Get Better Gear!

Premier Sponsors

TechRestore

Other World Computing

Top 5 Free Apps

Release Date: August 05, 2009
Genre: Games
Release Date: May 22, 2009
Genre: Games
Release Date: August 29, 2009
Genre: Games
Release Date: March 27, 2009
Release Date: August 07, 2009

iTunes New Music Releases

Release Date: September 29, 2009
Genre: Rock
Release Date: September 20, 2009
Release Date: September 15, 2009
Release Date: August 25, 2009
Genre: Rock
Release Date: August 25, 2009

Top 5 Paid Apps

Release Date: April 22, 2009
StickWars $0.99
Release Date: March 31, 2009
Genre: Games
Bloons $0.99
Release Date: April 05, 2009
Genre: Games

Discover New Music

  • Physical Graffiti

    • 10 out of 10
    • Led Zeppelin
    • This album bears every flavor of genius from the five records that came before. It is, I believe, the band's finest. With Physical Graffiti, Zep came raging back to their musical home territory -- har
  • Pressure Chief

    • 6 out of 10
    • Cake
    • Pressure Chief, Cake's latest album, didn't immediately grab me. In fact, it took perhaps half a dozen listens before I started truly enjoying it. Any

  • The Last 5 Years (2002 Off-Broadway Cast)

    • 10 out of 10
    • Jason Robert Brown
    • The soundtrack to this moving off-broadway musical is heart moving. The lyrics follow a couple in a relationship for five years, one point of view going forward in time, and the other tracing time fr
  • Abnormal Anonymous

    • 8 out of 10
    • Congo Norvell
    • Very few albums manage to capture snapshots of a quality of life in the manner that Congo Norvell's sophomore record, "Abnormals Anonymous," does.

      Comparisons to the Velvet Underground are

  • Chicago Transit Authority

    • 10 out of 10
    • Chicago
    • For those of you who don't know, Chicago didn't always suck, and everyone in the band didn't always play a keyboard. When the band started off they were pioneers of rock and jazz fusion, and guita

Reader Specials

Visit Deals On The Web for the best deals on all consumer electronics, iPods, and more!

Free on iTunes

PGC, On The Edge, More Aliens, And More

Just days after Christmas and already your new iPod is begging for new stuff to ingest. You’ve plowed through the tons of offerings at the iTunes Store and you just can’t decide how best to spend the remaining dollars on your redeemed iTunes Gift Card.

Here’s a thought: Why not hold on to your digital ducats and grab stuff that’s absolutely free?

For instance, there’s a podcast from Fox News that’s pretty cool -- Point, Click, Go! episodes are barely over a minute long, but they are choke full of information about interesting Web sites. In one episode, the ever-so-watchable host Liz Stowasky point us to a Web site dedicated to showing us how to make stuff with tampons.

Yes, tampons.


Point, Click, Go!

There are 8 episodes so far and all are entertaining. Subscribe now.

While we’re on the subject of podcasts you might also want to check out Edge Music Videocast, which features music videos from today’s popular and up and coming bands.

The podcast is sponsored by Ford who is promoting its new crossover vehicle, The Edge. Remember that silly commercial where the car was shown driving along the ledges of building? Probably the dumbest commercial ever. Thankfully, Ford isn’t plastering car commercials all through the videos, so you can watch your favorite bands relatively unscathed by wanton commercialism.

The podcast is well done and shows up well on both your iPod and Apple TV. Check it out.

And while we’re on the subject of music videos, there’s a free download of a music video made for the CW Network show Aliens in America, performed by PJ Osson and Salman Ahmad.

(What’s so funny bout) Peace, Love, and Understanding is actually a decent video (Nick Lowe wrote the song, but if you are familiar with it, it’s probably Elvis Costello’s version you’ve heard before), and the show isn’t bad either. In fact, you can still get the pilot episode as a free download as well.

By the way, Aliens in America is not a remake of Alien Nation, that show with the sour milk swilling slug people from space (which wasn’t a bad show, actually). No, this shows about a card carrying conservative family who inadvertently becomes host to a Middle Eastern exchange student. It’s actually quite funny once you get around the heavy politically correct hammer the show bludgeons you with.

Download both the pilot and the music video free this week at the iTunes Store.

Next up we have Gossip Girl. Think of Beverly Hills 90201, but with a Manhattan zip code.

This person sleeps with that person which upsets the significant other of the first person while the second person’s significant other is oblivious to who is sleeping with whom.

If you like this sort of thing then the iTunes Store is offering a 17 minute ’Get Acquainted" download that features the cast of Gossip Girl talking about their characters.

I will admit that the show looks good, the photography is slick and stylish and, at least from what I’ve gather from the cast interviews and snippets of the show, it looks like a complicated story. Should be fun.

OK, that ties things up for this week and this year. Thanks to those of you who regularly read Free on iTunes (and tell Dad I’ll stop by later). Those of you who are new to the column, welcome. See you all next week and next year.

Happy New Year!

More freebies at the iTunes Store:


Vern Seward is a writer who currently lives in Orlando, FL. He’s been a Mac fan since Atari Computers folded, but has worked with computers of nearly every type for 20 years.

Post Your Comments

  Remember Me  Forgot your password?

Not a member? Register now. You can post comments without logging in, but they'll show up as a "guest" post.

Commenting is not available in this section entry.