Just a few years ago, I was reading about the music industry decrying Apple Computer (AAPL) for it’s “Rip. Mix. Burn.” slogan which, to the industry, was sort of like a drive-by mooning. The thought being that the maker of the Mac was encouraging people to trade music in the virtual red market — red because the music industry wasn’t getting any money for the downloads. But it made users happy.
Today, Apple was let out of the dog house with its new iTunes Music Store. For 99 cents, you can by one of 200,000 songs from the company’s legal music downloading site through iTunes4. (Coincidentally, the company debuted updated iPods, too, including a 30 gig model.) You can even download an entire CD. Apple has titles from the five major recording companies.
This for Apple users first. But Steve Jobs is promising a Windows version of iTunes by the end of the year.
And there are rumors that the company is seeking to purchase a huge player in the music market: Vivendi.
So do you really think Apple is still just a computer company?