Veerle's blog

In the past I’ve written some articles to show my disappointment in the fact that the iTunes Music store wasn’t available in Belgium. It took way too long so I waited impatiently to enjoy the simplicity of buying.

With a big smile on my face I can say that all that has changed since yesterday evening 6PM. Yesterday Apple launched the Music Store not only in Belgium but also in Austria, Finland, Greece, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Portugal and Spain. Next on the list is Canada in November.

First I downloaded the new 4.7 version and then I was off to browse around in the store in search of some nice tunes. Too bad for the limited time that I had since my workload is rather heavy these days. In about 15 min and thanks to a banner in the dance section (never thought I would say this… The first helpful banner!) I was able to find a great album with some delicious chilled tunes on it.

Before you’re able to buy you need to setup an account. Apple did a smart move by linking this to your .Mac account so in a matter of a few clicks I was up an running and ready to buy. But even if you don’t have a .Mac creating one is a piece of cake, only filling in a user name and adding one of the major credit cards. Thanks to a deal with Amazon’s one click buying a song is just a matter of a click, hands down the most easy way of shopping. Some shops over here work with credits and I really don’t like that and it isn’t easy to understand because you need more credits to burn then listen etc. In iTunes Music Store everything is simple, a song is 0,99 Euro and an Album is 9,99 Euro. You can listen to the music you buy on up to five Macintosh or PC computers, make unlimited playlists, burn CDs, and transfer your music to iPod.

So the first album that I bought wasn’t spanking new it was an album from the Timewriter called Jigsaw Pieces from 1998. Jean Frank Cochois aka The Timewriter released his first album in 1994 ‘The Timerewinder’. In 2004, Frank has stopped using his alias “The Timewriter” and is now producing and DJing under his (almost) real name Jean F. Cochois. He holds a monthly DJ residency at Sven V�th’s state-of-the-art Cocoon club in Frankfurt.

As can you can hear this album contains the perfect companions to listen to while working. The content of the store isn’t up to par with the US store yet but that’s just a matter of time since they are just starting. Personally I’m not that interested in local content except for artists like Sweet Coffee etc. If Apple is able to add the same quality of music as in the US store then the future looks bright.

Now on to the other special news from Apple yesterday… A brand new color screen iPod Photo. The marketing slogan for this new device is typical Apple: “Why should your ears have all the fun?”. The newest member of the iPod family, iPod Photo comes in two sizes a 40GB and 60Gb version. Both feature a razor sharp LCD display that lets you see your photos in vivid 65,536 colors, to be exact. And with its built-in backlighting, you’ll be able to admire those photos indoors or out.

What I like about this iPod Photo is that Apple not just added a color screen but also did an extra mile on creating nice features like photo syncing and support for Album art. So the new iTunes 4.7 also autosyncs Album Art. The Album Art downloaded when you purchase music from the iTunes Music Store is transferred to iPod Photo along with the music. So while iPod Photo plays your tunes, you can enjoy the Album Art on the Now Playing screen. They also improved battery life, up to 15 hours of continuous music or up to 5 hours of continuous slideshows with music. Off course all this works on Mac and PC. On Mac you can use iPhoto from the iLife suite to organize your picts and on PC it works with either Adobe Photoshop Album 2.0 or Adobe Photoshop Elements 3.0.

For the fans of U2 there is a special edition U2 iPod. Just like U2 this iPod stands out, it’s black with a red clickwheel. As an extra special treat, it includes an iTunes Music Store coupon you can use to get 50 US Dollar off your purchase of “The Complete U2.” As unique as the iPod itself, this digital boxed set brings together an amazing 400 U2 tracks.

My iPod Mini is still favorite but my boyfriend is now for the first time seriously considering to buy an iPod as well. So it could be that this iPod Photo will be added to the Duoh family ;-) If this happens I’ll keep you informed and write a review.