Crazy rumor of the day, courtesy of Silicon Alley Insider, has Apple considering turning iTunes accounts into a Paypal competitor. Though they're careful to classify it as gossip and not confirmed news (heh), it's not beyond imagination that someone, somewhere, wanted to gauge a little public reaction to this idea.

Now, TiPb has given Microsoft a lot of negative feedback for losing focus and getting into areas they have no business getting into (pun intended). So, we have to do the same for Apple.

Does iTunes need to become a Paypal competitor? No doubt someone has to, given the more onerous sides of Paypal and the lack of Google Check Out, and still vaporish Pay with Facebook making eBay sweat enough to straighten up and behave properly, but Apple?

The link above suggests maybe Apple is interested in using the iPhone platform itself as a real-world payment system (they've only been doing that outside North America for years, after all), or they wish to diversify a la General Electric and this may be an easy and logical way to do it.

If it's the former, and it works with typical Apple magic, then yes please and now. If it's the latter then Apple should likely remember that focus, not diversification, has led them to tremendous success so far, even as their competition has floundered.

What do you think?

We've mentioned previously how iPhone 3.0 Beta 4 enabled an App Store tab in Preferences for managing and switching between iTunes Accounts. Looks like this feature is also available directly from the App Store application itself.

Scroll down to the bottom of a main page (i.e. before you've selected a specific app to look at) and you'll find a button containing your account user ID.

Tap on the button and you'll be given options to View Account, Sign Out, or Cancel.

Much more convenient than having to exit, launch Settings, navigate, switch accounts, go back...

Thanks Apple! More screenshots after the break...

(And thanks Roberto for the tip!)