Susan Boyle Breaks Amazon Pre-Order Record

Amazon.com has announced that Susan Boyle's upcoming album, "I Dreamed a Dream," has become its largest global pre-order in the history of the online retail giant.

The album will be released by Sony Music Entertainment on November 23. Boyle became a reality show and Internet sensation after her April 11, 2009 appearance on the TV show "Britain's Got Talent," where she sang "I Dreamed a Dream" from "Les Miserables."

"We were excited when Susan Boyle's album became the top CD pre-order in the U.S. We're absolutely ecstatic now that the album has become our largest global CD pre-order," said Craig Pape, senior manager of Music at Amazon.com.

"Looking at the rest of our global Top 5, you see titles that resonated in their local markets. Susan's album is clearly capturing the hearts of our customers around the globe."

A video on the Amazon Music Store allows fans to watch Boyle the first time she sang "I Dreamed a Dream." To watch the video and learn more about Boyle, fans can visit Amazon's Susan Boyle store. Fans can also enter a sweepstakes to win a trip for two to London to have afternoon tea with Boyle.

Boyle's "I Dreamed a Dream" CD is available for pre-order for $9.99 and can be downloaded from Amazon MP3 on November 23.

 

Here's a list of the Top 5 CD pre-orders of all time for Amazon, along with their top-selling country:

1. Susan Boyle, "I Dreamed a Dream" (2009), U.S.
2. Mr. Children, "Supermarket Fantasy" (2008), Japan
3. Ken Hirai, "Ken Hirai 10th Anniversary Complete Single Collection, '95-'05" (2005), Japan
4. Norah Jones, "Not Too Late" (2007), U.S.
5. Take That, "Never Forget: The Ultimate Collection" (2008), U.K.

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iTunes Lets You See Previews Without the Download

Apple has launched iTunes Preview, which is a means of showing what music is available on iTunes right in the web browser. This seems like an incredibly obvious way to do it, and one that many have been waiting for way too long, but now if you want to look at the iTunes catalog, without having to install iTunes, you can do so.

You can't listen to song previews without installing iTunes, but at least you can see what they have. You do still have to download iTunes to purchase music.

According to MacWorld, the feature only works for music, but could probably be applied to video at some point. The feature can be accessed at the iTunes Charts page or clicking on a link from the music store.

When you go to a preview page, you can see information for the album like the track listing, the length, and the price. There are also reviews that you can read through.

If you go to the Charts page, you can search for other artists and songs and get to preview pages for those results. However, if you click on the link on the search results page that says "view more results in iTunes," it will take you to the iTunes download page (assuming you don't have it installed).

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