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iTunes Stops Working For Windows XP Users
An anonymous reader writes: iTunes users who still run Windows XP started to experience connectivity issues this week. As documented in an Apple Support Communities thread, they can't log into the iTunes store, meaning functions like buying content, watching already purchased movies and TV shows, playing DRM-protected content, backing up, updating, and syncing all do not work.
This is precisely why you should never OWN your digital content, but rather LEASE it from trustworthy companies like Apple... Oh wait! =)
iTunes continues to work horribly for ALL other Windows operating systems...
To be fair, Apple supported XP longer than Microsoft did. Microsoft has already stated that if you choose to continue using XP, you do so at your own risk. That not only means potential exposure to malware, but also the distinct possibility that third party stuff may at any time stop working. I don't see this a fault of Apple in any way whatsoever.
Did iTunes ever really work on Windows?
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
Yes, because I am very anxious to buy more shit from the company that just locked me out of content I purchased from them prior with a forced upgrade.
Oh wait...
Apple updated their services to exclude those clients, probably to fix an SSL exploit by turning off older SSL protocols for all clients. If Apple really wanted to, they could have left that version of SSL running only for XP clients and updated iTunes to not use that protocol on any non-XP OS, but they didn't. Poor customer service if you ask me.
The services fail intermittently, which means they still work intermittently. That strongly implies that this wasn't an intentional change by Apple, but instead is a bug introduced with some other change. Said bug was likely not caught, in my opinion, due to limited access to test equipment running XP. Apple, like my employer, likely has IT policies that exclude XP machines from the common intranet, and it's a hassle to set up, maintain, and access the separate XP test lab. A bug that only occurs when an XP machine tries to access an online service is exactly the kind that would be missed by such a test farm setup.
It doesn't hurt to be nice.