Hi webmasters and developers, I'm not convinced by the title but let me explain. I will mention app names as this has been done in the past so I think it fits the fair use of specifics. Creating a music player similar to Apple iTunes could get me in trouble? What if the goal is making it as similar as possible? even with basic functionality? the intention (honestly) could even be considered a "tribute" or nostalgia app, FAR from creating a clone or to confuse users (that's not intention), but I know legally intentions could become meaningless and it's up to the accusing/offended party to build arguments, so, the situation could become something weird and evil like "this is a design rip off", or something like that. Let me try to explain.

A few years ago I got a Microsoft Surface RT (1 and 2) shipped with Windows 8.1 RT on an ARM processor. Basically you can't run anything there. A small community managed to get Windows 10 running (coo!) and members ported several open source apps to run on this device, so, my little machine became something else. I quite enjoy these, specially for the battery life so I used them quite a lot for writing, reading, editing, and PDF work becoming a serious work machine, but the music players were absolute garbage (including Windows Music) not only for the way it works, but because it's not exactly the ideal tool when you have tons of music files.

Then I decided to create my own music player using C# on Sharp Develop, and then moved to Microsoft Visual Studio, both free versions. My goal went around getting the closest UX experience on the RT platform including looks and functionality, moved my way from beta to beta version and the resulting product is pretty decent, so much I even installed it on my Surface running an Atom processor, my laptop, and my desktop computer. I didn't put any personal data there, also made sure to include a full disclaimer on this app being for FREE use and not related to Apple or iTunes as a product, only meant to get the same feeling on a diff platform with nostalgia involved. I then shared the app and became available in 2 languages, several users from that community tried it and some liked it pretty much.

Context
Key features (I'm not advertising anything, just explaining)
- Similar UX / looks
- Similar functionality
- FAST launch and efficient
- Small footprint requiring little RAM
- Simple, one job: play music and organize (and keep organized) the music collection

Why is it relevant to include those features on this thread? simple, I've used iTunes for years since I worked on Mac computers and then moved (again) to Windows, been using it since the year Apple launched the app (2001). As a regular user, I agree with most complains on the web around iTunes: it became a monster, slow, eating resources and tried to do too much, while it was cool when it was designed/used to mostly play music. I was a Winamp user but, since iTunes, just like other users I had issues moving to a different app, like many others I didn't like the options (I will not list them but trust me I tried anything I could find). Recently browsing the web came across multiple comments of people still on the same page "iTunes was great blah blah until blah blah, I hate what it became etc". Like some of those users I KEEP an older version of iTunes (that's what I use for music playing and conversions) because it's faster, simple, it works.

My app works FASTER <-- that's the thing. And does not involve any background services running in the background.

So, I've been tempted to start again from scratch and create another (improved) version and perhaps release it to the public (making some noise) so others in the same boat enjoy the SIMPLE experience for free. But... there is a difference between a small (almost literally closed) community around a dead Windows platform (both software and hardware), and making this available to the general public. Yes, my original app also runs on x86 and x64, it's just lack exposure. I don't pretend to earn money with this, and yes I would like to share it, and perhaps enjoy having my name there for coding portfolio purposes. I'm open to the idea of donations, but no, money is not the goal AT-ALL.

iTunes is dead, but I don't know if Apple would come after some nobody like me living outside the US and accuse me of silly things. I'm curious regarding other music players that allow skins to the point of looking exactly like iTunes, and to my knowledge they never had any issues with it (Winamp is the top example). Yes, I tried going back to Winamp, but now I can't stand it. Besides looks, the functionality is far from what I'm used to. Whenever I come across comments of people complaining about iTunes and missing the original app, I question myself the dangers of just sharing something that works for me so they can enjoy it too, but sure my app needs some fine tuning, I would make it better.

APP nostalgia can sound silly, but it's a thing. One gets used to certain functions, UX, appearance, and muscle memory becomes strong while using the app. Besides, it's a faster music player. I would have no issues sharing it around the concept of "tribute/nostalgia app".

Yes, I have considered enough UX, colors and appearance changes turning this into an entirely different app, but it would be something far from the original intention. I hope that I made some sense out of my explanation, please share your comments.