iTunes Alternatives
From as early as the late '90s social commentators and those in the music industry were already saying that the future of the music industry lay in mp3s. It might surprise some of our younger music fans to know that iTunes was yet to find itself in existence at this stage. Marketing geniuses within Steve Jobs' Apple took advantage of Windows' reluctance to support the virtual music industry and literally overnight the western world jumped on the iPod bandwagon, from then on forever finding themselves at the beck and call of those behind iTunes, a new and undeserving power in the music world.

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While it would be remiss of us to ignore the important role within the modern industry that Apple have carved out for themselves, we prefer to find alternative ways to embrace the mp3 and enjoy music in a way within our control. For this reason we endeavour to search online for different and legal ways to acquire the music you want. Over the coming weeks we will feature a series of reviews, giving you the pros and cons of numerous lesser-used websites online. If anyone out there knows of any that they would like to recommend (or not) themselves, do let us know!
June 7th, 2010 at 10:36 pm
Please try out HearJapan. It’s a digital music store that only sells Japanese music. They present everything including album info and artist info in English to help introduce you to new music.
June 8th, 2010 at 3:57 am
We’ll definitely take a look at Hear Japan, sounds interesting!
July 19th, 2010 at 1:05 pm
Hi Stephen, It’d be great if you’d review http://www.psonar.com as an iTunes alternative. We’ve built it to be the best place to keep your music and listen to it from anywhere, at any time on any device. Happy to send you a press summary and screenshots, if they’d be of use. Regards, Martin