30. Watch for Newly Added Music Using an RSS FeedBEFORE YOU BEGIN 19 Browse the iTunes Music Store 29 Request Music from the Music Store SEE ALSO 31 Tell a Friend About the iTunes Music Store 32 Create a Web Link to Your Favorite Music for Sale The iTunes Music Store is certainly not without its share of obscure, technically esoteric features that the serious power user can enjoy. One of these, which is all but impossible to find within the music store interface itself, is the iTunes Music Store RSS Feed Generator. RSS (Really Simple Syndication) is a mechanism by which you can "subscribe" to the URL (web address) of a dynamically updated list of pieces of information that you can browse using software usually known as an RSS reader or news reader. Software of this type exists for both Windows and the Mac; the top Windows RSS readers (NewzCrawler, FeedDemon, and NewsGator) sell for about $30 each. For Mac OS X, Shrook is a good choice, and free; if you have Mac OS X Tiger (10.4) or later, an RSS reader is built directly into the Safari browser, included as a part of the operating system. KEY TERM Really Simple Syndication (RSS) A mechanism for a dynamically updated series (or feed ) of items, such as in a blog or "latest news" site, that are delivered to a specialized application for quick and easy perusal. 30. Watch for Newly Added Music Using an RSS Feed RSS feeds, as the streams of information provided by an RSS subscription are known, are most popular as alternative methods of reading weblogs (" blogs "); RSS in combination with the iTunes Music Store means you get to keep a constant eye on all the new music being added to the store in any of the categories you want to watch. WEB RESOURCES http://www.newzcrawler.com/ http://www.bradsoft.com/feeddemon/index.asp http://www.newsgator.com/ NewzCrawler, FeedDemon, and NewsGator are three popular RSS readers for Windows. http://www.fondantfancies.com/apps/shrook/ Shrook is the best-known RSS reader for the Mac (aside from Safari RSS).
TIP Another good way to watch for new music by a certain artist is to set up an Artist Alert. From any artist's discography page or album download page, click the Add Artist Alert link. From then on, whenever new music by that artist is added to the store, you will receive an email notifying you of the event. Turn off Artist Alerts in the account information page (click your Apple ID in the Account box in the upper-right corner of the iTunes' window; enter your password when prompted, and click View Account ). |