Is it possible to create URLs to items on the Apple iTunes store programmatically?

Question

Is it possible to create URLs direct to items on the Apple iTunes store programmatically?

I have noticed that last.fm and similar sites have links which take the user directly to a part of the iTunes store, such as an album page.

The URL for the link is created by last.fm. Here's an example of such an URL: http://www.last.fm/affiliate_redirect.php?restype=9&id=3168755&supplier=24

I presume they have some code behind this link, but surely they did not add all of the items manually?

Answer 1

There are two aspects. First, you can get deep links by programatically searching the App Store:

http://www.onemanclapping.org/2009/01/itms-link-generator-api.html

Next, you can convert those links to affiliate links using the LinkShare API:

http://brandontreb.com/money-you-might-be-missing-out-on-linkshare-api-integration/

link text

Answer 2

This page states:

Linking to iTunes How do I create iTunes links?

Use your affiliate user name and password to log in at www.linkshare.com. On the Create Links page for iTunes, you will find banners and text links. As an affiliate, you also have access to the iTunes RSS feeds and the ability to create direct links to any song, artist, album, or audiobook on iTunes, as well as to iMix playlists, podcasts, and iTunes Essentials.

So that sounds like a "no". Of course there's always the brute force approach of screen-scraping the output of a search engine fed from a list of artist names, or from whatever you want to create a link to ...