At Microsoft Build in May, Microsoft dropped a big surprise announcement: iTunes would be coming to the Microsoft Store (then called the Windows Store) by the end of the year. The company didn't specify a date, however, and now there's no clear indication of when we'll see it.

"We have been working with Microsoft to deliver the full iTunes experience to our customers and we need a little more time to get it right," an Apple spokesperson told ZDNet.

According to ZDNet's Mary Jo Foley, both Apple and Microsoft are still planning to get the program in the store, but no one has given a reason for the holdup.

Having iTunes in the Microsoft Store would be a big deal for users on Windows 10 S, which allows apps only from the Microsoft Store, and claims to offer longer battery life and tighter security. If you're looking to sync music from iTunes to an iPhone or iPod, you'll still need to use a full version of Windows for now.

Windows 10 S came out earlier this year alongside Microsoft's own Surface Laptop.

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SEATTLE -- In a surprise announcement at its Build developer conference, Microsoft announced that Apple's iTunes app will be coming to the Windows Store.

This is particularly important, as Microsoft has just announced Windows 10 S, which only runs apps from the Windows Store. It's one of the most notable apps that was previously missing. Autodesk and SAP Boardroom will also join the store.

The addition adds serious credit to Windows Store apps, which Microsoft has struggled to get off of the ground. One app won't do it all, but with Apple on board, many developers may finally jump on the UWP platform.

Microsoft's Terry Myerson didn't announce a specific release date, but it will certainly make life easier for iOS users on Windows 10.

Image: Apple

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While we have to wait until September 20 for Apple to update OS X El Capitan to macOS Sierra, Mac users don't need to wait for the same version of Apple Music that arrived on iOS 10 yesterday (Sept. 13). The update, version 12.5.1, brings the bright and bold aesthetic of the Music app on iOS to iTunes, as well as personalized playlists that bring it closer to parity with Spotify.

Those playlists, My Favorites Mix and My New Music Mix, are updated weekly, based on what Apple bets will please your ears, given your listening history. Favorites, refreshed on Wednesdays, collects the songs you listen to most often, and New Music, replenished on Fridays, picks out the latest new jams that match your tastes.

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New Music Mix looks a lot like Spotify's Release Radar playlist, which also culls songs you may enjoy from the week's new releases. Favorites Mix seems to be a step or two behind on Spotify's Discover Weekly, as it finds songs, regardless of release date, that it believes you'll want to hear.

While you're enjoying the new playlists, you may notice that the above-the-screen navigation bar is a lot cleaner now. Previous editions had a total of seven buttons, and version 12.5.1 kills off Playlists and Connect and simplified iTunes Store to simply read Store. Playlist lovers need not fear, though, as those collections are now found in the Library tab, on the right rail. 

Once macOS Sierra comes out on September 20, iTunes users will also be able to use the music application by commanding Siri to play specific songs.

As always, users can update iTunes by opening the App store, clicking Updates and clicking the Update button next to iTunes 12.5.1.

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Microsoft's Windows Store is heading in the right direction with a welcome redesign and the release of a Facebook app (finally). However, Windows 8.1 still trails the iPad and Android by a mile it comes to the selection of tablet apps. We went digging into the iTunes App Store and Google Play, which are both hovering around 1 million strong, to find out the exact state of the Microsoft app universe. Sadly, we found that 75 of the most popular apps around aren't available for Windows. 

Sure, Windows Store has Netflix and Twitter, but you won't find Instagram, Pandora or Candy Crush Saga. There are also no Google apps, such as YouTube. While both iTunes and Google Play have apps that are unique to them, the vast majority of the most popular apps are not exclusive to either platform. 

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Despite having the Xbox brand in its corner, Windows 8.1 is missing a lot of games iPad and Android tablet owners are enjoying. These include Angry Birds Star Wars II, Minecraft, Pet Rescue Saga, Plague and Subway Surfers. You also won't find Snapchat.

To tabulate these results we eliminated Apple's proprietary apps that appear in the top list. Then we tallied the top 10 paid, top 10 free and top 10 highest grossing apps for Android and iPad. We then looked across both stores, as well as the Windows Store. 

With Windows 8.1, Microsoft has rolled out some great Bing apps of its own, including the Food & Drink app and much improved Xbox Music and Xbox Video. We also like Movie Moments (which made our Top 10 Windows 8.1 apps list) and the enhanced Fresh Paint. But if third-party apps play a major role in your tablet or hybrid buying decision, the Windows Store might not cut it.

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There is no dearth of radio apps out there, and all of them do more than just play songs. They all tailor themselves to your personal tastes, add social elements and allow you to buy the tunes you like for future listening. Some are free or offer free versions, while others require a monthly subscription. With the introduction of iOS 7, Apple is getting in on the radio app craze. iTunes Radio allows you to stream music from the Internet, much like Pandora and Slacker. Here's a quick look at how to start jamming.

1. Open the Music App. By default, it's the rightmost icon in the dock at the bottom of the Home screen. 

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2. Select the Radio icon in the lower left corner. When you first use the app, a list of Featured Stations will appear toward the top.

3. Create a station by pressing the Plus icon where it says New Station. 

4. Select a theme for your station by choosing one of the genres, or by entering an artist's name, genre or song in the search bar at the top.

5. Play a song by selecting a station. This will open a new window (Currently Playing) that shows album art, the song name, artist and album.

6. Press the Star icon to play more songs similar to the current track, Never play the song again, or add it to your iTunes wish list.

7. Press the I button at the middle top of the Currently Playing screen. This will provide you with  several other functions, such as purchasing the song, creating a new station based on that song or artist or sharing what you're listening to with others. 

Depending on the size of Apple's streaming library, iTunes Radio has the potential to unseat other streaming services, especially because Apple also offers the ability to download tracks you like. 

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It was inevitable, and we all saw it coming from a mile away, but Apple nonetheless made a major music announcement during its WWDC 2013 keynote, introducing  iTunes Radio. This fall, the Mac maker plans to enter the ring with the likes of Pandora and Spotify with its own aptly-named streaming radio service.

While we can’t get our ears on iTunes Radio until the change of seasons, we already know a lot about what it’s capable of. Apple’s first foray into Internet radio already sounds like it could put both Spotify and Pandora into the ground, and here’s why.

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Apple has just launched the final, and arguably coolest, piece of its iCloud strategy, iTunes Match. The service, which you can sign up for now through iTunes, lets users add songs they haven't downloaded through iTunes to their iCloud library. Without the Match, the only songs you can add to iCloud are those specifically purchased through the iTunes Store.

What does that mean? Well, if you sign up for Match, you can add any songs you may have ripped from CDs, downloaded through another source like Amazon's Music Store, or other, ahem ... illegitimate means, and listen to them on any iCloud-enabled device without having to sync your devices.

Match works by searching your music collection to determine which songs have been purchased through iTunes and which haven't. When it finds a song you have not purchased through iTunes, Match will find it on Apple's servers and add it to your iCloud library. The best part? Match will upgrade your songs to 256-Kbps AAC DRM-free versions, even if your original version was lower quality or acquired through shady means. Talk about MP3 laundering!

What makes the service even more impressive is that it essentially eliminates the often agonizingly long process of uploading your music collection to the cloud. That's because the songs already exist on Apple's servers. All Match has to do is find it and add it to your collection. The only time you'll have to upload something is if Match can't find a particular song. That's much easier and significantly less time consuming than the method used by services like Google Music, which require you to upload your entire library to the cloud.

That brings us to the matter of cost. Match will run you $24.99 a year. Decide you're done with the service, and you won't be able to play your non-iTunes songs through iCloud. To get iTunes Match, you'll have to download the latest version of iTunes. Once installed, a Match tab will be available in the iTunes sidebar. Click that and signup. As of this writing, Apple said its servers were being overwhelmed with users signing up for the service, so you may want to give it an hour or two.

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MacBooks now get their very own app market via the newly opened Mac App Store. The store opens its doors with more than 1,000 free and paid apps that can be downloaded via iTunes. The current app categories include education, games, graphics and design, lifestyle, productivity, utilities, and more. In the same way that the iOS App Store breaks down what's new and popular, you can browse by what's hot now and review user ratings. The app store will also keep you up-to-date by telling you when a new version is available. A few of the app highlights available now include Autodesk SketchBook Pro, Aperture 3, Flight Control HD, rubiTrack. Individual parts of Apple's iLife suite (a la iMovie and GarageBand) can be downloaded for $14.99 each, and the pieces of iWork (such as Keynote and Numbers) are also available separately for $14.99.

Snow Leopard users will need to download the Mac OS X v10.6.6 software update.

Unless you've been living in a yellow submarine, you've probably heard that the Beatles are now for sale on iTunes. To be sure, it's been a long and winding road, but Apple and Apple Corps. have worked it out, fixing a hole in iTunes' music selection. Without any help, you can now find the complete Beatles Discography on iTunes; the box set costs $149.

While many fans who have already ripped Beatles iTunes from CDs will let it be, this is something that prudence demanded. It won't make Paul McCartney (or Steve Jobs) a rich man any more than he already is, but now at least iTunes won't be so helter skelter.

Between Roku, Sony, Boxee, and Google TV/Logitech, this fall there will be no shortage of set-top boxes that allow you to stream premium movies and TV shows right to your HDTV. Apple has re-entered the game with its refreshed Apple TV, which delivers 99-cent show rentals and HD movies for $4.99 the same day DVDs ship. The box itself is a marvel of miniaturization, as it's just a quarter the size of the original box. More important, it runs quieter and much cooler--the first-gen model could nearly fry an egg.

Is this device good enough to beat the established players? Read on for more first impressions and check out the gallery and video.

What about content? Well, Apple has done what it needed to do to be competitive, signing up Netflix. You also still get YouTube, but the Roku box (starting at $59 for SD version, $69 for HD) does a lot more, including Amazon, MLB.TV, and a host of smaller providers. The Roku also does Pandora, and the company promises an upgrade that will handle 1080p. The Apple TV only does 720p, though the quality looked pretty impressive during our hands-on time.

Then again, Apple has iTunes, and you can't ignore its massive momentum and the amount of accounts that are already out there. In addition to movies from the major studios, you'll be able to rent TV shows from ABC/Disney and Fox to start. Apple hopes that it will be able to land CBS/Viacom and NBC, but there's no guarantee when these providers will show up.

We love the design of this little box, which you can easily hide in your entertainment center. It has 802.11n built-in, which will make it easy to stream video from your PC. But that's not all. Thanks to Apple's AirPlay feature, you'll be able to sling content from your iPad, iPod touch, or iPhone once the iOS 4.2 update rolls out. That's a killer feature no other device has, and during Steve Jobs' demo this technology seemed to work more smoothly than traditional DLNA technology.

Overall, the interface is exactly what current Apple TV owners enjoy, which is really intuitive. We find the UI much cleaner and easier to navigate than the Roku, and it also seems snappier. We also like the larger new remote, which should be much harder to lose under the couch.

The new Apple TV is definitely an improvement, but it will need a good marketing push and more content to win over the masses. After all, most people still don't know this category of product even exists.

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The story of hacked iTunes accounts, stolen money, rouge developers and scammy app farms that came out over the holiday weekend is scary enough. But seeing all these reports makes me wonder exactly how this happened in the first place given that Apple is supposed to have pretty tight control over what goes in the app store. The person responsible for this weekend's shenanigans is now gone (maybe for good), but the overall problem remains.

This is what we know so far: this weekend, several iTunes accounts were hacked and used to purchase apps for the purpose of raising their rankings. The Next Web posted that users are reporting charges to their accounts ranging from $100 to $1,400. The developer responsible for this, Thuat Nguyen, has been kicked off the app store, but it's unclear whether he will face any legal repercussions as he resides in Asia.

Apple's official response is to suggest that users change their iTunes password immediately, cancel their credit card if they were affected, and see if their financial institutions will cancel the fraudulent charges. That's not terribly reassuring, but probably the best first step right now. Be sure to check your app purchase statements to see if there are any apps that you didn't buy.

The real problem is that Thuat Nguyen is not that only developer to run this scam. According to Zee at The Next Web, this fraudulent activity didn't just start this weekend, it's been going on for at least 4 weeks and possibly since last year. And other "App Farms" in the app store haven't been removed even though it's apparently easy to tell which of these apps are just fronts by doing something as simple as visiting the links provided by the developers as they lead to non-existent pages. Another trademark appears to be low-quality images for the icons.

The question that immediately leaps to mind is: how did Apple let this happen? The approval process for the app store is already notorious for keeping out the likes of Google Voice, Skype, and dirty smut like James Joyce's Ulysses, so why can't the people involved spot these scam developers? Shouldn't the approval process involve going to the developer websites listed in the app at the very least?

It also appears that iTunes users have left comments on app farm apps that label them as fake or fraudulent. Though I don't expect Apple to keep track of every single comment or rating left on the thousands of apps in the store, wouldn't it be prudent to set up an alert when a user calls an app fake or explicitly says that the developer stole money? Of course users should report these incidents, too, but Apple needs to keep on top of this stuff themselves.

Instead of worrying over exposed breasts, Apple needs to evaluate the proliferation of useless apps in the iTunes store as it seems that they're breeding grounds for shady behavior. Zee is compiling a list here which is bound to grow. Hopefully the company will start there.

In the meantime, I'd follow Zee's suggestion and remove your credit card information from iTunes and just use gift cards, instead.