses stability and performance issues with Cover Flow, CD importing, iPod syncing, and more.
Disney today announced that they have sold over 125,000 movies in the iTunes Movie store during it’s opening week. This resulted in $1 million revenue. Rob Iger (Disney CEO) projects that Disney will earn over $50 million in additional revenue during the first year business.
It appears that Apple is busy fixing up iTunes for a quick “point one” update next week. Since iTunes 7 was released a few days ago, many users have been saying that it’s “the worse iTunes update ever” and “did Apple even alpha test it?”. Posts on Apple Support forums have angry users complaining that iTunes 7 is a memory hog, crashes the system and has song “amnesia”. Don’t expect a change to the new interface though, it seems that this is the upcoming “Leopard” look *shudders*. Anyone else having problems?
Before you start shouting, “Where’s the difference” - just look! Notice the blue sidebar instead of the silver one that “us” users have. The picture comes from an Apple Support page. I think I prefer this one actually.
Update: If you also look at the sidebar icons, they’re different from the iTunes 7 release we got. Still has the old green iTunes logo!
Apple today announced iTunes 7, the most significant enhancement to the world’s most popular music jukebox and online music and video store since it debuted in 2001. iTunes 7 delivers stunning new features such as the new album and Cover Flow views of music, TV shows and movies, enabling users to quickly find titles in their library as well as casually browse through and re-discover titles they already own. In addition, the iTunes Store is now offering over 75 movies from Walt Disney Pictures, Pixar, Touchstone Pictures and Miramax Films, that customers can purchase and download to watch on their computers and iPods, and soon on their flat screen televisions with Apple’s upcoming iTV player. Movies will become available on the iTunes Store the same day they are released on DVD, with new releases priced at $12.99 when pre-ordered and during their first week of availability, and $14.99 thereafter, and library titles available for just $9.99 every day.
