As much as I love Apple as a company, I can’t stand how they don’t even follow their own “Interface Guidelines” sometimes.

Well I’ve had it with them and their need to have iTunes on Windows being an excuse for the interface that it uses.

And the fact that it doesn’t share resources with Finder.app and other application on the Mac.

I’ve taken it upon myself to Aquafy (if thats even a term) iTunes for improved usability while not sacrificing any features that other modifications do, or performance.

My modification is simply a hacked iTunes (read iTunes not system file!) resource file. It’s modified with buttons and resources of those found on Leopard. It greatly improves usability and simply looks good. Not to mention I had to get creative in some areas and was inspired by the 2d Dock separator in one of the section dividers.

Download here

Coversutra is Leopard compatible since version 1.1.8. Today, Sophiestication surprises us with an update of this great application by integrating the ability to pick an album cover style to display on the desktop. As a result, no need for the hack (I was using) to display a vinyl cover instead of the classical CD.

Coversutra 1.2 has 3 album covers to choose from: Vinyl, Transparent CD Case and the Classical CD Case.
As usual the application uses a few of your computer’s resources even with the Last.fm support turned on.

Download Coversutra 1.2 here.

Many of you regular visitors to Apple.com may have seen this newly created TV ad for new iPod Nano. If you still have not seen it (How dare you! ) you can watch right now: iPod Nano Ad

The ad is simple and elegant at the same time, like most of Apple’s ads. This one, however, differs from other iPod ads - it does not have epileptic guys in there, which is so refreshing! Another thing that you will notice is the kind of music is in the ad - simple and cute. The song is by Indie rock singer and songwriter Feist.

You can download the song from the link below:

1234 - Feist

I think Apple has finally swept away all the hopes of iPhones hackers with this update, but it seem it also has some great new features, according to Apple:

With iTunes 7.4, sync your favorite music and more with the new iPod nano (third generation), iPod classic, and iPod touch, plus create custom ringtones exclusively for iPhone with many of your favorite songs purchased from the iTunes Store. You can now also play purchased videos with closed captioning (when available), easily rate your favorite albums from one to five stars, and watch videos at a larger size inside the iTunes window. iTunes 7.4.2 addresses an issue with creating ringtones using iTunes Plus song purchases and includes bug fixes to improve stability and performance.

Those who organize their playlists like I do, will understand me just by watching this image… It’s for me the end of a nightmare!

In the “summary” tab of the iPod welcome screen, iTunes notifies that it will check for an iPod’s Software update on Sept 14th, iPhoto ‘08 support maybe?

Now with iTunes 7.4 you can convert on the flow videos to the Apple TV or iPod format just by ctrl+clicking on the video you’d like to convert from iTunes….

Here’s iTunes 7.4.1 which supports the latest iPods (classic & nano), it also has the ringtone creation capability (from songs you purchased from the ITMS).

According to many users of the iPhone, iTunes 7.4 blocks back the iPhone that have been activated without an AT&T card.

Apple did this amazing trick without even modifying the firmware of the iPhone. iTunes 7.4 also deletes from these iPhones any ringtone that have been added without Apple’s agreement.

So.. Now it’s impossible to unlock the iPhone and impossible to use it outside the AT&T network!

TV programmes are now available on the UK’s iTunes Music Store!

Can’t wait to see videos on other’s european ITMS’s!