AfterDawn: News

Apple has launched an Irish version of their iTunes music store. In 2004, Apple opened iTunes stores in most European countries but seemed to be having difficulty opening a store in Ireland. Now that they have, the store will have featured slots for Irish artists like U2, Damien Rice, The Thrills, The Pogues and The Corrs. The store has opened with 700,000 tracks and 8,000 audio books. Apple have also kept their 99c price policy per track and €9.99 per album. The store also has the same features as other Apple music stores around the world including iMix, music videos, movie trailers, celebrity playlists and gift certificates.

iTunes is by far the most successful music download store in the world right now. The store has sold more than 200 million tracks worldwide and is getting growing support from other corporations, including Motorola who plan to make many devices compatible with the music purchased from iTunes. But such success has also been met with bad luck, as recently Apple has been slammed with a lawsuit by a man who claims they are forcing their iTunes customers to purchase an iPod in order to listen to their music on a portable device.



Apple have also threatened the owner of the iTunes.co.uk domain, accusing him of being a cybersquatter. The owner registered the itunes.co.uk domain name on 7th November 2000, whereas Apple were only had the trademark for "iTunes" published in the Trade Marks Journal on 6 December 2000. Also, the UK's Office of Fair Trading reported Apple to the European Commission accusing the company of infringing European Trade regulations by not allowing customers in one EU state purchase tracks from an iTunes store in another EU state. However, such problems have not slowed down Apple's success just yet.

Source:
MacWorld

Written by: James Delahunty @ 6 Jan 2005 22:38