By AppleInsider Staff

Published: 02:00 PM EST (11:00 AM PST)

Apple today launched a European Union version of its iTunes Music Store, giving music fans in Austria, Belgium, Finland, Greece, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Portugal and Spain the same innovative features and breakthrough price of €0.99 per song that have made iTunes the number one online music service in the world. The company also announced it will launch the iTunes Music Store in Canada in November.

"We’re excited to bring the iTunes Music Store to even more music fans across Europe, and with this expansion we now reach customers in almost 70 percent of the global music market," said Eddy Cue, Apple’s vice president of Applications. "iTunes is the world’s number one online music store, with more than 150 million downloads and over 70 percent market share in the US and UK."

The EU iTunes Music Store features over 700,000 songs from all four major music companies and more than 100 independent record labels and exclusive tracks from a wide variety of leading worldwide artists, including songs from Anastacia, Marc Anthony, Andrea Bocelli, Black Eyed Peas, Destiny’s Child, Duran Duran, Keane, Bob Marley, George Michael, Gianni Morandi, Nas, La Oreja de Van Gogh, Laura Pausini, The Prodigy, Gwen Stefani, Travis and Zucchero. The EU iTunes Music Store offers the exclusive iTunes Originals in-studio series featuring exclusive recording sessions and interviews with LL Cool J, Jack Johnson, PJ Harvey and Sting.

With the same personal use rights as in the US, UK, France and Germany, the EU iTunes Music Store gives users the ability to play songs on up to five personal computers, burn a single song onto CDs an unlimited number of times, burn the same playlist up to seven times and listen to their music on an unlimited number of iPods. The EU iTunes Music Store offers PC and Mac users the same innovative features including:

"iMix," an innovative way for users to publish playlists of their favorite songs on the iTunes Music Store for other users to preview, rate and purchase. iMix creates a virtual iTunes community, enabling users to discover new music recommended by fellow music fans, rate iMixes published by other iTunes users and share iMix previews with friends;

"Party Shuffle," a dynamic playlist that automatically shuffles songs from a user’s music library, displays just-played and upcoming songs, and allows users to easily add, delete and rearrange upcoming songs on the fly. Party Shuffle is the ultimate DJ at any gathering and a great way for users to get reacquainted with their personal music library;

more than 8,000 audiobooks, which can be purchased with one click and listened to on any PC or Mac computer as well as on iPods. iTunes is the only digital music jukebox that allows users to seamlessly purchase audiobooks in the same easy way that they purchase music;

"Artist Alerts,: an email alert notifying users when music from one of their favorite artists has been added to iTunes;

the ability to create and print stunning CD jewel case inserts for albums or compilation discs, combining album art and track lists using professionally designed templates. For compilation CDs, iTunes will automatically generate a mosaic of album covers based on the chosen songs; and

automatic WMA to AAC conversion, enabling Windows users to automatically create iTunes versions of their songs encoded in unprotected WMA. Converting an entire music library into iTunes and syncing it onto iPod is now a snap.

Pricing & Availability

iTunes 4.7--a new version Apple's jukebox software for Mac and Windows--includes the EU iTunes Music Store and is available as a free download immediately from www.itunes.com. The EU iTunes Music Store works with the Euro, and purchase and download of songs requires a valid credit card with a billing address in the country of purchase. Further information about iTunes or iPod can be found at www.apple.com