In the LP we dissected, Big Whiskey and the GrooGrux King, the root directory consisted of 12 items. This included seven folders, an .xml and .plist file — which appears to point to full media files inside an iTunes library — an iTunesArtwork file, an .itlp file with a file size of 0KB, and a standard, run-of-the-the mill index.html file. Inside the HTML file, the doctype is HTML 4.01 with meta name properties set to “hdtv-fullscreen” and “hdtv-cursor-off”. This particular one made use of three stylesheets and 34 JavaScript files, which were marked copyright of Apple Computer.
The index file isn’t complicated; it’s largely made up of JavaScript calls and a single “div” tag. Most of the HTML is stored inside the “vues” sub-directory and called from within the JavaScript files. The most interesting part of the file are the comments referencing “TuneKit.” What TuneKit is, exactly, is anyone’s guess, but I’m willing to bet it has something to do with the “resource” Steve Jobs referred to during the September keynote that Apple makes available to artists to create these LPs.
The LP we dissected had a huge number of images. Keep in mind the file is 206.5MB and it doesn’t have any audio or video inside of it, short of a 484KB audio loop. That, of course, means there’s an extraordinary number of images–in fact, the majority of the text is made up of images! Some users have complained that they can’t scrape for the lyrics in each song because they are handled this way.
The last bit of interesting information is the inclusion of a font .svg file. Not every browser supports this feature, and WebKit only added the compatibility recently. SVG is the future — accept it, or be consumed.
My wife bought the new Muse album as an iTunes LP, and the whole experience is really nice. I hope more and more artists go this route.