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Warner Music, Sony BMG and Universal going iTunes Plus very soon

I think it's safe to say that Apple has plugged this leak. Unfortunately.

Next week is their earliest opportunity now (although it's only 12:30 PST, an afternoon announcement is plausible) though their most logical opportunity is MacWorld '09.
 
Looks like there are still some singles and albums from Warner that are slipping through the iTunes Plus cracks; I found these today (and discovered this thread while trying to investigate what was up):

Madonna - Hung Up
The B-52s - Cosmic Thing

Also, several tracks from The Meters and New Order (also on Warner labels) show up in the search results as iTunes Plus, but not on the actual album pages (or in the shopping cart).

(And yes, I know, I have very interesting musical tastes.)

Edited to add: And another!
Traveling Wilburys - Handle With Care (single)
 
Let's start this up again, people! iTunes mysteriously hasn't been updated yet today - very strange. Combine this with Engadget (http://www.engadget.com/2008/12/08/apple-rumored-to-be-turning-itunes-into-a-drm-free-music-store/) and AppleInsider (http://www.appleinsider.com/article...s_itunes_going_drm_free_starting_tuesday.html) reporting on a French website claiming that iTunes goes fully DRM-free starting today; it's possible, especially because they haven't updated - it's not a holiday week, and nothing special has happened.

Come on!
 
Doodledoo said:
Let's start this up again, people! iTunes mysteriously hasn't been updated yet today - very strange. Combine this with Engadget (http://www.engadget.com/2008/12/08/apple-rumored-to-be-turning-itunes-into-a-drm-free-music-store/) and AppleInsider (http://www.appleinsider.com/article...s_itunes_going_drm_free_starting_tuesday.html) reporting on a French website claiming that iTunes goes fully DRM-free starting today; it's possible, especially because they haven't updated - it's not a holiday week, and nothing special has happened.

Come on!
Click to expand...
As I already posted above, the iTunes store has already been updated today. New music, TV shows and movies are already up today.
 
Alright, so iTunes just took a while to update today, but iTunes Plus is gone from the sidebar (though iTunes has been generally pretty bipolar today - stuff appearing and disappearing from the TV Show section. EDIT: yup, just it being bipolar, it's back.
 
Upgrade my Library is gone from my iTunes here in Canada. Sign of the times? I can't get it to reappear.
 
Doodledoo said:
Upgrade my Library is gone from my iTunes here in Canada. Sign of the times? I can't get it to reappear.
Click to expand...

It's gone here in the U.S. as well. I think it;s just because it's Christmas Eve and they removed it to save the servers from becoming overloaded because of the increased iPhone/iPod sales as gifts. Last year they removed the Just For You section till about a week after the holiday.
 
Upgrade My Library is gone! Vanished!

hexonxonx said:
It's gone here in the U.S. as well. I think it;s just because it's Christmas Eve and they removed it to save the servers from becoming overloaded because of the increased iPhone/iPod sales as gifts. Last year they removed the Just For You section till about a week after the holiday.
Click to expand...

Copy that, Jack.

I can click on the link that says 'iTunes Plus' on the sidebar. But then it takes me to the usual iTunes Plus page, BUT that page no longer displays the "All Your Music Is Up To Date. There Is Nothing To Upgrade For Now".

In other words, Apple has removed the Upgrade My Library option. It is gone from its usual place.

Hmmm....
 
It's still gone, last I checked. I think it's safe to say that while we won't see anything next week, Phil Schiller is almost certain to announce something big at the final MacWorld come January 6th. Will we see variable pricing? Standard structure?

Acknowledgement that we clawed this hole open? 😀 I think it's excellent that Apple has used our iTMS hunting skills to their own benefit. What we've learned is that Apple has a hidden ability to make a song that is iTunes Plus appear DRM'ed. The places this has shown through are the Upgrade My Library widget (leak plugged by its removal), the Genius Sidebar (leak not plugged - songs show up as Plus there but aren't on their page, though it appears no more has leaked out since things were first noticed back in November) and, to a far smaller extent, songs have shown up as iTunes Plus on their album pages when they really shouldn't be.

This is a total bonus to us iTunes consumers. Bye bye, Amazon MP3 (for iPod users) - your days are numbered. Circle your calendars, everyone, and add iTunes Plus' massive expansion to the list of expected announcements.
 
Time to start up the rumors again!

I've noticed a lot of Warner activity on iTunes lately -- albums that were already in the database being added again (from artists who I own, and thus appearing on the My Alerts page). Some of these, like Depeche Mode and Bjork, are now listed as iTunes Plus.

More importantly, the link to the Upgrade My Library page has been disabled over the holidays, but you can access it via the iTunes Plus FAQs... and mine shows about 10 albums from Warner subsidiaries, inc. Warner Bros, Sire, Elektra, and Atlantic.

One has to wonder if the upgrade link is going to remain disabled until the inevitable announcement. We saw a "test" on upgrades for Universal about a month ago -- now it seems the same thing is happening with Warner.

RTW
 
RTW said:
More importantly, the link to the Upgrade My Library page has been disabled over the holidays, but you can access it via the iTunes Plus FAQs... and mine shows about 10 albums from Warner subsidiaries, inc. Warner Bros, Sire, Elektra, and Atlantic.
Click to expand...

Well spotted - although only 1 song on there for me at the moment.
 
'be noticed some new Warner music appearing in the Sidebar this week, as well. Strange, considering the fact we've seen and had Sony and Universal stuff - later date?

Does anyone have the link to Upgrade My Library from the FAQs? It should really be posted here.
 
The upgrade link showed three songs, Green Day's "I fought the law"(Yes the one Apple used in the super bowl commercial a few years ago 😉), Madonna's "True Blue" and Disturbed's "Ten Thousand Fists".

I'm not sure which record label any of them are from however.
 
Richdmoore said:
The upgrade link showed three songs, Green Day's "I fought the law"(Yes the one Apple used in the super bowl commercial a few years ago 😉), Madonna's "True Blue" and Disturbed's "Ten Thousand Fists".

I'm not sure which record label any of them are from however.
Click to expand...

Those are all Warner artists.
 
http://phobos.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/iTunesPlusPage is what worked for me. Six songs there:

Aretha Franklin - Respect: Warner
War - Low Rider: Warner
War - Why Can't We Be Friends?: Warner
Try - Blue Rodeo: Warner
Yes - Owner of a Lonely Heart: Warner
T. Rex - Bang a Gong (Get It On): Warner

Weird thing is, a bunch of Atlantic albums are available as iTunes Plus already without using our secret spy tools - Aretha Franklin's I Never Loved A Man The Way I Loved You, Yes' 90125, War's Why Can't We Be Friends? - but strangely enough some of the albums just aren't.

Searching for other Atlantic songs: Charles Mingus' Passions of a Man - The Complete Atlantic Recordings is listed as iTunes Plus on its album page though the songs themselves don't have the little plus (EDIT: As of Thursday, now all have the plus). Ray Charles' The Best of Ray Charles: The Atlantic Years is fully available as iTunes Plus, as is John Coltrane's Heavyweight Champion: The Complete Atlantic Recordings.
 
I'm suprised that's there been no official announcement by Apple regarding Warner,Sony and Universal offering iTunes plus tracks.
 
FYI - more secret spy tools.

If you do a "Power Search" on Warner artists with the "Search iTunes Plus" box checked, you gain access to a lot more iTunes Plus albums. Some big names, for example, include Oasis (now distributed by Reprise in the U.S. instead of Sony), REM, Prince, Madonna, etc. Many of these albums don't appear on the album pages as iTunes Plus, but the albums themselves do appear with plus signs and are assumedly purchasable already.

There are examples of albums that come up with the search that *aren't* marked as Plus in any other way, too... for example, The Name of This Band Is Talking Heads or Echo & The Bunnymen.
 
RTW said:
FYI - more secret spy tools.

If you do a "Power Search" on Warner artists with the "Search iTunes Plus" box checked, you gain access to a lot more iTunes Plus albums. Some big names, for example, include Oasis (now distributed by Reprise in the U.S. instead of Sony), REM, Prince, Madonna, etc. Many of these albums don't appear on the album pages as iTunes Plus, but the albums themselves do appear with plus signs and are assumedly purchasable already.

There are examples of albums that come up with the search that *aren't* marked as Plus in any other way, too... for example, The Name of This Band Is Talking Heads or Echo & The Bunnymen.
Click to expand...

Yeah... EVERY Madonna album is apparently available this way. It also seems that music videos are more likely to show up this way, as most of Sony's Chris Brown and one Backstreet Boys video show up (without the plus but in the list).
 
Apple has again hidden a whole whack of music; Talking Heads and Madonna's catalogues are now back under the radar. Waiting til tomorrow never felt this exciting!
 
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