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Apple's iTunes hits 1 billion song mark

updated 12:50 am EST, Thu February 23, 2006

iTunes hits 1 billion


Apple's iTunes today reached the 1 billion song mark, setting an industry milestone for sales of digital music from its popular online store. The industry-leading iTunes Music Store sold its billionth song at just after 12:30 a.m. on Thursday, February 22nd--less than three years after its launch in April of 2003. Although the company did not provide any details on the winner, it celebrated with a note on its homepage: "To every iTunes Music Store customer, thanks a billion. 1 billion songs have been downloaded from the iTunes Music Store." The company launched its billion song promo earlier this month and offered a 20-inch iMac, 10 60GB iPods, and a $10,000 iTunes Music Card as well as a full-ride scholarship in the winner's name to a world-renowned music school.

“Music lovers like you in 21 countries around the globe have purchased one billion songs from the iTunes Music Store. And for helping us reach this massive milestone in digital music history, we’d like to thank you,” Apple wrote in a note on its website.
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iTunes first launched on April 28, 2003 and it sold its first million tracks in the first 5 days and then reached the 70 million song mark on its one-year anniversary. The company sold more than a quarter of a billion songs worldwide by January 2005 and began its countdown to half a billion songs in early July 2005.


by MacNN Staff

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Comments

  1. Ganesha

    Senior User

    Joined: Jul 2002

    0

    Since, Steve didn't call

    I guess I didn't win...

  1. dimplemonkey

    Fresh-Faced Recruit

    Joined: Oct 2001

    0

    I heard my phone ring...

    and it was from a man named Steve...

    but it wasn't from Cupertino and his last name wasn't Jobs. :-(

  1. SiliconAddict

    Fresh-Faced Recruit

    Joined: Feb 2006

    0

    Napster

    So Napster....how's that subscription thing treating ya?

  1. ZinkDifferent

    Fresh-Faced Recruit

    Joined: Jan 2005

    0

    ROTFLOL

    That's all I gotta say to the 'winning' subscription model.

  1. bdusen

    Fresh-Faced Recruit

    Joined: Aug 2001

    0

    Putting it in perspective

    To put it in perspective of how fast songs are flying out the door, if Apple sold one song every second, it would have taken them almost 32 years to reach the 1 billion mark. Since they did it in under 1/10th the time, that's, well, a lot of songs per second.

  1. toddtmw

    Forum Regular

    Joined: Mar 2005

    0

    A Billion again!

    Wow, each day when I hit the main page, I'm amazed that Apple has sold ANOTHER billion songs!

    "Apple's iTunes today reached the 1 billion song mark..."

    Either put a date on the main page banner, or stop using Today in the first sentence of the article!!!

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