Did Winamp ever have a built-in music store? I was under the impression that people basically stopped caring about Winamp mostly because the newer versions of Windows Media Player (7 and up) were "good enough" that mainstream users didn't see any need to go hunting down an alternative player.
Nobody really likes iTunes as a player, it's only notable because of the store and the device lock-in.
To be honest, iTunes a kind of bloated, it is a memory hog and it could be easier to use. But they have the store and the connection with the i-devices and are shipped with the macintoshes, and I believe that is their greatest feature.
I don't use the store (except a few promotional tracks I downloaded for free) and I don't own an iDevice (though I used to). I use iTunes because it's easy to use and offers features that make listening to music more enjoyable (smart playlists, etc).
Few? It was the prevalent player on Mac even before the iPod and the store. And with hundreds of millions of people using it, I don't hear many complaints.
Mainly stuff about how it "does too many things", as if I would want to juggle 4-5 different programs for my digital media library, store, etc...
Nobody really likes iTunes as a player, it's only notable because of the store and the device lock-in.