One of the great strengths of Songbird, a jukebox app intended to serve as a more open-design iTunes competitor, is its Firefox-like extensibility. Take Songbird Remote as example A.

The 779Media group gets into the game with a remote-control application for iPhones and iPod touch devices that, while simple in basic functionality, does give you basic play/pause/back/forward control from anywhere your home wireless network reaches.

After installing the Songbird add-on and the app on your device, you simply launch the app, hit the “info” button to choose your computer, then control your tunes. It really needs a full library listing to match up against Apple’s own Remote app, but it’s a very nice start and something to look out for in the near future. And the best thing is: Songbird Remote is a completely free download for iPhones and iPod touch.

Songbird is available here: http://getsongbird.com/