Rumour mill: alive and well.
Appletalk.com.au is reporting that iTMS.au – that’s the Australian iteration of the iTunes Music Store – is in the “on again” phase of its rumoured status. This is the third go-round of rumours we’ve had; each time it’s looked like happening, the launch has been scotched by licensing issues. (Australia’s copyright and licensing laws are somewhat different from many other Western nations.)
Still, Appletalk.com.au is sounding pretty convinced:
AppleTalk sources have this afternoon confirmed that a date is set for the release, but at this stage will only go as far to say “end of April”.
I’m not going to hold my breath, but I’d be very happy to see this. I have absolutely nothing against paying for music – as my CD collection attests – and this is really going to suit me very well. (3am: “I must have this track! MUST GET IT NOW!”) Bigpond Music charges $1.89 per song, HMV’s online download store doesn’t support Macs (so I no longer support HMV), Destramusic.com.au don’t support iPods (and isn’t that a brilliant positioning decision? answer: no) and generally there aren’t many appealing legit download sites in Australia. Provided iTMS.au has a reasonable range, I can see me handing them a fair bit of money on a regular basis. Especially since I’ve just realised that I no longer really care about owning physical CDs.
(I should note that ITMS is perfectly usable for PC users, as well, in case any of you were thinking “Pffft, she’s just talking about Macs again; let’s move on.”)