iTunes Says Its Customers Top 50 Million.

February 26, 2008—Apple® today announced that iTunes® (www.itunes.com) is now the number two music retailer in the US, behind only Wal-Mart, based on the latest data from the NPD Group*. Apple also announced that there are now over 50 million iTunes Store customers. iTunes has sold over four billion songs, with an incredible 20 million songs sold on Christmas Day 2007 alone, and offers the world’s largest music catalog of over six million songs from all of the major and thousands of independent labels.

“We’d like to thank the over 50 million music lovers who have helped the iTunes Store reach this incredible milestone,” said Eddy Cue, Apple’s vice president of iTunes. “We continue to add great new features like iTunes Movie Rentals to give our customers even more reason to love iTunes.”

Last month, Apple launched iTunes Movie Rentals featuring movies from all of the major movie studios including 20th Century Fox, The Walt Disney Studios, Warner Bros., Paramount, Universal Studios Home Entertainment, Sony Pictures Entertainment, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM), Lionsgate and New Line Cinema. Users can rent movies and watch them on their PCs or Macs, all current generation iPods**, iPhone™ and on a widescreen TV with Apple TV®. iTunes Movie Rentals will offer over 1,000 titles by the end of this month, including over 100 titles in stunning high definition video with 5.1 Dolby Digital surround sound which users can rent directly from their widescreen TV using Apple TV.

iTunes 7.6 is available as a free download at www.itunes.com. iTunes Movie Rentals are available in the US only and are $2.99 (US) for library titles and $3.99 (US) for new releases, and high definition versions are priced just one dollar more with library titles at $3.99 (US) and new releases at $4.99 (US). Movie rentals from the iTunes Store for Mac® or Windows require iTunes 7.6. iTunes Movie Rentals require a valid credit card with a billing address in the country of purchase.

*Based on data from market research firm the NPD Group’s MusicWatch survey that captures consumer reported past week unit purchases and counts one CD representing 12 tracks, excluding wireless transactions. The iTunes Music Store became the second-largest music retailer in the US after Wal-Mart, based on the amount of music sold during 2007.

**Movie rentals work on iPod® classic, iPod nano with video and iPod touch.

Apple ignited the personal computer revolution in the 1970s with the Apple II and reinvented the personal computer in the 1980s with the Macintosh. Today, Apple continues to lead the industry in innovation with its award-winning computers, OS X operating system and iLife and professional applications. Apple is also spearheading the digital media revolution with its iPod portable music and video players and iTunes online store, and has entered the mobile phone market with its revolutionary iPhone.

Britney Spears’ ex-husband Kevin Federline has agreed to reinstate her visitation rights with their two sons, his lawyer said in a statement on Friday, according to The Associated Press.

Federline’s attorney, Mark Vincent Kaplan, said in a statement the former couple has agreed to a modification of a court order that had stripped Spears of her visitation rights, AP reported. The statement did not provide more details, but Kaplan told People.com on Friday that Spears would be allowed to see her sons “soon, very soon.”

Good news travels fast, and when Marc Anthony’s sister found out about the double blessing he and wife Jennifer Lopez had early Friday morning, she was overjoyed.

“I learned this morning. I’m ecstatic, I really am. I’m happy for her,” Yolanda Santa Maria, Anthony’s older sister, told PEOPLE Friday after hearing the birth news on Good Morning America. “She’s a mom for the first time. I can just imagine the euphoria she’s going through.”

And as for her brother? “It’s another two blessings for him. He beat me – I have four [kids] and now he has five. I’m so happy for him. I don’t even know what to say. It’s like if I had the babies.”

Santa Maria, who expects to meet her new niece and nephew soon, added, “I can’t wait to see them, I can’t wait to meet them. Words don’t even begin to express how happy I am for them.”

British “Girl Power” group will cut their much hyped reunion tour short. British “Girl Power” group will cut their much hyped reunion tour short. The Spice Girls apologized to disappointed fans for cutting short their reunion tour. The tour that featured the British “Girl Power” group will come to an end in Toronto on February 26. The girls deny that bitter fighting was the cause of the tour cancellation. Rather, they cite that “family and personal commitments” are to blame for the abrupt change of plan. On Wednesday, the girls posted an “apology video” on their official Web site. In the video, the group pretended to fight each other before Mel B screamed: “We hate each other? Are you kidding? We love each other!” Reuters reports that the girls have canceled concerts in China, South Africa, Australia and Argentina. The Spice Girls were one of the biggest pop acts of the 1990s, selling 35 million albums worldwide. 

Warner Music Group Corp., the record company of Led Zeppelin, reported a first-quarter loss on costs to close a business it acquired nine months ago. The shares posted a record drop. The net loss of $16 million, or 11 cents a share, in the three months ended Dec. 31, compares with net income of $18 million, or 12 cents, a year earlier, the New York-based company said today in a statement. Excluding the costs to close the acquired unit, earnings of 1 cent a share missed the 12-cent average of seven analysts’ estimates compiled by Bloomberg.

Warner Music, facing an industrywide decline in compact disc sales, bought concert company Bulldog Entertainment in May to try to boost revenue. It shut down the unit at a cost of $18 million. Revenue rose 6.6 percent to $989 million, driven by Josh Groban’s album “Noel” and currency changes. Excluding the changes, sales rose 1 percent, the first increase in six quarters.

“The write-off shows they were entering a business they arguably shouldn’t have gotten into in the first place,” said Chris White, an analyst with Wedbush Morgan Securities in Los Angeles who recommends holding the shares and doesn’t own them. “Revenue growth is still decent but supported by acquisitions that are questionable.”

Warner Music, the world’s third largest record company, tumbled $1.59, or 18 percent, to $7.15 at 10:32 a.m. in New York Stock Exchange composite trading after dropping as much as 19 percent, the most since the company went public in May 2005. The shares had declined 58 percent in the past 12 months before today on concern gains in digital sales won’t make up for the decline in higher-priced CDs.

Not `Standing Still’

Chief Executive Officer Edgar Bronfman is also trying to increase sales by adding merchandising and management services. Warner Music invested $50 million in a joint venture with Frank Sinatra’s family last year to market his music and videos as well as his name and likeness. It also paid about $110 million for a stake in artist management company Front Line Management.

Investments and acquisitions are likely to be smaller this year than in 2007, Chief Financial Officer Michael Fleisher said today on a conference call.

“While we were obviously disappointed with” Bulldog Entertainment, Bronfman said on the call, “we continue to believe that taking prudent risks to expand and enlarge our revenue opportunities is a far better strategy than standing still.”

(The company held a conference call to discuss the results at 8:30 a.m. New York time. For a replay, dial +1-888-566-0618 or +1-203-369-3076.)

To contact the reporter on this story: Don Jeffrey in New York at djeffrey1@bloomberg.net