In recent days, Apple has begun to remove from its social network accounts most of the references to iTunes, its famous program for listening to music, downloading movies and managing podcasts on Mac and Windows PC. According to many technology sites, the deletion of content is further confirmation of the information that has been circulating for months on the imminent demise of iTunes, or rather of its “unpacking” into individual applications dedicated to music, podcasts and television.
The announcement of this change, which would mark the end of iTunes as many users have known it for the past 18 years, could come on Monday, June 3 from Apple. Tomorrow will start the Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC), the series of conferences organized every year by the company to present its latest news and update developers (those who produce programs and applications).
In its 18 years of existence, iTunes has made a huge contribution (for better or for worse) to change the digital music market. Its introduction made the legal download of songs more practical, albeit with limitations imposed by record companies for the management of rights. With the increase in the offer of content for entertainment by Apple, the functionality of iTunes has increased significantly, to the point of making the program heavy for computers less powerful (especially on Windows) and unintuitive, especially for functionality. management of content other than music such as films, TV series and podcasts.
Many newspapers, including generalists, have published articles talking about the “end of iTunes”, but in reality, as Bloomberg explains, the program will continue to exist, in a different form and divided into multiple applications to make it less cumbersome and confusing on computers.
For Macs, Apple plans to introduce apps: Music, TV and Podcast, following a path that it has already undertaken for some time for iOS, the operating system of iPhones and iPads. Backups of Apple's mobile devices can be managed by the new Music app, which will therefore effectively maintain the basic functions of iTunes.
It is less clear what will happen with the Windows version of iTunes. Its introduction on Microsoft's operating system was belated, precisely because the then CEO of Apple, Steve Jobs, believed that the presence of iTunes only on Macs could be a good incentive to switch to Apple computers. When finally persuaded to make iTunes available on Windows as well, Jobs said laconically: “It's like offering a glass of fresh water to someone living in hell”.
Apple is working to renew the offering of much of its content services, as it demonstrated in late April, during a special event where it unveiled its new plans for television, video games and news. Also with a view to offering an app for TV content and movies, it makes sense that iTunes is transformed into something else, and reduced to a set of applications that are more practical to use, and without too many complications.
However, it seems unlikely that iTunes will quickly disappear from Macs around the world. The new applications will likely be part of the new version of the macOS operating system, which will be unveiled tomorrow and made available to users in the fall. And even then, iTunes may hold some chance of survival. Apple had done something similar years ago, when it decided to replace the iPhoto photo program with the new Photos app on Macs: iPhoto was kept for some time, however, to give users the possibility to gradually switch to the new system.
The WWDC opening event is usually dedicated to software news. In addition to presenting the new macOS, Apple will dedicate space to iOS 13, the new edition of the operating system for mobile devices. There are no major revolutions expected, but among the most anticipated news is the announcement of a “dark theme”, which on some of the most recent iPhone models will reduce battery consumption. Apple is also expected to introduce a new version of the Mac Pro, its most powerful computers.
