metallica finally has made its songs available on iTunes, the dominant online music store. The group has been notorious for its relationship with online world. It was a prime critic of the original Napster.

A few highlights from Metallica's past ...
> Metallica allowed MP3 concert downloads after previously fighting them.
> Metallica fought P2P with "free bootlegs" if you bought the CD.

... as well as humor
> Metallica Sues Canadian Band over E, F Chords

... and the Camp Chaos Napster Bad series.
> Napster Bad
> Metallica Millionaire
> Bizarro Napster Bad.
> Sue All the World
> MetalliCops

Part of the band's message from their web site:

Happy Monday!! From the "It's about fucking time!" file, comes this....

At 12:01 AM, on Tuesday July 25th, we will begin offering our music on the iTunes Music Store, a Cupertino, CA based upstart outfit, who we feel may very well have a bright future . . . .

Over the last year or so, we have seen an ever-growing number of Metallica fans using online sites like iTunes to get their music. So, in continuing with the tradition of offering our albums for sale online (which we've been doing for a few years through various sites), as well as making our live concerts available for download in their entirety (through the livemetallica.com site), we are now offering fans the opportunity to obtain our songs individually.