iTunes 4

Introduction
As detailed elsewhere on this site, Apple on April 28 launched a revamped line of iPods and, along with them, a new version of iTunes and a new service the company calls the iTunes Music Store. In this report, we'll take a closer look at the iTunes 4 software.

GUI Changes
There are a number of changes to iTunes 4. Most obviously, the musical notes on the icon are now a rather lurid green. When you launch the application, you'll notice that the interface (which seems a little uglier overall to us) has been given a makeover in other ways, too. The "Safari-style" buttons now have less of a sculpted border, and appear flatter when highlighted. They are a somewhat darker blue than that seen elsewhere in the Jaguar interface, lending credence to the pictures of the Panther interface posted at Apple-X.net, showing a darker blue Apple logo on the forthcoming OS. The volume slider now has an apparently gratuitous blue dot. There's a new button in the lower-left corner that shows or hides Album artwork. More on this later.

Under the Hood
As promised several months earlier, iTunes 4 has the ability to share playlists between local machines via Apple's Rendezvous technology. But the big surprise is... version 4.0 can also stream music from other Macs running iTunes 4 across the Internet. This is accomplished via the Advanced menu's "Connect to Shared Music..." option. (You may need to open port #3689 if you are behind a firewall.) Citing disappointment that this this feature was being abused, Apple removed this feature in version 4.0.1, undoubtedly due to pressure from record labels. The functionality can, however, be restored with a little hack called iTunes 4.0.1 sharing fix- 401(ok) or via several other methods.

Interestingly, the Internet sharing feature does not work with music purchased from the iTunes Music Store. As one user on MacNN notes, "this sharing feature seems like it actually SUPPORTS pirated music, because the more music we buy, the less we'll be able to share through Rendezvous and this IP sharing feature." Indeed, within weeks of the launch of iTunes 4, a number of programs surfaced, designed to copy the streaming music to others' computers.

At the launch of the product, Apple CEO Steve Jobs emphasized that tunes shared in this way are streamed, not copied. In other words, the machines must be on and connected to the Internet for this feature to work. When a connection is made, you'll see a new icon appear in the "Source" column, listing the shared music library. When it is selected, the iTunes library on the IP-connected machine shows up just as if it were on your own machine. There's also a new icon for the iTunes Music Store, detailed at length elsewhere on this site.

iTunes 4 runs only under Mac OS X (as did its predecessor). AAC-encoded songs can be used as soundtracks in iPhoto or iMovie if you have QuickTime 6.2 or later. (QuickTime 6.3 Pro improves the quality of AAC encoding, says Apple.)

Bug Hunt
Try this. Click the Show Album Art icon in iTunes 4, then go to www.discographynet.com/beatles/btys.html with Safari and drag the album art image for the Yellow Submarine Original Soundtrack into the area marked "Drag Album Artwork Here." When we did this with the artwork at the above-noted link, the image appeared upside-down and backwards in iTunes. That looks like a bug to us! (It works as expected when using Internet Explorer or when using locally stored images.) n

About the Author
Graeme Bennett has a background as a professional musician (keyboards/guitars/vocals), backed up the Dixie Dregs (look 'em up -- they're in the Store!) at the Commodore ballroom and gigged in many other venues around the country back in the early 80s. Graeme was on the board of directors of the Vancouver New New Music Society for several years and has produced shows for several major acts, including New York-based performance artist and musician Laurie Anderson. In Dec. 2002 he discussed digital rights management systems with Peter Gabriel.

For Further Reading

• Applemusic.com - Visit the iTunes Music Store for more information.
• The iTunes/Sharing debate from the developer of the controversial SpyMac music indexing service.
• Mac OS X Hints: Re-enable iTunes sharing outside local subnet