There’s very little in life that pisses me off. I’m pretty open minded and I have thick skin. Yet, when iTunes is trying to sabotage me, that’s when the gloves come off.

About 6-months ago, I separated my blog and podcast feeds after getting some complaints that people couldn’t find my podcast. I thought everything was hunky doory until my publisher told me he couldn’t find my podcast in iTunes.

“Oh, just search for my podcast using the search directory,” I said.

I waited a few minutes as he searched and then he says to me that the podcover says wordpress and podpress and there’s no episode.

So, I go and check for myself and voila! My publisher was right. If you go to iTunes and search for Podonomics in the podcast directory, it spits back this ugly cover that was created for the Podpress plug-in. Here’s what’s so crazy about this – I don’t use podpress. The damn plug-in is installed on my server, but it’s inactive. I can’t stand podpress, so I don’t use the damn thing. So why the hell does iTunes think I use it?

And now, I F***ING HATE iTUNES. The feed that’s submitted wasn’t submitted by me. I know that for a fact because it’s not a feedburner feed. Any feed I submit to iTunes is a feedburner feed. I would never submit a WordPress feed. Never. And that’s what’s in iTunes right now – a WordPress feed from god knows where.

So, I go to report a concern and choose Remove Feed. I submit all my details. That’s when iTunes tells me to go and change the tag in my RSS feed to block iTunes from following it.

I can’t believe this. I must open my RSS feed and edit it? WTF for? I mean, I didn’t create it in the first place, so why must I now tinker with something like that? No wonder people are having a tough time wrapping their heads around this podcasting thing. Because of stunts like this pulled by iTunes.

This is similar to getting your hair did in some poofy ‘do and then it starts to rain while you’re waiting for the bus. Some chick standing beside you at the bus stop sees the gel running down the side of your face, sees your look of frustration as $100 goes down the sewage drain, sees your hair deflating into a flat mess and then says:

“A great day to bring your umbrella.”

And then she smugly pops hers open over her own head. iTunes is that chick. I want to shove her into the road and watch the very bus we’re waiting for crush her umbrella. That would bring me some joy.

So, I go to submit my new podcast feed to iTunes. What does iTunes tell me?

Looks like this feed has already been submitted.

WT-triple-F? When? Can you hear Nelson‘s laugh at the end of that sentence? Re-read that sentence above, then imagine Nelson’s laugh. Everytime I replay that sentence in my head, I hear it and now I want to squeeze his neck.

At this point, I’m so utterly frustrated with iTunes that I’m too pissed off to write anything else. I’m going in this endless circle and I hate it. No, actually…I hate iTunes.

Tags: itunes, podcasting,