Itunes Store

Royalties that digital music companies, including Apple Inc. and record labels, pay songwriters for selling their music as ring tones, CDs and permanent digital downloads are to be set today by a federal agency. This is the first time in nearly three decades that the industry has been unable to decide the fee for sales of recorded music on its own. Apple has so strongly opposed increasing the rate, now 9.

Verizon Wireless will unveil a music-playing phone and online music service to compete with Apple Computer Inc.'s iTunes store and phone to be launched with Motorola Inc. A Verizon Wireless-branded LG Electronics Inc. handset will be available by August, as much as a month before Motorola and Apple are due to unveil an iTunes phone. Verizon Wireless' music service is expected to be up and running in six to eight months, Chief Executive Dennis Strigl said.

I just want to express how much I enjoyed Michelle Quinn's story on iPod University ("The iPod lecture circuit," Nov. 24). I was in Florence, Italy, last week and read the article online. Not looking forward to the 15-hour travel time back to Los Angeles, I immediately went to the iTunes store and downloaded some of the most wonderful lectures from Stanford, MIT and several others. And all of them are absolutely free. Steve Dworman Brentwood

Microsoft Corp. confirmed plans to release a new music and entertainment player and accompanying software under the "Zune" brand this year. The Redmond, Wash.-based software maker faces an uphill climb in closing the gap on Apple's iPod media player and iTunes Music Store, the runaway leaders in their respective areas.

Apple announced a new version of iTunes on Wednesday. The Cupertino tech company said its music program and the iTunes Store have both been redesigned and given new features. Now users can click on albums to expand them in place, and artists can now also share photos with users. A new feature called "Up Next" that lets users see a pop-up window with a list of songs coming up on their playlist has also been added. The new iTunes will launch next month. The store itself will look more like the new version of the iOS iTunes Store, which is set to launch with iOS 6 later this month.

One of the great new features on iOS 6 and the iPhone 5 is a new app called Passbook, but for a lot of people who updated their devices with the new operating system, the app simply won't work. In theory, Passbook will let you keep digital passes in one location. When you open the app, you get a screen saying you can use Passbook to store digital copies of flight boarding passes, event tickets and coupons. Target on Thursday announced it would support mobile coupons on Passbook.

The world's largest music store, Apple's iTunes, plans to boost the price of many hit singles and selected classic tracks to $1.29 on April 7, breaking the psychological barrier of 99 cents in what could be the first big test of how much consumers are willing to pay to download individual songs. Although the date for higher prices has not been publicly announced, Apple has been notifying record labels it will go into effect on that date, industry executives said.

Apple has agreed to hand out more than $100 million in iTunes store credits to settle a lawsuit alleging that its iPhone and iPad apps allowed children to make purchases without their parent's knowledge or consent. The lawsuit, which was filed by five parents two years ago, alleged that Apple did not create parental controls to keep children from buying extra features sold within a video games app. The parents who filed the lawsuit said they didn't realize their children were charging their accounts until they were billed.

Avid gamers and app store junkies beware: Not one, but two, fake "Halo 4" iPhone apps have been released over the last two days. "Halo 4 for iPhone/iPad is the fourth in the Halo series where Master Chief returns to battle an ancient evil bent on vengeance and annihilation," reads a summary of the game, which was priced at $4.99. Microsoft just launched the game for Xbox in November. Apple users who were lured by screenshots of the game and detailed descriptions were met with a rude awakening -- the game turned out to be a simple chess game, according to Gizmodo . One of the developers is listed as "Toan Tran," and the support page links to a website hosted by Weebly.

ENTERTAINMENT Apple Computer Inc. said it would dedicate space within its iTunes Store for Spanish-language music, music videos, TV shows and podcasts. Telemundo, NBC Universal's Spanish-language TV network, also signed a deal with Apple to offer downloads of its shows, including "Pasion de Gavilanes." Los Angeles-based Univision Communications Inc.