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Richard Devine
Today, June 15, marks the 10th birthday of the iTunes Store in the UK, France and Germany. Having already been launched in the U.S. the year before, Apple's first international expansion saw the trio of European countries become the first non-Americans to have access to its online media catalog. But perhaps more importantly it marked the beginning of a serious change in how media buyers got their content. And the rest, as they say, is history.
We take for granted today how easy it is to buy our favorite media content. Be it on our iPhone or iPad, Mac, Windows PC or Apple TV, buying music, TV shows, movies and books takes just a few clicks and we can get it pretty much everywhere on all our devices. Before iTunes came along it was a much different picture.
Indeed, the iPod had launched before the iTunes Store and the only way to listen to your music on it was to import your own CDs. Today we're literally spoiled for choice. We've got competing stores from the likes of Microsoft, Google and Amazon to name but a few, alongside a bunch of different streaming media services for music and video. This may end up becoming the next shift in the industry just as the iTunes Store was all those years ago.
So, while things will likely look different again in another 10 years, it's a great time to reflect on how the digital landscape has transformed in the past decade. Looking back, what was your first, and favorite purchase from the iTunes Store? Let us know in the comments below. Here's to the next 10!
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