KEY POINTS:
iTunes is quite a fascinating beast - there's nothing else quite like it. With the iTunes Store it evolved into a dedicated web browser aimed squarely at a vast collection of songs managed by Apple. You can buy them, of course, downloading them straight into your Mac or
PC to play on your computer and for transferring onto your iPod or iPhone.
Cynics can view this as another way for Apple to glean revenue - especially those used to downloading thousands of tracks for no cost at all. Of course, iTunes does glean revenue - but New Zealand musicians are well represented and, as an ex-musician myself, I think it's great they're getting some money for their efforts. Besides, $1.79 a track is reasonable, and an album is usually $17.90, which compares favourably with retail music CD pricing for new releases.
You can preview the tracks before you buy and the iTunes store detects previously-bought songs and lets you 'complete' your album by only charging you for, then adding, the songs on albums you don't have yet.
iTunes has specials, too. When I looked, you could get Duffy's top-selling album for just $11.99. There are iTunes Exclusives, in which artists (PJ Harvey, Alanis Morisette and many others) record or rerecord tracks exclusively for iTunes distribution.
And now you can buy and rent movies that will play on some iPods, on your Mac or PC and over your television, providing you have an Apple TV (and your TV is up to scratch).
But you can actually get a lot out of iTunes without paying a cent. For example, every week there's a free song - the Single of the Week. Download it for free - chuck it if you don't like it. You might get a track you like every few weeks and you will get to hear artists you otherwise may not give the time to.
But the real killer freebies on iTunes are podcasts. These cover almost everything - they can entertain you or inform you; some do both. Podcasts are audio files, usually of someone (or several someone's) talking. Comedians do it, academics do it, and Joe Schmo (like me) does it. Whether you like Flight of the Conchords or Ricky Gervais, or you want to learn more about home recording - or cooking or the American Revolution - there's probably a podcast for you.
When you subscribe to a podcast you're presented with a list in iTunes you can download from at will. They're greyed out if you haven't downloaded them. I have, for example, subscriptions (99 per cent of which are free) Radio NZ National and BFM. If I miss an interview or discussion, I check my free subscriptions and download the ones I'm interested in. They're just like song files as far as iTunes is concerned, so they play on iPods too.
Some podcasts are more sophisticated and contain either still images or video files - these are called, respectively, rich podcasts and 'vodcasts'. They are bigger files so be aware of your download cap. Among the classier video podcasts are those from National Geographic, covering everything from whales to archaeology in Wales. Great for those at school, and once again, free.
Search for any topic that captures your imagination by clicking on Power Search over on the right in the iTunes Store.
But wait, there's more (as Steve Jobs likes to say near the end of his keynotes. There's always more.) iTunes U is a fantastic feature for anybody studying ... almost anything. The 'U' is for University and the section comprises lectures saved as podcasts from universities the world over, including Otago, some Australian universities and many US offerings like Yale, Princeton, Duke... This is a simply awesome resource and many more people should be using it.
Oh, did I mention it was free?
You really should check out podcasts in iTunes. Of particular interest to some Mac Planet readers may be 'PCs wee all over Macs (Made on a Mac)', the 'Dellguide Magazine Fanboy Podcast' and 'OMG The Sun Shines Out of Redmond's Rear Fire Exit', three topical and balanced podcasts that offer topical and balanced views of why topical and balanced PCs are better than Macs, which everyone hates.
Good luck finding those.