Just about a year ago, Apple ran a promotion to celebrate the 100,000,000th song purchased from iTunes. Now, a mere 378 days later, they're about to hit the half billion mark. Apple isn't saying exactly what the number is but they predict download 500,000,000 will happen sometime today or tomorrow. The lucky customer who downloads the half billionth iTune will win ten iPods (any combination of models you choose), ten 50-song gift cards for each of those iPods, 10,000 free song downloads, and four front-row tickets and backstage passes (plus the trip to the concert city) to a Coldplay show. Every 100,000th download until the half billion point will win an iPod mini and 50 songs.

If you're the lucky winner, I'd recommend ten of the 60 GB models, which retail for $399. Would anyone decide they wanted a bunch of $99 Shuffles? All the standard iPods (this doesn't include the mini or the Shuffle) now have color screens for displaying photos, so there's not a special Photo model anymore.

Good luck!

Official Rules.