Sorry, I do not eat and drink apple. I do not worship Steve Jobs as a god. I do not buy apple products. The only thing that I have on my machine that is apple is quicktime. It’s your choice as to where you spend your money, so spend it wisely.

i agree you should not be forced to open a account but what unique features of this phone could you use without one.

ipod function (needs account for existing DRM)
adress book (needs unike identifier in account)
etc…..

if you dont agree with the requirements dont get one

no one biched that you needed a free itunes account to use a ipod.

Well said, it’s not the Itunes SOFTWARE we have a problem with, it’s the music store ACCOUNT we DO NOT NEED!

“How would you expect to receive software updates for your new iPhone without a program like iTunes? Use some logic, people!”

I have used thousands of pieces of software were thee have been updates WITHOUT TRYING TO TRACK ME VIA AN ACCOUNT. You could get updates via the phone, via a web browser, through a CD, hell they could mail them to you on a sheet of paper and you type them in for Christ’s sake. I can think of no reasonable reason for this requirement. I can think of a few unreasonable ones, and for some strange reason they all involve marketing people. Let’s go with the obvious one.

Tracking where your customers are at all times tells you what stores your customers shop at. Hmmm have we seen this anywhere before? Oh yeah, the internet! And what do people call these programs and what do they do with them? Ah yes spyware and delete them.

Now since you also have iTunes installed on your computer and it feels compelled to run all the time. I can just see the $$ in the marketers eyes ‘ if we can connect their offline life with their online life we could sell more information and in the end sell more stuff’. Sure cell phone companies could track your locations and sell that information, but I don’t think they are allowed to… what’s stopping a company that has you sign an agreement that probably says they are allowed to ‘share’ that information with associated companies to ‘improve your experience’. And if it does not say that yet, oh well, you already agreed that Apple can change the agreement anytime they want (which I believe is illegal but that’s a different subject).