News ITunes, Now for the Rest of Us

Wired covered the typically slick launch:

SAN FRANCISCO -- With a little help from his friends (in the music business), Steve Jobs introduced a new version of Apple Computer's iTunes jukebox and online music store for Windows PCs.

During a slick presentation in downtown San Francisco Thursday morning, Mick Jagger, Bono and Dr. Dre joined Jobs to endorse a new version of Apple's iTunes software and music store for the Mac and Windows.

In front of an enthusiastic crowd of several hundred reporters, music executives, software developers and Apple employees, Jobs also announced a Pepsi-sponsored giveaway of 100 million songs through the iTunes store.

The campaign, which Pepsi described as the biggest music promotion ever, will be launched during next year's Super Bowl. Winning soda bottle caps will be redeemable for a song online.

Wearing trademark jeans and black turtleneck, Jobs said the "second generation" of iTunes is identical on both Mac and Windows platforms. Now, however, Apple's lauded software and online service is open to the 97 percent of computer users who don't have a Mac.

"ITunes for Windows is the best jukebox for Windows, ever," said Jobs with typical humility. "It's been hailed as the best jukebox out there, and now it's available for Windows."

The Windows software is available immediately for free from iTunes.com.

Full story here

It may sound as if I'm banging on about this, but believe me, it's great! And the new peripherals for iPod look genuinely useful.

Now all I need to do is update the firmware on my pod...