Apple unveils iTunes store for 32 markets

Apple unveiled legal ways for consumers of mainly Asian countries to have access to its iTunes store that provide over 650,000 apps to consumers in 155 countries. The store has been launched in 32 more countries mainly in Africa, Europe, and Asia Pacific, according to a press communiqué.

“The iTunes store is the best way for iPhone, iPad, iPod, Mac and PC users to legally discover, purchase and download music online,” it said adding, “all music on the iTunes store comes in iTunes Plus, Apple’s DRM-free format with high-quality 256 kbps AAC encoding for audio virtually indistinguishable from the original recordings”.

Asian and African users can enjoy music from local artists and also rent or download high resolution movies of 20^th Century Fox, Paramount Pictures, Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, The Walt Disney Studios, and Warner Bros.

Now, music enthusiasts in Brunei, Cambodia, Laos, Macau, Malaysia, Philippines, Thailand, Sri Lanka, Vietnam, Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan, etc. can browse through iconic renditions of ADELE, The Beatles, Jason Mraz, Lang Lang, Yo Yo Ma, and Yuja Wang, noted the communiqué. All in all, users can sift through more than 20 million songs in iTunes store.

iCloud lessens load on storage capacity of devices, which can retrieve music and movies under recently introduced service of iTunes Match from personal library in iCloud, which is accessible from all iOS devices. iTunes Match service is ready for use in all markets where iTunes store is available.

Apple store is not just about music and movies, but iusers can also access paid or free of cost apps from there.

“Apple has reinvented the mobile phone with its revolutionary iPhone and App Store, and is defining the future of mobile media and computing devices with iPad,” said the communiqué.

Since its rollout in 2008, the store made five billion dollar earning possible for the developers, according to the Cnet. So far, 30 billion apps have been downloaded from iTunes. Global app downloads are expected to reach 36 billion this year, according to the ABI Research.