“Apple says it needs a little longer to finish up work on iTunes 11,” Josh Lowensohn reports for CNET. “The software, which adds a handful of new features and a facelift, was previewed at an event last month, and was originally due by the end of October.”
MacDailyNews Take: iTunes 11 is more than a mere “facelift.” It is a completely redesigned player and a newly remodeled iTunes Store.
“Apple now says the software will be out before the end of next month,” Lowensohn reports. “‘The new iTunes is taking longer than expected and we wanted to take a little extra time to get it right,’ Apple spokesman Tom Neumayr told CNET. ‘We look forward to releasing this new version of iTunes with its dramatically simpler and cleaner interface, and seamless integration with iCloud before the end of November.'”
Lowensohn reports, “As of last month, Apple said it had more than 435 million iTunes accounts set up with 1-Click purchasing, meaning accounts with credit cards or other payment options attached. The storefront itself has a catalog of 26 million songs available for purchase, of which there have been 20 billion purchased by consumers during the past nine years. Apple’s last major iteration of iTunes, version 10, was released in September 2010.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Yes, by all means, from now on get it right; don’t ship anything until is worthy of the Apple brand.
Have fun stripping off skeuomorphs, Jony!
Related articles:
Revamped new iTunes 11 user interface hints at future of OS X – October 22, 2012
Apple’s new iTunes 11: Everything you need to know (with video) – September 13, 2012
Apple expected to reveal all new, built-from-the-ground-up iTunes 11 today – September 12, 2012
Scott just sent out an email saying that he saw iTunes 11, and that it was fine. He said that everyone would just get over it.
That’s great but don’t tell people when to expect it. If this was Google or Microsoft you would be all over it MDN. Karma. Lets face it… The new Apple under Tim sucks!
A 1 month delay = sucks?
This is the nature of software. If it was ready to ship when they announced it, they would’ve shipped it then. Instead it looks like unexpected bugs and other issues delayed it.
“This is the nature of software” excuse is crap. All technological development involves hard work, iterative effort, and plenty of setbacks. Yes, execution of the plan is critical, but 9 times out of 10 a missed schedule can be directly attributed to the arrogance or willful ignorance of the guy creating an unrealistic schedule.
It would have probably made the original date if the turmoil of the personnel re-org hadn’t been going on.
Mike, this Mike (me) has written and shipped lots of software for over thirty years. I gather you haven’t. Even with good planning and a total lack of arrogance, software sometimes takes longer than you hope. Missing a ship date by a month for something this complicated isn’t really much of a sin.
@ Mikey:
I think you misunderstand my post. All tech development, software or otherwise, involves setbacks. Never claimed it was a sin for tech development to not hit internal goals.
The issue here is that somebody just couldn’t wait to tell the whole world about the new software, choosing to blab his imaginary marketing schedule to the world instead of keeping his trap shut and listening to the engineers. Typical management hubris.
If everybody who underestimated on scheduling was shot there wouldn’t be very many people around. My world has zero impact awaiting iTunes 11, anytime it’s properly baked Apple is OK by me.
Oh give me a break…. We all experienced how iTunes 10 completely quit functioning the very nanosecond that 11 was announced.
If the announcement had been streaming in iTunes instead of on safari, it would have died mid-sentence something like this
“Apple is pleased to announce iTunes 11 . . . . ”
Dead air. Apple can’t hide the fact that they disabled iTunes 10 like self destructing mission assignments on the old Mission Impossible.
Darknite, they probably just pulled the plug on you because you’re such a whiney little girl. I’ve not heard of iT 10 ‘shutting down’ from anyone, and mine certainly works.
Take as long as is necessary to get it right! And by the way, why don’t you really stick it to amazon and others AND make it easier for the rest of us by adding hardware and other items for purchase with “one click”? With all the bragging of the number of subscribers with credit card info on line the store shelves are not really as full as some would like.
Well, if anyone should know about sucking it would be you Nancy.
Nah. Google or Microsoft would just release half-baked software.
It’s a good call by the powers that be at Apple, IMHO.
Only to a complete idiot.
I’m fine with it taking longer to come out, just as long as they support Snow Leopard. If not then ill be a little bummed out 🙁
Fine – launch when absolutely ready but for goodness sake what is happening at Apple?
They announce iTunes 11 and declare an October launch and then 24 hours before that self-imposed deadline ends, they extend it for another month.
Happy to wait for a great product, but Apple seems to be inflicting pain on themselves – is there anyone in charge here keeping an overseeing eye on the business?
Adult supervision at Apple encountered a little turbulence but should be fine once we clear Hurricane Forstall.
Happy to wait. Just don’t shop junk.
Waiting until the product’s right is the right thing to do. They could have done this for maps, perhaps?
This isn’t the end of the world but why say “in late October” if you aren’t really on track for that? They could have said, “We expect to ship in late Fall.”
Or perhaps “this century”. That would give them some added wiggle room. 😉
When they said “in late October”, wasn’t Forstall still in charge? I think it would come out bugs and all if he was still here. (Or was he not in charge of iTunes?)
——RM
Hey, anyone having iMessage troubles? Seems like a reoccurring theme. Who else should be joining John and Scott?!
had a few delays early on, but all ok now. i put it down to the storms.
My iMessage has been down time to time, last 3 days. Storm does put things into perspective.
Tim “make the trains run on time” Cook needs to realize that SOME practices from the Jobs era were correct and don’t need to be changed. Often, Jobs wouldn’t announce new products/software in advance, only when they were ready to ship. When Jobs himself violated that rule, Apple often embarrassed themselves by not meeting their own deadline. If your goal is top-notch software, that DOESN’T happen on a schedule. Certainly fine to have internal timelines as GOALS, but public timelines often result in either inferior software or missed benchmarks.
Grooming 101
Are you referring to the still awaited 3GHZ G5?
Jony wAnts to check it out before releasing…. Give him a break he just got the job yesterday for gods sake.
People are probably going to find issues and complain anyway, but I’d rather see it delayed and most bugs fixed before shipping a 1.0 product. If issues are known then the product shouldn’t ship!
I would delay the release if my name was over the department when it goes public. Check for any problems, get feed back from engineering, and pluck out interface element that does not meet his high standards. I say it is well worth the delay.
I guess I am one of the few who find iTunes fine for my use. I have around 11,000 files and it seems to work fine. Hope to be pleasantly surprised.
Same here, never a problem.
Don’t get why all the complaints, it’s been an awesome app for me.
Good move apple, honesty is the best policy, taking time to do it right is fantastic move, its not that the competitors like Gupta’s andriod or samsung have any thing in thier crap arsenal to compete with the current itunes 🙂 LOOL
Too bad Scott isn’t around, else I could have my animated players!!
You know, play a song from the 50’s animate a 78 or 8 track, from the 60’s a 45, from the 70’s a 33-1/3, 90’s a CD, 2000’s animate downloading illegally, and 2010’s, animate playing on thumb drive.
Now that would be cool.
Where’s Scott!!!
Please don’t mess with iTunes Match. In iOS is already hard to delete a song… I need this feature back. I want to be iTunes DESKTOP free. thanks
People on the inside core are lucky 😉 Garcia Rocks! Fire On The Mountain!
Only those with low musical expectations would use iT Match. I have <14000 tracks in iTunes, 90%+ are ripped at 320Kb. Why on earth would anyone who cares about music use a service that downgrades their music files to an inferior quality version?
And pay a significant amount per year for the privilege.
Let’s talk about sound quality:
256 AAC >>>> 320 MP3
If you have Lossless MP3 Apple gives you 320 AAC.
This is more than enough.
Rorschach, not a retort, just a little useful info for you. Most of my 24,000+ library tracks are in lossless codec (.alc, .if, .flac), or hi-resolution (24bit) formats, and I have a decent, full-bandwidth hi-resolution playback system on the other end of it. I have discovered, that because iTunes makes its 256k tracks from very high quality masters, usually at least 24/96, I find their 256k .aac tracks usually (of course there are exceptions if Apple can’t get good enough masters from the label) are in every way superior to WMA or MP3 that one can rip themselves at 320k from 16/44.1. It is very difficult for me, someone with pretty good ears and pretty good equipment, to hear any disadvantage to 256k vs. lossless on an iPhone or iPod or iPad. Those are the only places where I’m “forced,” via Match, to listen to those lossy versions. In this case, Apple has it right. Now if they could do something about the fact that one can’t always have a broadband or solid 3G connection that would allow one to seamlessly listen to Match tracks, that would be something. That would be the only reason for me to abandon Match when renewal comes up next year. But if you do have a good connection, 256k makes a LOT of sense. Think about it.
Would all of the skeuomorphic bashing please ease up? I’m not a fan of every implementation of it, but It has ALWAYS been a part of the Mac concept since version 1.
If not for some level of skeuomorphic design, then the “Trash Can” would have been the “Directory for Files Soon to be Deleted.” Or the Desktop might be called “A persistent window for commonly used items.”
This was always part of Steve Jobs’ concept for making the Mac a computer “for the rest of us.”
You can’t be a Steve Jobs fanboy AND be a relentlessly smug basher of skeuomorphic design.
Well said!
Mac OSX without skeuomorphism is Windows 8; solid colored rectangles with obscure one-color icons accompanied by a micro-sized font description; reminiscent of teaching art in a kindergarten class.
Granted, a leather texture (without any ability to change it) could be a bit over the top, especially if you are trying to garner the favor of the 1.2+ billion animal worshiping vegans in India.
Looks like Tim has a lot on his plate at the moment.
Right choice to delay shipping.
Apple can’t afford to ship inferior beta software. iTunes has to be exactly right as its a critical part of the apple Eco system. Get this wrong and every apple customer will moan!
The store should be separated from iTunes. A web browser interface would be just fine for Desktop/laptop clients.
Move it to Apple.com and put up store tabs for music, video & books.
Same Game Different Decade. Think Forward! Vanderbilt!
PLAY SMART! Don’t CHEAT!
Insiders tell me the new visualizer is what is holding things up: It’s supposed to do iOS 6 Maps 3D flyovers………..
Who gives a damn about the delay? A few whine about iTunes interface and Apple goes about its business, not listening to the tech pundits or whiners and when it is ready to change things, it does. Mostly it works well, and sometimes it doesn’t. It always needs updating and fixes. iTunes is a huge piece of software and is the center of Apple’s ecosystem, their crown jewel. They probably can update it without the “wisdom” of pundits, fans and detractors. Delays from Apple are rare compared to competition. Perhaps the real reason Forstall had to go was he wasn’t getting iTunes finished? Who knows.
All this sudden bashing of Forstall is getting old – how quick you all are to turn on such an influential force at Apple. You do all realize Forstall was key to making iOS what it was 5 years ago, right? Even more so than Jobs?
I could not care less about iTunes 11.
It’s a massive disappointment.
After 10 years of status quo they decide to keep the tiny grey display window along the top exactly the same. The mini player- that gets in the way no matter where you put it – remains.
And all the dicks are ‘Forstall’ this and ‘skewmorphic’ that….
They just have to make sure you cannot switch off gapless play scanning…. So they can spy on you and delete the files you have not downloaded from thier service….lol Only last week i found iTunes had dispatched an early fond album that I do own from Pink Floyd.
“accounts set up with 1-Click purchasing, meaning accounts with credit cards or other payment options attached”
I was under the impression that you had to supply a credit card to even create an account.