Gearfuse

Oh shit! If you’re one of the suckers consumers that pays for tracks on iTunes, your world is about to get flipped upside down. Starting April 7th, Apple will charge more than $.99 for songs with popular tracks shooting up to $1.29. This, according to the LA Times, has been in the works for awhile and Apple has apparently let record labels know when the change goes into effect.

Everyone is predicting it’ll be a fiasco and a half if Apple follows through with the change in pricing. As for me, I’ll stick to Bit Torrent thank you very much.

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According to Billboard, the ever-popular Rock Band is due to get “as many as 5000″ new tracks this year via downloadable content. The report comes as I completed “…And Justice For All” on Expert at 100% last night. Harmonix has already released over 500 songs for the Rock Band series, putting it way above the number of tracks Guitar Hero: World Tour offers. But for Harmonix to meet the 5000 mark, it would need to release over 90 tracks each week for the rest of the year.

I don’t really see that happening, but hey, 2000 new songs is perfectly OK with me. Just stop charging $1.99 for a fuckin’ song!

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Love it or hate it, the Zune isn’t the hit Microsoft hoped that it would be. The current $14.95 a month Zune Pass subscription model hasn’t been attracting enough subscribers, so in an effort to generate more revenue, Microsoft will offer subscribers 10 free tracks to keep each month. 10 free songs a month isn’t a bad idea, but it’s not enough to really lure in a whole new audience. Says Adam Sohn of Microsoft:

Microsoft marketing director Adam Sohn said that Microsoft saw some boost when it targeted its advertising specifically around subscriptions but said that the total number of subscribers is less than the company would like.

“It’s not grown as fast as we’d like it so we think this will give it a shot in the arm,” Sohn said, declining to say how many Zune Pass subscribers Microsoft currently has.

I give the Zune another 12 to 16 months before Microsoft pulls the plug. What say you?

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