where's the Irish iTunes Music Store...

flywheel

From this article on siliconrepublic.com: iTunes Music Store blocked for Irish users

It is understood that the failure to resolve copyright issues with IMRO prevented the Republic of Ireland from being among the countries to enjoy the use of the iTunes store.

a quick browse on the IMRO contact page it looks like their 'Director of Finance' Brendan Griffin is assigned 'Internet Licensing'

given they provide his email address on the page it looks like they welcome contact being made

perhaps emails from concerned iPod / iTunes users waiting on Monday morning asking for an ETA and what the hold up is could spur them on...

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Peteer

DubWireless wrote:

perhaps emails from concerned iPod / iTunes users waiting on Monday morning asking for an ETA and what the hold up is could spur them on...

O.K. Mines sent.

Dear Mr Griffin.

I am an Apple computer & iPod user and having read an article on: http://www.siliconrepublic.com/news/news4a.nv?storyid=single4002

I am concerned that Irish computer users are still unable to make a purchase of music from the iTunes music store. I include a quote from the article:

"It is understood that the failure to resolve copyright issues with IMRO prevented the Republic of Ireland from being among the countries to enjoy the use of the iTunes store. IMRO exists to protect the rights of Irish recorded music artists and has been outspoken about the threat of music piracy over the internet. Ironically, the advent of iTunes is seen as the first progressive step towards enabling people to buy music and has been broadly embraced across the music industry, both by labels, bands and emerging artists."

If this is the case can you advise when users like myself can expect to be able to make a purchase from the iTunes store.

I understand that there is a lot involved in making sure that the artists work is protected and that any revenue due to to them is protected but at present the non-availability of an electronic means of purchasing music can I imagine only contribute to the current abuse of an artistes work by those who see no alternative than to download tracks illegally and continue to hurt the music industry.

I look forward to your comments,

Kind regards,
Peter Collins

I hope this helps!

daveyjoe

Aparently, iTunes Ireland is coming, it was expected to be launched with the other euro stores, but they had some last minute 'glitches' with the store, so they went for a later release date (sounds very Irish to me).

Even the iTunes download page originally included Ireland among the countries listed look at the bottom of the screenshot below (it has been changed now)

More info at http://homepage.mac.com/sspence/macinfo/pages/news.html
&
http://blogs.linux.ie/stuff/2004/10/28/itunes-music-store-ireland-real-soon-now/

flywheel

daveyjoe wrote:

but they had some last minute 'glitches' with the store

from the article it sounds like the 'glitches' they had were with IMRO... and here's another piece from MacWorld mentioned over on the IMUG:

iTunes Ireland sees 'pot of gold'?

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PhoenixRising

Just sent mine aswell.

What are the odds that IMRO were trying to negotiate a higher price for Irish users than our european counterparts?

daveyjoe

DubWireless wrote:

it sounds like the 'glitches' they had were with IMRO...

Yeah, That's what I was implying.

RobertFoster

DubWireless wrote:

iTunes Ireland sees 'pot of gold'?

While one OD2-supported music download service does exist in Ireland, any move into the territory will be hampered by the country's low broadband adoption rate. Ireland has one of the lowest broadband penetration rates in Europe, with many complaining that former state-owned telecoms company, Eirecomm, is not doing enough to make such services available.

Just made me laugh. English people seem to say Eire more than we do