If you were planning to get an iPhone, like a lot of tech people are (I would like to get one, but the price is not very nice), now there is one more hoop to jump through. As if $499 out of your pocket wasn’t enough, Apple now wants you to join their huge digital distribution service, therefore ensuring that one of their products will beget another, as the iPod, video iPod, AppleTV, and upcoming iLife all have wonderful relationships with iTunes.

All this means is that before you can use your iPhone, you must activate it, which is true for most if not all cell-phones. The only difference is that Apple wants you to have an iTunes account. Okay, so this is no big deal, but it is a strange request nonetheless.

Apple puts it another way:

To set up your iPhone, you’ll need an account with Apple’s iTunes Store. If you already have an iTunes account, make sure you know your account name and password. If you don’t have an account, you should set one up now to save time later. To set up an account, launch iTunes, select the iTunes Store, and click the Sign In button in the upper right corner of iTunes. Sign in and you’re ready to go.

While I cannot say for certain whether or not I will be buying an iPhone, this may or may not deter me (vague, huh?). Basically, it would be nice if I could just walk into a store, buy the iPhone for the handsome price of half a grand, activate it with a calling plan, then walk out of the store and call my friend and make fun of them for not having an iPhone. If I have to set up an iTunes account, that is just one more thing between me and my smug sense of self-worth and keeping up with the Jones attitude.

If you have ever dual-booted Linux and Windows like I have, you would know that Amarok for KDE (a GUI for Linux) is far superior to Winamp and iTunes. Since it was only found within Linux, every time I used Winamp I would always wish that I could have Amarok instead because of great features like:

* Excellent support for scripts (plugins)
* Doesn’t support any audio formats (all formats are installed through engines)
* Has a better album display:

More info inside
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News moves fast it seems. Between writing a story and publishing a story about possible DRM-free music coming to the iTunes music store, it seems like it’s actually going to happen. EMI has announced that it’s entire catalog of music will be available on the iTunes store without DRM restrictions. Chalk one up for the consumers. This move marks the 1st true step to a record company embracing digital downloads (welcome to 1999 guys).

But here’s the rub, the DRM-free songs will cost $1.29, 30 cents more than the till now standard $.99. Talk about a crap bait and switch tactic. We’ve known that the labels haven’t been too pleased with the .99 cent price tag, and they found a way to sneak in a .30 increase.
[EMI Group]

Music executives gathered for the Digital Music Forum East conference on Tuesday in New York to whine, cry and collectively slap Apple CEO Steve Jobs for his recent comments on digital rights management (DRM). Jobs bent the music industry over and inflicted massive damage three weeks ago when he proclaimed Apple would support an end to DRM. Still sore, execs took the opportunity at the “State of the Digital Union” panel to publicly berate Jobs and label his comments “insincere.” Of course, none of the music bigwigs said they were going to pull their support for Apple, probably because iTunes makes them bundles of money.

The doom and gloom speak is not entirely without merit, as CD sales are down 23 percent from over the last six years. Still, blasting your biggest source of legal downloading income … not such a good idea. Right now, to consumers, iPod means music. What do you think will happen if there’s a rift between the music industry and Apple? Without iTunes, music revenues would probably drop faster than a drunk sorority girl’s panties and the execs would be left holding the bag. Battle lines are being drawn over DRM. Could music civil war be far behind?

[Via cnet]

Johnny Abbatiello aka winner of the most likely to get pwn’d on ‘How to catch a Predator’ has just tied the noose and kicked the chair.  It appears that the young college student majoring in Advanced Ancient Roman Practices 102, has outed himself on a shared iTunes network across his dorm.  Further inspection into the site Yay Hooray shows a link to Johnny Abbatiello’s MySpace profile, which, of course, has been deleted.

One other quick note: If you have a friend or classmate that listens to to Alanis Morisette and Barenaked Ladies, he might also be housing underage porn.

[via Yay Hooray]