The 10-millionth song to be downloaded was Canadian popster Avril Lavigne's 'Complicated', according to Apple. iTunes is currently available only to Mac users in the US, having launched in April, and allows users to download tracks for 99 cents each. Apple has said that the online music store will be available to Windows users by the end of this year.
Chris Martin, lead singer of Coldplay, said that the band embraced the efforts of Apple and saw iTunes as the future of the music business.
"It's clear Apple has delivered a working and successful platform for music fans to discover artists and purchase both albums and single songs instantly with ease," he said.
The music industry is frantically looking at ways it can be a part of the phenomenon of music downloads. While Apple and MSN both offer stores where tracks from different record companies can be downloaded for a fee, Sony Music announced last week that it too planned to get in on the act.
Sir Howard Stringer, vice-chairman of Sony and head of entertainment operations, claimed at a conference last week that the industry had lost $7bn (£4.4bn) over the past two years to illegal downloads.
In the US, the recording industry has turned to lawyers in an attempt to stop the practice. The Recording Industry Association of America has filed suits against 261 individuals who have uploaded music on the internet after forcing internet service providers to disclose the ISP addresses of people who illegally trade music.
RIAA has also filed suits against numerous file-sharing sites including Aimster and Napster.
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