14 DAY TRIAL // Apple has addressed its developer community with an email signaling plans to delete all current iCloud libraries tested with the new iTunes Match feature.
iTunes Match will allow customers to store their entire music collection, including songs they’ve imported from CDs or purchased somewhere else, for just $24.99 a year.
The feature determines which songs in your collection are available in the iTunes Store and any music with a match is automatically added to your iCloud library.
According to Apple, most of your music is probably already in iCloud, since there are more than 20 million songs in the iTunes Store. Basically, all that gets uploaded to the servers is what you own exclusively.
And all the music iTunes matches for you plays at 256-Kbps AAC DRM-free quality, even if your copy was of poorer quality.
As Cupertino prepares to take the service online (no specifics on the exact date for now), developers who’ve beta tested iTunes Match are being told, “To continue to improve the overall quality and reliability of iTunes Match, we will be deleting all current iCloud libraries on Thursday, October 27th.”
“To prepare, please turn off iTunes Match on all of your computers and iOS devices,” Apple adds, continuing with the instructions on how to do so.
Cupertino confirms that the songs on a developer’s computer should not be affected but, as a precaution, testers are urged to back up regularly and to keep the content uploaded to iCloud safely stored on their local drive.
iCloud is Apple’s new set of free cloud services replacing MobileMe. It includes iTunes in the Cloud, Photo Stream and Documents in the Cloud, all of which work seamlessly with your iDevices and full-fledged computers, including your Windows PC.
The service automatically and wirelessly stores your content on Apple’s servers and pushes it to all your devices. When you make a change as small as modifying a file, the rest of your devices will reflect that change as well.