Filed under: Software, Cult of Mac, Odds and ends, iTunes, Apple History
A walk through iTunes history
Recognize the software above? The brushed steel, the rounded buttons, the liquid digital-style display. If you said SoundJam, you're right. But if you said iTunes, you're right, too -- SoundJam is the app that Apple originally bought to turn into the multimedia/handheld software juggernaut we know today. This is the first (public) iteration of the software, as told in this interesting history of iTunes over at Mac|Life.
The program actually started as a Winamp-style (oh man, remember Winamp? Justin Frankel's now doing stuff with Reaper, which is the app artists will use to release their songs in Rock Band. But I digress...) media management application, and it's really interesting to see how it turned into a real keystone of Apple's media plans over the years, from the "Rip. Mix. Burn." idea to the home base for the iPhone, up into the current iTMS (complete with music, movies, TV shows and even audiobooks) and of course the game-changing App Store.
If you'd told the SoundJam guys that their software would one day revolutionize the music and smartphone industries, not to mention be at the center of a multimillion dollar software delivery system, they'd probably have told you to keep dreaming.
And we're only at version 9. Who knows what we'll see in the next ten years of iTunes?
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
James said 9:31AM on 9-17-2009
Apple dropped the name iTunes Music Store (iTMS) in favour of the iTunes store as it sells TV shows, movies, music etc.
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Marcos said 9:32AM on 9-17-2009
The iTunes Music Store was long ago renamed to the iTunes Store. Why are you still referring to it as the iTMS? I see this a lot on TUAW.
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loz said 9:34AM on 9-17-2009
http://www.panic.com/extras/audionstory/
The other 'iTunes'. Ahh what could have been. Panic make great software.
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oZ said 10:29AM on 9-17-2009
At the time, SoundJam didn't randomly crash for no reason at all as often as Audion. That made it my player of choice, despite Audion looking cooler.
kaslings said 12:19PM on 9-17-2009
I was more of a fan of Audium as well. Alpha shading skins, and it just worked. Although if I remember correctly, burning audio cds was pretty convoluted.
Simon Arch said 12:43PM on 9-17-2009
Yeah, I was an Audion partisan myself. I loved that little app. SoundJam was just too clunky for my tastes. It look TOO much like WinAmp at a time when WinAmp was seriously ugly.
I loved the Reintegration+ face: http://www.panic.com/audion/gallery/previews/reintegration_g.jpg Sweet.
aardivark said 9:44AM on 9-17-2009
Bought my first iPod in '04. Shortly after that I realized that iTunes is the secret sauce in Apple's recipe for world domination of digital home entertainment. The key is that people like being able to manage their devices and content from a central 'location' that offers excellent ergonomics unlike the cramped conditions offered by a mobile pocket-sized device. Furthermore. anyone who invested the time and effort to learn how to use iTunes will not buy a device that requires a separate iTunes-like app. And since Apple had an enormous head start (100 million registered credit cards says Jobs) then all the other competitors are basically doomed to fringe status.
I also predicted that device manufacturers will someday be knocking at Apple's doors asking to be allowed inside the iTunes walled garden. Lo and behold here comes the Palm Pre who doesn't even knock and ask nicely.
With all the face time that iTunes gets, of course we can only expect that Apple would keep expanding iTunes' scope.
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Mr B said 9:46AM on 9-17-2009
Ah I almost bought a boxed copy of SoundJam. I was new to the Mac and pretty new to digital music in general. Wish I had.
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Dan said 9:48AM on 9-17-2009
I think it was 1999 or 2000 when I got a Creative Nomad II MP3 player with 64mb!! flash storage. It held 18 songs and also had a FM radio tuner. And my parents paid $50 to buy SoundJam MP Plus for me for Christmas that year. I used it to make MP3 files from cassette tapes. Recalling this makes me feel a lot older than 23.
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David said 10:40AM on 9-17-2009
I miss SoundJam. Simpler times.
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Jeff said 11:17AM on 9-17-2009
Soundjam was awesome.
I was all bummed out when Apple turned it into iTunes, as they dropped a few of the features i used all the time... but it's turned out well. :)
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SpinThis! said 11:32AM on 9-17-2009
Yeh me too. I hated iTunes when it first arrived. That single window pissed me off and it just didn't feel and work right. And it lacked broadcasting features. (I used to do Shoutcast streams) and SoundJam handled all of that no problem.
It wasn't until a few versions in that iTunes became really useful—smart playlists, etc.
Colin said 11:18AM on 9-17-2009
I worked for Casady & Greene, the original developer, when SoundJam was still in beta and then for a couple years after its release. It was astonishing to see the rapid rise in avid users of the software, especially since PMPs were barely a novelty at the time. More significantly though, after OS X came out, SoundJam became C&G's most successful piece of software, not to mention the only piece that truly survived the transition into a Cocoa world. After Apple purchased SoundJam, the company, which had been one of the most successful small-scale developers for the Mac for close to 20 years, had very few successful titles left in their catalog and was forced to shut down less than a year or two after the sale. As successful as iTunes has become, the way it came about can also serve as a potent warning to software developers making killer apps: if Apple asks to buy, make sure you aren't putting yourself out of business by signing away your app.
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boriscleto said 12:09PM on 9-17-2009
Casady & Greene wasn't a developer, they were a publisher. They distributed software developed by others. The Internet killed C&G, not Apple.
otiose3 said 12:18PM on 9-17-2009
Here's a more in-depth history:
http://www.evansharp.com/2009/01/document-metadata-and-the-finder-part-i/
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Victor said 12:27PM on 9-17-2009
oh my god... I remember using that on my performa 6400. I could barely chat on aim and listen to music at the same time.... oh the good ol days of 1998.
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Fred said 1:03PM on 9-17-2009
HA! This has turned into a pretty awesome trip down memory lane. I remember Winamp and "whipping the llama's ass". My first MP3 player was an RCA Lyra that had a CF slot. It was horrible! Then I got my hands on a creative CD player that read MP3 and thought that was just about the best thing ever! But then there was iPod. Mac only, seemed very cool, but was so expensive! I finally jumped in with a 20gb 4th gen iPod and haven't looked back. It's so funny when I see people rail against iTunes, but I remember the clunky software for that Lyra and I compare that to the iTunes of today and my head spins.
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ryan said 2:40PM on 9-17-2009
The top display of iTunes still mimics the look of a grayscale LCD. Do you suppose Apple has kept it this way as an homage to the original iPod?
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CyBeR said 3:39PM on 9-17-2009
That was there long before the iPod. It is, however, a reference to audio players (i.e., cd players, amps, etc.) which invariably come with something similar tacked on to the front.
victor said 3:43PM on 9-17-2009
I forget if it was bill or jeff that approached me while I was working at adaptec managing toast 4.0. He was shopping around SoundJam and was wondering if Adaptec was interested. To this day I am thankful that I didn't pursue the relationship. Adaptec was a terrible place for anything Mac, specially software. We were the red headed step child of that pc hardware company.
Anyway it went to a good home (I hope apple is a good home, hard to know from the outside).
As a side note after Toast 4.0 (and my burn out) adaptec had the good sense of arranging for Toast to go back to the capable hands of Markus Fest and his merrymen at El Gato.
All wells that ends well?
v.
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