I got my email last week that my iTunes account had been approved! Yay! About time. I think the holdup was the fact that my EIN was brand new and not on file with the government yet. Took about two weeks. But at last, the first hurdle was gone.

On to the next hurdle. You get into your account, you accept the Terms and Definitions or whatnot, then you get to look at your dashboard. Flip through some instructions, download a PDF on how to proceed, and then download the iTunes Producer.

But wait … it’s not running. In fact, my computer doesn’t know what to do with it. Huh? What kind of file is that?

Search around, no instructions. None. Nothing to indicate why it’s not working. Search and search and search some more, all the while getting that sinking feeling that what you have is an Apple file that only runs on Apple computers. But do they SAY that anywhere?? No??

Finally you come across some references on other bulletin boards (MobiReads is a good one) where other people are complaining that iTunes Producer won’t run on anything but a Mac. Okay, then. I finally wasted two hours of time when a simple sentence would have fixed this: THIS FILE WILL ONLY RUN ON APPLE COMPUTERS.

So now I either have to buy a Mac or find a trusting friend who will let me borrow theirs.

Again, I am delayed in uploading my book.

I guess I can’t complain too much. Having worked for that OTHER big software company, I have to say we didn’t give much thought to making things work with Apple computers …

So, two weeks later and still no luck. No love from Apple with regards to getting into their bookstore, and no way of knowing just what the heck is going on. No number to call, to information posted by Apple, just an email address to an account that probably never gets checked. Argh.

Although I think I know what’s at the root of this. When I first applied, I used my SSN instead of an EIN — in most cases, especially for a sole proprietorship, that should be FINE. But for whatever reason, Apple didn’t like it and rejected my application.

So what I did was to pick up the phone and CALL THE IRS. Under most circumstances, people think that’s CRAZY. But it turned out to be a quick and efficient way to pick up an EIN right there on the spot! Now I have one.

I plugged it in to the Apple website and guess what? No love. Same thing. But the nice tax man said that it might take three weeks to get into the system before someone like Apple can verify it.

So now all I do is check that email account for the Apple rejection email, which contains a link to “try again.” I think every other day I do this. I re-enter my new EIN and wait for something different to happen.

Maybe someday soon my persistence will pay off.

So today I looked into adding “Brigitta of the White Forest” to the Apple iTunes bookstore. Now, I’m a pretty tech-savvy guy, but WOW. Apple is doing themselves no favor by having the application process so convoluted and difficult to get through. In fact, two years after they set this up, you still can’t find any information on what you’re supposed to do!

I tried to sign in to my “iTunes Connect” account and got nothing but an error saying that someone had already submitted an application through this ID. Well, I guess that was me, right? But there was NO WAY to find out. None. No information in my iTunes account, or in my profile, or anywhere.

I tried Googling this problem and came up with very little. Some people had this problem, but nobody had a common method for correcting it. In most cases, they had to write the Apple support team and wait for a response. NO PHONE NUMBER. I even tried calling a random Apple number I came up with and was referred to an email address. Wonderful.

Turns out I had applied a couple of weeks ago and my application was delayed because my EIN wasn’t correct. I only found this out by doing a search through my email for “do_not_reply@apple.com”. I came up with a cryptic email telling me this much. I tried inputting my SSN again, but haven’t received a reply.

In the meantime, I decided to just pick up the phone and call the IRS about my EIN, since they’re the ones who issued it. A very polite man at the other end was all too happy to look me up (nope! you don’t have one!) and issue me a brand spankin’ new EIN. And there you go. I guess I’m an official business now.

I emailed this into the Apple black hole and am now waiting for a response. Apparently, this isn’t automated. There are monkeys at the other end who take care of this. And so I wait, and wait, and wait …

What an ordeal. Just for one book. But this will, of course, allow me to post others.

Life in the internet age. Pah.