Nobody expected the partnership between Apple and EMI to bring DRM free music to the world. Only a few days until the promised May release was missed, the content finally arrived, along with an iTunes Update.
Apple has updated iTunes to version 7.2 for both Macs and Windows. This latest update does not come with an impressive list of changes, being more of a service update for the iTunes Store. The latest version allows preview and purchase of the new iTunes Plus music. As you might suspect, the iTunes Plus music is actually the high quality 256 kbps AAC encoding for audio quality virtually indistinguishable from the original recordings, which will sell for $1.29 per song. iTunes Plus is launching with EMI's digital catalog of outstanding recordings, including singles and albums from Coldplay, The Rolling Stones, Norah Jones, Frank Sinatra, Joss Stone, Pink Floyd, John Coltrane and more than a dozen of Paul McCartney's classic albums available on.
"Our customers are very excited about the freedom and amazing sound quality of iTunes Plus," said Steve Jobs, Apple's CEO. "We expect more than half of the songs on iTunes will be offered in iTunes Plus versions by the end of this year."
Of course, in with the new does not necessarily mean out with the old, and iTunes will continue to offer its entire catalog, currently over five million songs, in the same versions as today-128 kbps AAC encoding with DRM-at the same price of 99 cents per song, alongside the higher quality iTunes Plus versions when available. In addition, iTunes customers can now easily upgrade their library of previously purchased EMI content to iTunes Plus tracks for just 30 cents a song and $3.00 for most albums.
"This is a tremendous milestone for digital music," said Eric Nicoli, CEO of EMI Group. "Consumers are going to love listening to higher quality iTunes Plus tracks from their favorite EMI artists with no usage restrictions."
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