Some speculation exists claiming Apple may be migrating its iTunes services to services hosted at its growing North Carolina data center this Thanksgiving. This speculation is based on information provided to Apple developers in which the company warns that its traditional Christmas period shut down of the iTunes Connect service will this year also see a similar shut down happen at Thanksgiving. Industry watchers think the closures could offer the company a significant opportunity to migrate iTunes service to its new servers for testing and future deployment of cloud-based services. Apple’s billion dolllar data center is thought to be near completion, with previous reports claiming the place will be operational from the end of this year. There will be need to migrate whatever services the company intends servicing from there to the new location. As any website admin can tell you, this process always takes time and usually throws up a couple of frustrations. Preventing external access to iTunes Connect may be part of the process, as the company focuses on seamless transfer and continued provision of the iTunes shopping experience to customers. 148Apps.biz reports that Apple will be locking developers out of their iTunes Connect accounts for both holiday periods. “Heard through the grapevine that in addition to the now traditional lock down of the App Store during the week of Christmas, this year we’ll see an additional lock down the week of Thanksgiving. These are traditionally very busy weeks for the App Store. And this lockdown presents some interesting challenges to app marketing.” Developers are concerned the lock down may impact their opportunity for Black Friday sales promotions, with 148Apps.biz recommending they focus on strategies to get as high as they can in Apple’s App charts.
