Happy Birthday iTunes...

Apple's digital music store just celebrated its fifth anniversary and had a Cinderella-like run so far. More than four billion music tracks and more than 125 million TV episodes have been sold since launch. The market share is estimated at or above 70% worldwide. Earlier this year, iTunes was believed to briefly have been the nation’s largest music retailer.

Apple launched the iTS in the U.S. on 28 April, 2003. Paying for music downloaded online was not a very popular idea among Internet users at the time. Why should you pay when everyone else is getting it for free via P2P file sharing? The initially Mac-only service started with just 200,000 songs available on day one. Today, the service offers more than ten million tracks in the U.S. store alone. iTunes sold 275,000 tracks in the first 18 hours, passing the one million mark after five days. In the following October, Apple introduced iTS for Windows, effectively covering the whole computer market, not just the 3% market share Macs held back then – and the service was quickly accepted by Windows users: iTS for Windows sold million songs within three days. By December 15, barely 8 months after launch, iTS passed 25 million songs. A day later, Apple introduced iTS in France, Germany and the UK. As of March of this year, iTS has sold more than four billion songs worldwide. Since its inception, iTS has been the market leader in its segment and is estimated to commands 85% market share in U.S. paid music downloads. 

So happy birthday iTS!!! Live long and prosper....

http://www.apple.com/itunes/store/

Red Light runners watch out!

Of all the places I have lived in throughout the U.S. , Lufkin is the worst at red light running. O.k.,  maybe I can concede the yellow light runner trickling into the red but not a full blown 2-3 seconds after the red!  

Cameras have been installed at several of the worst intersections in the hopes that drivers would be more aware of running red lights. City officials researched the progress of red light cameras in other cities and states before installing them in Lufkin. My intersection where it intersects at loop is the one of the worst sighted for red light fatalities. 

Lufkin city officials want drivers to know that the goal of the red light cameras is to increase safety and not revenue. The simple result is that they work. Each ticket costs $75. The money from tickets is split three ways: between the city of Lufkin, the state of Texas, and Traffipax. That leaves the city of Lufkin about $22.50 per ticket. Lufkin city officials say that money is put back is put right back into funding traffic enforcement.

DON'T LET THIS HAPPEN TO YOU