Sorry, Amazon, Rhapsody, eMusic, and others, but it looks like there won’t be any iTunes support in the iPhone / iPod Touch SDK coming soon. This means third-party apps can’t access iTunes to change your music library.

Why would Apple do such a selfish and greedy thing? It would be safe to assume the company wants to keep iTunes sales up, and services like Amazon and eMusic pose a major threat to music and video purchases. Though the move wouldn’t be surprising on Apple’s part, the Inquirer points out that the lack of music-related apps is unofficial, meaning Apple may have an unannoucned plan for such apps — that is unlikely, however.

The lack of iTunes support also means iLike, Last.fm, and other streaming services will be unavailable as well as anything that might enhance or inhibit iTunes functionality.

Anti-iTunes iPhone / iPod Touch owners will likely be dissapointed, but they’re used to that now, aren’t they? Isn’t that why the hacking scene exists, for Apple hardware lovers that can’t stand being controlled?

It’s all in the name of stability, Apple tends to point that out, but at what point does handicapping your own product go too far? Sadly, this is what happens when a great company like Apple depends sources of income other than sales of its own products. Apple shouldn’t be concerned about music sales! The company should be helping its fans turn Apple products into ass-kicking machines, but — alas — politics and business step on things once again.

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Entry was posted on Thursday, March 20th, 2008 at 6:00 am under Commercial Software, Opinion, iPhone, iPod Touch.  Print This Post

Read more entries by Danny Mendez.