Apple’s Ping Social Network Reported to Be Eliminated in Next iOS Update

Apple’s social network for music, Ping, was a dud the moment it was released back in September of 2010. Sure, it was fun to try out when it was new and all (it had over 1 million registered users in 48 hours), but many of us haven’t touched it since.

AllThingsD now reports Apple is ready to axe the social network and focus its efforts on Twitter and Facebook, which are now built in to iOS:

Sources close to the company say that Ping, which still exists today in iTunes 10.6.3, will be gone with the software’s next major release, likely scheduled for this fall. And at that point Apple’s social networking offerings will shift to Twitter and new partner Facebook entirely.

Tim Cook spoke about Ping when asked about it at D10, and echoed the service was a failure according to customer feedback:

We tried Ping, and I think the customer voted and said ‘This isn’t something that I want to put a lot of energy into.

Ping was a valiant effort, but users have spoken. There’s no point in keeping it around if it’s not being used, or is wasting valuable resources. Anyone out there actually still using Ping?!

[via AllThingsD]