Apple Inc (NASDAQ: AAPL) admits that on the last iTunes update, some users have reported that their music has been deleted from the library.
To fix this terrible bug, Apple will release an update in the next weeks that might end this problem, adding various music protection policies into the music player.
“In an extremely small number of cases users have reported that music files saved on their computer were removed without their permission,” Apple stated on the iMore blog, one of the main sites for Apple users and fans.
Apple also said that they are taking these reports seriously as they know how important music is to their customers and the Apple music team will be focused on identifying the cause.
“We have not been able to reproduce this issue; however, we’re releasing an update to iTunes early next week which includes additional safeguards. If a user experiences this issue they should contact AppleCare,” Apple said.
The bug
This bug was first reported by Vellum designer Jake Pinkstone, from Atlanta, Georgia, who wrote down his experience with this songs-getting-deleted-from-iTunes bug that deleted about 120GB of music from his library. Pinkstone’s “experience” was written down on a blog, and later it was getting into other visited sites, such as Buzzfeed and Slate among others.
Several users experienced the bug and started sharing their experience on the social media, some supporting Pinkstone and some against his blog post. The truth is that this bug didn’t affect all iTunes users, it just affected a few, and that’s why controversy started.
iTunes-deleting-music controversy over the web
Serenity Caldwell, one of the outlets that received the statement from Apple wrote a blog post at iMore, where she replied to Pinkstone’s version of the events, stating that Apple Music and iTunes are just not designed to allow this to happen. Another blogger identified as Kirk McElhearn backed up Caldwell’s sentiment for Macworld, mentioning the fact that Pinkstone wrote the post on his company’s blog.
Caldwell later wrote another article stating that after speaking to different sources and citing support threads in Apple’s help forums, there could actually be a bug within iTunes itself causing the issue.
It’s unclear if the problem, which seems to affect a very small number of people, preventing from Apple’s “Fair Play” digital-rights management and the iTunes, it might cause some confusion to the users that might inadvertently delete their previously matched songs.
Source: iMore