It was a seemingly watershed moment in iTunes history. Earlier this year, Apple finally broke down and did away with their previously iron-clad pricing structure of .99 for any song in the iTunes catalog. Instead, they introduced their “iTunes Variable Pricing”, meaning that you might pay any of .66, .99, or $1.29 for a tune. But what makes this really interesting is that, in addition, now the entirety of Apple’s iTunes music catalog has lost the Apple-proprietary digital rights management (DRM) and is DRM-free, which is the + in “iTunes Plus”.

Free Christmas music onilne is always nice. And free online Christmas music is just what you need to get yourself into that holiday spirit – or at least to make work go by more quickly! So if you’ve been asking yourself “where can I listen to Christmas music on the Internet?”, here is a list of some great places offering streaming Christmas music so that you can listen to Christmas music online! Just jingle while you work!

Is your ISP interfering with your downloading and your bandwidth? If you are legitimately using a torrent service, is your ISP interfering with your connections by doing some peer-to-peer busting? Or, maybe, is your ISP is limiting or even disconnecting your VoIP calls, such as if you use Vonage, or even Skype? How would you know? By using Switzerland, the new Net Neutrality-sniffing program from the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF).

99 cent iTunes downloads will go the way of the dodo if California state lawmaker Charles Calderon gets his way. His proposal, AB1956, seeks to tax music downloads, adding 8.25-8.75% sales tax to music purchases made online, and increasing the purchase price to $1.08.

A class action lawsuit against the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) claims that the RIAA has used extortion and rackateering practices in the witch-hunt-like way that it has gone after people whom it claims have downloaded music illegally – “defendants” who include children, people who don’t own computers, and even dead people (downloading from the afterlife requires a heck of a strong wifi signal!)

Despite our article clarifying that the RIAA has said that they are not interested in going after people for making copies of music for personal use, the myth abounds, and misinformation is ricocheting around the Internet faster than a speeding CD laser.

So, here, for your own ears, are snippets of the NPR interview, in which RIAA President Cary Sherman has clearly stated the RIAA’s position on making copies of legally purchased music, for personal use.

Much has been made in the media this week about the news that the Recording Industry of America (RIAA) has announced, through one of their lawsuits, that they now consider it illegal for you to copy music from a CD you have purchased to your own computer, for your own personal use. The one thing that everyone seems to be overlooking is that the RIAA has not said this at all. In fact, they have explicitly stated that they are not concerned with people copying music to their computer (or iPod, or other personal MP3 player) for their own personal use.

If you’re looking for free online music downloads – legal free music downloads and free music videos downloads – then have we got news for you! Spiral Frog is a new free legal music downloads service offering free music downloads! That’s right, absolutely free music downloads! Rather than charge for its music downloads it is instead advertising supported – so you get music downloads free while Spiral Frog gets to show you ads. The twist is that these totally free music downloads will not play on iPods or Zunes. It also won’t work with any Apple computer. So you can get all your music downloads free, but they won’t work with your Mac, iPod or Zune. That is because Spiral Frog relies on the Microsoft Digital Rights Management (DRM) system its free music downloads.

Allofmp3.com, one of the top mp3 download sites in the world for people looking for mp3 mp3 downloads, allowing people do to an mp3 search of the works of thousands of popular artists, and then download the mp3s for as little as ten cents, has been closed down by the Russian government in a bid to gain membership in the World Trade Organization. Allofmp3.com was considered a barrier to entry for Russia, with what has been estimated to be the world’s largest collection of pirated music, all available as low cost and even nearly free mp3 downloads to Allofmp3’s 5.5 million customers.

The RIAA has sent 400 letters to 13 colleges and universities demanding that they put the squeeze on as many as 400 students for downloading music for free. The “pre-lawsuit” college letters from the RIAA tell the students that they may settle with the RIAA “at a discounted rate” or face a lawsuit.

Early adopters who have rushed out to grab their copy of Windows Vista have found that it has broken iTunes. As a result, Apple has suggested that people hold off upgrading to Vista “for a few weeks”, at which time a new version of iTunes is expected to be released. They are also offering an iTunes Repair Tool for Vista, for those who have already made the switch.

Starbucks has just struck a deal to have their own “Starbucks Entertainment” area on Apple’s iTunes internet music store. According to Starbucks, their Hear Music catalog will be available through the iTunes website.

MySpace has announced that they will start selling music downloads, in competition with iTunes. Actually, more accurately, My Space is going to allow the indie artists who make up a substantial portion of their userbase to start selling their own music via downloads on My Space, or what some are calling MyTunes.

Just about a year ago we told you that AOL had announced they had purchased Music Now and its entire catalog of music. Now AOL has announced that they have revamped the Music Now music service, and it is open for business as “AOL Music Now”.

Forget your fancy Mac MP3 players!

Did you know that you can play an MP3 on the fly on your Mac without using or loading any separate Mac MP3 players, and without even loading or using iTunes?