Apple's iPod And iTunes Event As Details Become Known

Posted by: Arik Hesseldahl on September 09, 2009

A few early details from the Apple event in San Francisco today:

Bloomberg News is reporting that Apple CEO Steve Jobs has been spotted at the Apple event. It’s not 100% clear that he’s expected to speak but I think he will.

Meanwhile, TheFlyOnTheWall.com is reporting that Apple announced iTunes 9 within iTunes itself. I haven’t seen that yet, but I suspect it’s correct.

I just noticed a new label “iTunes LP” in on a few iTunes offerings. This may be the new album format that’s been known by codename “cocktail.”

And now the Apple store is down, with it’s usual “We’ll Be Back Soon” sign.

The event is now underway. Steve Jobs is now on the stage. A quote Via Gizmodo: “I’m very happy to be here with you all. As some of you might know, I had a liver transplant.” He said he now has the liver of a 20 year old who died in a car crash, and he thanks him for his generosity.

New figures on iTunes App store: 75,000 applications, and 1.8 billion applications downloaded. In two years, Apple has sold 30 million iPhones. 8.5 billion songs sold. 100 million accounts.

New iPhone software: 3.1, for iPhone and iPod touch owners.

GDGT.com reports iTunes store will offer 30,000 ringtones for phones at $1.29.

Now he’s covering new iTunes features. There’s the iTunes LP: It will include videos, liner notes and other things you used to get when you bought an album, but now they’ll be digital. Home sharing, which will let you share and actually copy songs within a household, on up to five authorized computers.

As had been rumored, iTunes has some social media features built in, including links to Facebook and Twitter.

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