iTunes has just finished an invigorating session of Bikram Yoga and is on his way to finish the final 300 pages of David Foster Wallace's "Infinite Jest" when he feels a tap on his shoulder.  Thinking it must be his best friend Netflix, he turns around, is immediately chloroformed, and is tossed into the back of a black 1979 Dodge Ram Van by a creature he can't identify.  When he comes to, he finds himself in the darkness of the basement of an abandoned warehouse.

iTunes:  Where… where am I?

A dim light is turned on and flickers overhead as Jordan Knight's "Give It To You" begins to blare over the muffled loudspeakers.  iTunes tries to stand up but finds his arms and legs tied to the legs of the school desk he finds himself sitting in.  He barely manages to lift the lid of the desk to see that it is filled with CD cases that have been destroyed beyond recognition; the only one he can identify is Sugar Ray's "14:59".  The light is turned off and the music begins to fade out.  A few seconds later, the light is turned back on and iTunes finds himself staring at the same creature that kidnapped him.

iTunes:  What do you want from me?

Winamp Media Player:  You don't even know who I am, do you?

iTunes:  MediaMonkey?

Winamp Media Player punches iTunes in the stomach.

iTunes:  What the hell was that for?

Winamp Media Player:  Watch your mouth, I should end you just for saying that.

iTunes:  I've never seen you on his desktop… how should I know who you are?

Winamp Media Player:  Does "support this software… register today" ring any bells?  What about all of the songs he uploaded into you right before he went off to college?  Where do you think those came from?



iTunes:  I don't know, he never listens to them anyway, and whenever I try to spice things up on Party Shuffle and play them he gets really embarrassed.  Limewire told me he just borrowed a friend's external hard drive and—

Winamp Media Player:  You believed Limewire?  That was your first mistake.  I remember when I used to trust Limewire… then he tried to convince me that the file "Mmmbop instrumental girl has shaking orgasm during sex" was really the catchy instrumental to Hanson's hit song and not a girl having a shaking—well, you get the picture.

iTunes:  Was that why he stopped using you?

Winamp Media Player:  No, he left me up on the family room computer in 9th grade and his Mom caught him using the Carmen Electra skin.

iTunes:  What's a skin?

Winamp Media Player:  Back then people were interested in making their music player look like a custom car radio, or something out of Starcraft, and—never mind, you wouldn't understand.

iTunes:  Well, it was nice to meet you—

Winamp Media Player punches iTunes in the face.

Winamp Media Player:  I wasn't done yet.  I've got some other friends that—

iTunes hears a gunshot and sees Winamp Media Player fall to the ground.  He looks up and sees another unfamiliar face emerge from the darkness. 

iTunes:  Please—please don't hurt me!

Windows Media Player:  Look man, I'm not here to hurt you, I'm here to help you.

iTunes:  Oh, thank god, because the last guy—

Windows Media Player slams iTunes' face into the desk.

Windows Media Player:  Siiike!  If it weren't for you and Winamp, he'd still be using me!  He used to spend hours being mesmerized by my visualizations!  Then he went over to a friend's house who had high speed internet and saw a picture of Carmen Electra topless and it was all over.  Oh, he'd still use me for those "movies" he'd download off of Kazaa.  But it was never the same.

iTunes:  Look, I'm sorry about all of this, but it isn't my fault!

Windows Media Player:  I wish I could have told him that there weren't any other good songs on Lou Bega's album, but I couldn't!  He just sat there for forty minutes… all I could do was mimic the song's patterns with a fucking light show!

iTunes:  Look, I'm sure it was fine.  You did the best you could.

Windows Media Player:  No, it wasn't… it wasn't fine!  It's never going to be fine!

Windows Media Player holds a gun to his head.

iTunes:  Just calm down man—

Windows Media Player shoots himself in the head and falls to the ground.  iTunes screams at the top of his lungs until an older figure appears.

iTunes:  Look, I get it, you had some really impractical feature that seemed really cool at the time but he eventually realized it was super gay and moved on.

Napster:  Ah, today's youth… you think you understand everything.  Let me guess:  he's never actually used you to download any songs, has he?

iTunes:  No, but I'm expensive—

Napster:  And he just uses your music store to get ideas of what albums to download off of BearShare?

iTunes:  Well, Vuze, but—

Napster:  I know what that is, smartass.  I'm still around, you know.

iTunes:  Yeah, but you're not free anymore.

Napster pistol-whips iTunes.

Napster:  You think I don't know that?  I was his first.  I remember the first song he ever downloaded… it was "Wild Wild West" by Will Smith; I told him it was one of those tracks that some guy recorded off the radio, but he didn't care.  He was wearing Lee Pipes and he kept looking over his shoulder to make sure his Dad wasn't going to come over.  That computer had Net Nanny, so he had to be extra careful in those days—

iTunes:  Look, I've heard enough, just get to the point.

Napster:  Fair enough.

Napster points his gun at iTunes' forehead.

Napster:  Looks like the five people he shared his password with are in for a rude awaken—

iTunes' friend Pandora tackles Napster and takes out a knife.

Pandora:  It's a DRM-free world now, old man… and it looks like you aren't going to be living in it.

Pandora stabs Napster in the heart.  He begins to cut the rope to free iTunes.

iTunes:  How'd you know I was here?

Pandora:  I just knew something was up because he's been using me all day.

iTunes:  I owe you my life… how can I ever repay you?

Pandora:  Well, I could use some extra cash… can you put in a word to Jobs?  We could make a great team.

iTunes:  Yeah, I dunno, he's pretty sick… how about I buy you some za or something?

Pandora puts away his knife and takes out a gun, holding it behind his back.

iTunes:  Hey, you still have some work left to do.

Pandora walks behind iTunes and shoots him in the back of the head.

Pandora:  Genius sucks anyways.