After NBC Universal said it will not renew a contract that runs through December to sell digital copies of its television shows through Apple’s iTunes store, Apple today announced it will pull NBC shows from iTunes in September.

Apple said negotiations fell through when it declined to pay more than double the wholesale price for each NBC TV episode. Apple said that price increase would have resulted in the retail price to consumers increasing to $4.99 per episode from the current $1.99. That’s not a price Apple was willing to pay, even though it confirmed NBC supplied iTunes with three of its 10 best-selling TV shows last season, accounting for 30 percent of iTunes TV show sales. [internetnews.com]

In other related news, NBC and News Corp. have begun sending out private beta invitations to hulu.com, their joint advertiser-supported web video venture.

And lest I forget, there is an Apple event scheduled for Wednesday, September 5 where new iPods will be announced (but apparently not the addition of The Beatles catalog to the iTunes store).