Apple Gives in to Critics

NOW, THIS IS INTERESTING. We’ve hardly touched the iTunes iSbogus page since we first put it up almost two months ago, but we still get emails every day complimenting or criticizing it and we try to respond to all of them. One of our major points on the iTunes page is that Apple misleads customers when it says that the iTunes Music Store is “fair to the artists”. But two days ago, a guy wrote to us and said that he couldn’t find anywhere on the Apple website where they make that claim. We went looking for our original source, but we couldn’t find it anywhere either and we were pretty sure that we didn’t just make it up. After some self doubt and then some googling, we figured it out: when Apple updated their iTunes page a few days ago, they completely removed the claim that iTunes is fair to artists! Now we were hoping for some more concrete improvements, but at least this is a little more honest. We’ve just announced this small victory on the iTunes page: take a look.

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Ben at Magnetbox wants to enter his brilliant RIAA Radar in the Webby Awards. RIAA Radar tells you whether an album was released by an RIAA record label which helps you avoid funding the music industry’s dirty deeds. It’s a crucial tool for fighting the major labels and it’s a perfect example of how the internet can be used to get information to consumers that they couldn’t find anywhere else. The entrance fee for the awards is $120 and Ben is asking for donations. Give him a couple bucks, winning would give a real boost to RIAA opposition. And look for a hot RIAA Radar / Downhill Battle collaboration in the next couple weeks.

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Rest in peace, Elliot Smith. Fan site memorial.