Apple apparently pulled the trigger ahead of schedule, but you can't put one past Droxy! We noticed immediately that the new version of iTunes has the built-in podcasting support that Steve Jobs presented last month as our Engadget sister site reported.. Now you can subscribe to your favorite 'casts directly through Apple.

Like most good podcatchers, you can configure iTunes to pull your podcasts at various intervals (daily, hourly, and manually). You can set how many episodes iTunes will pull and store as well. There's a listing of the top podcasts highlighted on the main page. Nice to see: Peter Rojas currently at number four on the list! There are numerous categories to browse and even a "Publish Your Podcast" function that allows you to provide your podcast RSS feed. No word yet on any charges for podcasts which have historically been free up to now.