itunes problem or keyboard configuration?

Hi everyone, I have a question that is really driving me up the wall. I am new to mac and use VLC to run my movies. For some reason every time I use the F8 key to "pause" or "play" a movie, my itunes opens up and begins playing music.

I am really happy I made the switch from PC. But could someone help me figure this one out?

Thanks.

Go to VLC preferences, got to hotkeys, and select a shortcut that you are happy with.
Otherwise, by default it is Command P.
Keep in mind that VLC is not Apple software, so your mac play/pause keys etc aren't going to work with it, however they will with Quicktime, as too will the remote.

Thanks! that was really helpfull

I got it to work on VLC, however my itunes still opens and plays music every time I push F8, even if I don't have itunes open or running...

Is there any way I can stop this and make the hotkey work for itunes only when itunes is running?

All I can say is that I think that it's a glitch that I only noticed fairly recently.
There are ways of getting around this using commands in terminal, changing itunes name, and also applications that mess with the mac.... However, if I'm watching a movie in VLC, I stay away from the remote and use the shortcuts, otherwise, it doesn't effect me.
I hope that someone comes along to this thread with a safe easy fix while watching VLC, as I think it would be nice to be able to use the remote.

Update:
I just updated to VLC version 1.0.3
Now the play, pause etc controls work, and I found a workaround to stop I tunes music playing....
In itunes, if you go into genius without signing in.... it stops songs from playing when you use the play and pause keys while watching media on VLC

Once again very helpful advice. I just made the upgrade and turning genius on does do the trick!

Question, when you have genius off, and itunes not running, does pushing the "play/pause" button launch your itunes by default? or is that just my computer?

yep.... it does.... the idea I'm sure from Apple's side is that the idea is that you can launch itunes using that little remote! I would personally prefer a bigger remote with the option to launch itunes, so that play pause would be more versatile.
I guess this is one of those things with technology, that everyone wants everything so streamline, that we loose the user choice on many things.
In saying that, hopefully Apple will see to this in a future update, but I doubt that unless they come out with a new remote, but who knows!

Thanks 6string. Very helpful advice.

no sarcasm intended by the way...You really did solve my issue!

Pleasure.... glad you it helped