[chucker]

I don't think this was posted yet; apologies if it was.

First, a quick review for those who don't know what I'm talking about. With the introduction of iTunes 6.0.2 after the MWSF keynote, Apple somewhat quietly slipped in a new feature called the Mini Store. I say somewhat quietly since, in Software Update, this was not mentioned at all:

With iTunes 6, you can preview, buy, and download over 2,000 music videos and hit TV shows on the iTunes Music Store and sync your music and purchased videos with iPod to enjoy on the go. To watch purchased videos, you must have QuickTime 7.0.3 or later and Mac OS X 10.3.9 or later. iTunes 6.0.2 includes stability and performance improvements over iTunes 6.0.1. Note: After purchasing music from the iTunes Music Store with iTunes 6 or later, you will also need to upgrade your other computers that purchase music from the iTunes Music Store to the latest version of iTunes.

For those who downloaded manually, however, it was:

Discover new music as you enjoy your collection or import new CDs with MiniStore — right from your iTunes library.

In fact, you find out that there's two other new features (movie transcoding for the iPod and multi-destination AirTunes) as well.

Now, what this feature does is add a little new pane (oh no, not another) to the bottom of your iTunes window (if you're in a suitable source, e.g. Library or a particular playlist, but sadly, not in Party Shuffle). Information about the song you're currently playing is transmitted to the store, and if they have a match, they try and find other stuff from the same artist, including customers' ratings, not to mention other artists you might care about.

So it's a bit like the "Just For You" feature, except it applies to any music, not just what you purchased (off iTMS), and it's in the context of what you're playing right this very moment.

So what is, or was, the problem?

1) It used to be without the customer's consent. Not everyone will want Apple to know what they're playing right now. Apple has expressly stated that they do not store this information in any way whatsoever, but strangely,
2) the user ID, which should be irrelevant in this case, is transmitted as well.
3) you can turn it off, in which case no information is transmitted at all, but per default, it is on (after the upgrade).

Now if you ask me, regardless, it's just a little feature that helps you buy more stuff, which means more revenues for Apple, yadda yadda. No real privacy issue at all. But a lot of people disagree, and more power to them.

So there was a minor outrage in the blogosphere, on Slashdot, and so on. Has Apple reacted (aside from their "no, we don't store stuff" response)? Yes! They finally have. As of a few hours before (I haven't noticed this before), the mini store does not immediately come up. Rather, an introduction page appears, letting you know exactly what is going to happen, exactly how you can turn it off (with a cute little arrow), and that the feature is entirely optional.

A very great solution that nobody could disagree with, if you ask me.