Apple pulls links to Messages beta for OS X Lion
updated 01:30 pm EDT, Tue June 12, 2012
Company preps for Mountain Lion in July
Apple has removed virtually all links and references to the Messages for Mac beta from its website, reports note. One link is still present at the bottom of Apple's Downloads page, but even this redirects to Apple's generic OS X page. The only way a person can still download the beta is through a direct URL; the file is 63.8MB.
The move may hint that Apple is satisfied with the results of beta testing to this point and sees no reason to continue taking in more users. There is also just a month or so left until the launch of Mountain Lion, the only version of OS X for which the finished release of Messages will be available. There may be little time left for more testing, and in any case Apple likely wants to avoid keeping one of Mountain Lion's selling points available to non-upgrading customers. It's believed that the beta will in fact stop working after Mountain Lion's launch.
Junior Member
Joined: Feb 2000
I ditched Messages
In a timely coincidence I just ditched Messages yesterday, it was too buggy and kept freezing and crashing too often, and reverted back to iChat. I'm currently beta testing Mountain Lion and Messages works better there, so maybe it's a Lion thing, not sure.