iTunes Meltdown

Started by Apple Inc. July 14th, 2008 6:54 AM
  • 459 views
  • 4 replies

Apple Inc.

This Changes Everything. Again

Age 29
Seen March 29th, 2023
Posted August 1st, 2015
732 posts
15.9 Years
On Friday July 11th, 2008. Apple released 3 new products. The iPhone 3g, iPhone 2.0 and the App store. All in which needed activation or download from iTunes. With the cost of the iPhone 3g being so cheap and the reduced price for iTouch users to upgrade to iPhone 2.0, people were going crazy to obtain these items. It was all released in 21 countries on the same day which was a big mistake on Apple's part. They should have released iPhone 2.0 a week later. Users of the original iPhone who attempted to upgrade to iPhone 2.0 were either successful or unsuccessful. If they were successful the iPhone had to be reactivated and was usable. However if you were unsuccessful, you were stuck with a nonfunctioning iPhone which you could only use for emergency calls or as a Wifi iPod until it was able to be fixed. Many people purchasing the iPhone 3G had to finish the activation themselve at home because it was taking so long in the store.

So what do you think about this situation? Do you think it was preventable?

Wish

No spoils for the meek.

Seen February 11th, 2018
Posted August 4th, 2016
1,893 posts
15.8 Years
I got the iPhone 3G that day and one of the people who had to wait an hour for them to attempt to activate mine.

Then when I got home, I connected it to iTunes and kept trying for about 4-6 hours to connect to the iTunes store to activate my phone. I was one of the lucky ones. XD

In my opinion, Apple should have known about all those people accessing the iTunes server all at once for the 2.0 update and the activation of 3G phones around the world. Apple did try their best to fix this problem, but I believe it could have been preventable by not releasing everything on that Friday.

Gerri Shin

  

Male
Burbank, CA
Seen February 17th, 2014
Posted April 13th, 2013
3,575 posts
15.9 Years
I believe that there was opportunity to prevent this, however, I also believe that Apple was acting in all fairness to current iPhone and iPod touch owners by releasing it at the same time. Though to be honest I believe there would have been hang time even if they had waited to release the software upgrade, due to the hundreds of thousands of activation requests within the first 24 hours. Now if Apple had waited just 24 hours after the initial launch in New Zealand to release the ability to download the 2.0 software upgrade I believe that the bulk of the downtime experienced would have been significantly less.
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