iTunes Match, Apple’s highly anticipated new music service, is nearly ready to launch. In a recent email to developers, Apple announced they’ll be deleting developer iTunes Match libraries tomorrow, November 12th, in preparation for the launch.
iTunes Match is a new $24.99 per year service that stores your entire music collection on iCloud.
Here’s how it works: iTunes determines which songs in your collection are available in the iTunes Store. Any music with a match is automatically added to your iCloud library. Since there are more than 20 million songs in the iTunes Store, most of your music is probably already in iCloud. All you have to upload is what iTunes can’t match. Which is much faster than starting from scratch. Once your music is in iCloud, you can stream and store it on any of your devices. Even better, all the music iTunes matches plays back from iCloud at 256-Kbps AAC DRM-free quality — even if your original copy was of lower quality.
Apple recently missed their own projected deadline for launching the service, making the news that it is coming soon especially welcome. Apple has not announced a specific launch date, but the wording of their notice to developers suggests that this may the final clearing of the iTunes Match libraries, meaning the service could launch as soon as sometime tomorrow. The full notice is below:
As we prepare for the launch of iTunes Match, we will be deleting all current iCloud libraries on Saturday, November 12th at 10 AM PST.
Please turn off iTunes Match on all of your computers and iOS devices. On your computer, choose Store > Turn off iTunes Match. On your iOS device, tap Settings > Music, then turn off iTunes Match. On your Apple TV, please choose Music > Turn off iTunes Match.
The songs on your computer should not be affected. As always, please backup regularly and do not delete the music you add to iCloud from your computer.
Best regards,
Apple Developer Program Support
