ReadWriteWeb

In this edition of the Weekly Wrapup - our newsletter summarizing the top stories of the week - we analyze the 5 biggest trends of 2009 on the Web, review the iTunes and iPhone announcements made by Apple during the week, tell you about a new Wordpress feature that makes blogs more real-time, and more. We also check in on our two new channels: ReadWriteEnterprise (devoted to 'enterprise 2.0' trends and products) and ReadWriteStart (dedicated to profiling startups and entrepreneurs).

Even though Apple launched a major redesign of iTunes yesterday, searching the iTunes App Store is still a bit of a hassle, especially because iTunes lacks convenient options to filter apps by price, category, or release date. Given the amount of apps available in the store, even Apple's new Genius feature for the App Store isn't likely to make finding new apps much easier. UQuery, however, sets out to change all of this by indexing all the apps in the store and making this index available through a web-based search engine.

The "iTunes LP" is just one of the many new iTunes features revealed yesterday during Apple's announcement at their "It's Only Rock and Roll"-themed event. But the iTunes LP, unlike the other new features which get to exist as simple and fun enhancements in iTunes 9, has a heavy burden on its shoulders. It's supposed to revitalize the music industry by encouraging consumers to once again purchase entire albums as opposed to single tracks. With this new digital album format, the idea is to replicate the experience of buying an album, complete with lyrics, liner notes, album art, photos, and more, giving music buyers extra content to peruse while enjoying their new music. The only problem is that this so-called "interactive" format isn't all that interactive. And what's more, innovative artists are already discovering how to monetize their music while engaging fans in new ways that have nothing to do with a re-imagined LP. Instead, the "interactive format" of the future isn't the album, it's the app.

As is the trend with every Apple-related announcement, Apple stock rises during the hype of initial rumors and drops shortly after the keynote simply fails to live up to expectations. Apple could've put a man on the moon this morning and fanboys would've still expected a monkey on Venus. Although users were not blessed with the announcement of a Beatles' release, the company did offer Genius Mixes and the iTunes' LP. ReadWriteWeb covered the news earlier this morning, now we take an in-depth look at Apple's latest music-related releases.

Steve Jobs returned to a standing ovation at Apple's annual iPod event today, where Apple introduced version 3.1 of the iPhone OS and the next version of iTunes. With iTunes 9, Apple introduces a Genius-like recommendation feature for apps and 30,000 premade ringtones for $1.29 in iTunes. Version 9 of iTunes has also seen a major redesign. The application and the iTunes store now look much cleaner. Apple also introduced 'iTunes LPs' that will bring liner notes and artwork to digital albums (the much rumored 'Cocktail' feature), as well as app management for the iPhone and iPod touch that is built in to iTunes.