Regarding the App Store Outage (Updated)

Update

Apple’s system status page is reporting that everything is back online now. Developers are reporting that some back-end functionality is still unavailable, but for most users, it seems the problem is addressed.

Wednesday, traditionally “new release day” to the world of iOS gamers, is off to a rough start. The App Store, iTunes Store, iBook Store, and iTunes Radio are all currently offline.

The stores have been down for over 8 hours now, with no news from Apple about what happened or when it will be corrected.

Considering that Apple’s System Status page didn’t even report the outage until several hours after it first occurred, I’m not holding out much hope for an explanation.

This outage is has already cost Apple tens of millions of dollars in App revenue, and is potentially far worse news for developers hoping to release their games today. Which is also, of course bad news for gamers hoping to play those games. I was planning to sit back, relax, and enjoy Paper Monsters Recut tonight, but it seems that will have to wait for now.