iTunes sells 5 billionth tune

The path to world domination is paved in round numbers, especially big ones like this: 5 billion.

That's the number of songs that have been purchased and downloaded from the iTunes Store, Apple said on Thursday. (Actually, for the record, the press release says "over 5 billion".)

That shouldn't be surprising, of course. Apple's iTunes store has long overshadowed the rest of the music download scene. Rivals have launched many an assault, but even e-commerce competitors as savvy as Amazon still face quite an uphill battle -- sales of songs at 9-month-old AmazonMP3, the number two digital music store, are only a tenth the volume of those at iTunes, according to market researcher NPD Group.

Apple is, in fact, the largest music retailer in the US, period, having pushed past Wal-mart earlier this year. And it seems to be making a healthy profit from its iTunes operations -- no wonder many a US politician is toying with the notion of taxing digital downloads.

The company also said on Tuesday that iTunes customers are buying and renting more than 50,000 movies per day.