Apple today announced that it will be supporting Paul McCartney's new album release with a special free video stream of a live concert on Thursday, February 9 [ iTunes Store ]. The concert is not only being streamed via iTunes on Mac and PC, but will also be available directly on users' Apple TVs, signaling new efforts by Apple to increase the utility of its set-top box.

Apple's interest in incorporating Near Field Communication (NFC) capabilities into the iPhone has been long rumored.

Apple has created a new section on its web site dedicated to the enhanced iTunes U service which was updated during last week’s education announcement. The new web-based resources available at

To coincide nicely with the impressive educational announcements made today in New York, Apple have also released iTunes 10.5.3 which adds synchronization support for the newly announced interactive books. Continue reading this article at RedmondPie.com

Engadget highlights the economics of publishing iBooks Textbooks to the iBookstore, noting that paid downloads follow Apple's traditional App Store and iBookstore model where the company takes a 30% cut of the purchase price of each book. Authors are free to set their own pricing, although Apple has placed a maximum price tag of $14.99 on the textbooks. In addition, the report notes that Apple requires all iBooks Textbooks to be exclusive to the iBookstore.

. Along with today’s Education updates, Apple released a new version of iTunes today to allow the

At its education-focused media event today, Apple introduced iBooks 2 , an updated version of the company's e-book software for iOS devices. The update comes as part of a push into interactive digital textbooks in partnership with a number of major publishers. From the iBooks 2 description : Introducing iBooks 2 — now with iBooks textbooks

Earlier today, we noted that iTunes Match had begun going live in Netherlands, following last week's news of an agreement between Apple and Dutch copyright oversight group Buma/Stemra. But as Apple now details on its iTunes Match availability page , the service actually launched in 19 new countries today, focusing on Latin America, the Baltic states, and the Netherlands.

Italian Apple blog Ispazio pointed out [ Google translation ] an interesting new iTunes App Store feature late last week: pop-up windows that appear with a click, making most descriptive information available without having to reload a full page. This feature is available in the Mac and Windows versions of the App Store

The Steve Jobs Moment of Silence audio track lets you remember Steve Jobs's legacy and make a donation to pancreatic cancer research. The audio file is a silent recording that's eight seconds long. Each second is a reminder of the eight years that Jobs spent battling the cancer that eventually took his life