Warning: Apple changed their iTunes Producer specs (in the form of a rant)

8513 Views 58 Replies 26 Participants Last post by Mark E. Cooper, Mar 23, 2013

Alex Anders

Discussion Starter · Mar 20, 2013

So I bought an apple mini for one purpose; to upload books to the iTunes store because unlike every other book distribution company, they require users to use a mac to upload books. They're bastards for that, btw.

Before I did, though, I called up Apple's publishing and confirmed the specs needed. After I find a mac that fit it, I called them back and asked them if it were possible that Apple, in their infinite wisdom, would change iTunes Publisher so that it wouldn't work on my operating system. They said it was probably safe for a while.

Well, it's been 5 months and I saw an update. It mentioned a change to the way that Japanese titles are uploaded and I have Japanese title. I checked the specs to make sure that my mini mac met them. It did, so I downloaded the new version. The program stopped working. I called up Apple and no one knew why.

I received an email today that iTunes Producer 2.9 only works on 64 bit processors. Mine is 32 bit. Apple, in their infinite wisdom, didn't bother to mention this anywhere. Somehow they didn't think that this might be an important piece of information to share with the people using the program. I guess they figured that their Apple slaves shouldn't have such dated computers anyway. "Buy more computers, my Apple slaves, buy!"

So now, the computer that I bought so that I could run that one piece of software, is junk. Thank you Apple. Thank you very much! God I hate Apple!

1 - 20 of 59 Posts

unkownwriter

· #2 · Mar 20, 2013

That sucketh massively!

I was planning on getting a cheap Mac to upload my own work, too, when I could scrounge up the money (having a teen boy with a gas-guzzler is hard!), but I guess that will have to wait until I can afford an even newer system.

Rats.

Victoria Champion

· #3 · Mar 21, 2013

Might I recommend draft2Digital? I started using them recently to submit to iTunes for me as I am a PC user, and now am waiting for my first payment. It was painless and easy and I'm getting paid. A pretty good endorsement, yes? Screw iProducer.

Alex Anders

Discussion Starter · #4 · Mar 21, 2013

Victoria Champion said:
Might I recommend draft2Digital? I started using them recently to submit to iTunes for me as I am a PC user, and now am waiting for my first payment. It was painless and easy and I'm getting paid. A pretty good endorsement, yes? Screw iProducer.

How long does it take for a book to go live on iTunes through D2D? Because I used to, and still do, use Lulu. But it takes up to 5 weeks for erotica to go live through them as well as Smashwords. Going direct cuts that approval time down to a couple of days.

Victoria Champion

· #5 · Mar 21, 2013

Alex Anders said:
How long does it take for a book to go live on iTunes through D2D? Because I used to, and still do, use Lulu. But it takes up to 5 weeks for erotica to go live through them as well as Smashwords. Going direct cuts that approval time down to a couple of days.

It takes anywhere from one day to a couple of weeks. It's how iTunes does it, has nothing to do with d2D. I have had erotica books go through next day and one took almost 2 weeks. d2D submits them immediately. It's all iTunes on the length of time. Someone suggested maybe iTunes publishes in batches, and that seems to be true.

Greer

· #6 · Mar 21, 2013

Can I just jump on the I Hate Apple bandwagon for a sec?I use D2D, so iProducer isn't an issue, but after downloading the latest version of iTunes, I went to play a movie I'd bought, and found that everything had been taken off my hard drive and was only in my iCloud. Which wouldn't be too bad, except for my Internet is not unlimited, and DLing all of it again will cost me hundreds and hundreds of dollars in bandwidth charges. I HATE APPLE!!! (in honor of caps lock Wednesday).

Hildred

· #7 · Mar 21, 2013

Alex Anders said:
How long does it take for a book to go live on iTunes through D2D? Because I used to, and still do, use Lulu. But it takes up to 5 weeks for erotica to go live through them as well as Smashwords. Going direct cuts that approval time down to a couple of days.

All my titles (including erotica) take about 5-6 weeks to go through. Every one of them. On the flipside updates go through within a day.

H.M. Ward

· #8 · Mar 21, 2013

I was using Mac in Cloud up until Dec when they decided not to accept any more books that way. I keep sending, it says received, but they dont get the books. When I ask about, I swear I'm talking to a dog. No help at all. I need to look at D2D.

Alex Anders

Discussion Starter · #9 · Mar 21, 2013

Shayne said:
Can I just jump on the I Hate Apple bandwagon for a sec?I use D2D, so iProducer isn't an issue, but after downloading the latest version of iTunes, I went to play a movie I'd bought, and found that everything had been taken off my hard drive and was only in my iCloud. Which wouldn't be too bad, except for my Internet is not unlimited, and DLing all of it again will cost me hundreds and hundreds of dollars in bandwidth charges. I HATE APPLE!!! (in honor of caps lock Wednesday).

Man, that sucks! Remember when they made that famous 1984 commercial? Now, I can't think of a company that is more of a "big brother" than they are. Man, they're horrible. If it wasn't for the iBookstore, I would be living a completely Apple free life. Sigh!

Alex Anders

Discussion Starter · #10 · Mar 21, 2013

Hildred said:
All my titles (including erotica) take about 5-6 weeks to go through. Every one of them. On the flipside updates go through within a day.

That's what I was afraid of. Also, it doesn't look like D2D supports all of the languages that I publish in.

Alex Anders

Discussion Starter · #11 · Mar 21, 2013

holly w. said:
I was using Mac in Cloud up until Dec when they decided not to accept any more books that way. I keep sending, it says received, but they dont get the books. When I ask about, I swear I'm talking to a dog. No help at all. I need to look at D2D.

Thanks for the heads up. I was thinking about trying that.

Courtney Milan

· #12 · Mar 21, 2013

I have a copy of one of the old iTunes Producer dmg files for 2.71, if you want to downgrade. I don't know if that will help at all.

Betsy the Quilter

· #13 · Mar 21, 2013

Alex Anders said:
That's what I was afraid of. Also, it doesn't look like D2D supports all of the languages that I publish in.

D2D has a support thread here; I'd suggest you post there with any questions--they're adding new stuff all the time, from what I've read in the thread.

Betsy

Greer

· #14 · Mar 21, 2013

holly w. said:
I was using Mac in Cloud up until Dec when they decided not to accept any more books that way. I keep sending, it says received, but they dont get the books. When I ask about, I swear I'm talking to a dog. No help at all. I need to look at D2D.

I was a first timer when I used them and it was so simple I don't think I could have screwed it up if I'd tried (famous last words...). B&N went live within a day. Apple took about ten days, I think. But no problems, as far as I could tell.

DarkScribe

· #15 · Mar 21, 2013

Sheila_Guthrie said:
That sucketh massively!

I was planning on getting a cheap Mac to upload my own work, too, when I could scrounge up the money (having a teen boy with a gas-guzzler is hard!), but I guess that will have to wait until I can afford an even newer system.

Rats.

As long as the Mac will run Mountain Lion you will have no problem. There are plenty of inexpensive second hand Macs that will do this.

Jan Strnad

· #16 · Mar 21, 2013

No help.

But I went to the folks who design my covers, graphic artists who are heavily Mac, and solicited their help in posting to iTunes. I am so happy that I did! The first submission didn't go through because my cover wasn't large enough. It had to be x-pixels by y-pixels. They had the original elements and quickly produced a cover that was x-pixels by y-pixels. Submitted again. Now the cover had to be xx-pixels by yy-pixels! Another re-do, another submission, and now it went through. Three weeks later my books went live.

This is the sort of thing that would have consumed a weekend or more on my part alone, and I probably would have given up in frustration. Instead, after a couple of hours, I was up and running.

I fell out of love with Apple some time ago, after initially believing their hype. Now, as noted above, they have become the Big Brother they used to rail against.

I still love my iPod and my iTunes, but when the iPod dies, I'll definitely be looking to de-Apple my life.

I feel like a rebel who threw his lot in with the Resistance and, once the Resistance became the Man, feels that he needs to find a new Resistance.

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Terrence OBrien

· #17 · Mar 21, 2013

God Bless Apple.

Victoria Champion

· #18 · Mar 21, 2013

My iTunes sales are same as my Amazon, so I love them for that, but I think they make submission too complicated in order to force proprietary usage.

Jan Strnad

· #19 · Mar 21, 2013

BTW, I can check all of my book info from my PC but I don't see how to access a sales report on Apple Connect. If anyone has any insight on this, I'd deeply appreciate it.

Greer

· #20 · Mar 21, 2013

Victoria Champion said:
My iTunes sales are same as my Amazon, so I love them for that, but I think they make submission too complicated in order to force proprietary usage.

The thing that ticks me off most about all their proprietary crap is that they force you to upgrade your tech even when you don't need to. My first ereader was a first gen iPod Touch, cuz I could use both the Kindle and the Kobo app, and not be tied down to just one. But the first gen will only run up to a certain version iOS, and then you can't upgrade anymore. Which is a problem when the Kindle app gets glitchy and I get a twitchy delete finger, and then find out the hard way that the newer version of the Kindle app needs a higher iOS than I can put on my iTouch. Grrr.

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