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It's pretty crazy that you need to use the same credentials to "buy" a $0 app as you have to remotely lock and wipe your iphone and mac.

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You don't need to at all. I use two separate Apple IDs on my iOS devices.

Apple ID accounts are individually configurable for most, if not all iCloud/App Store services.

If no one uses a feature the feature might as well not exist.

Who doesn't use this feature? Single people, that's who.

People with families have known about this feature for years. The sales staff at the Apple Stores specifically bring it up.

Yeah, I suppose single people have no interest in security, so poorly devised workarounds are ok.

People may have 1+ device per person and not share them.

As plenty of people do use that feature, I'm not sure of your point.

I’m glad that you are able to understand that abstraction, but if I'm being honest, how Apple handles accounts gets way over my head — and anyone around me is baffled by it too.

To quote JWZ: "You have invoked the "Oh, but there's a preference to turn off that stupid behavior" defense. I am showering you with negativity."

(Yes, it's not a preference pedantically, it's an option to create multiple accounts. Still the default and most used is using one account).

I'm an engineer an I didn't know you could use two accounts for different tasks on the same device. Just never thought about it, because why would I? Not a reasonable workaround, I agree.

> Just never thought about it, because why would I?

Anyone with family members using their iTunes account would and has for many years. That's why it's there.

Everyone I know with family members tries to share a single login across all devices to share purchases.

It's there so that you can create a junk account for apps which want access to your credentials? Doubtful. Remember the context of the topic.

This thread started with:

"It's pretty crazy that you need to use the same credentials to "buy" a $0 app as you have to remotely lock and wipe your iphone and mac."

I'm having no trouble remembering the context. Why are you?

if you set up an iOS device, it specifically asks you if you want have a single Apple ID or 2 ids ( one for iTunes/App Store and another one for iCloud/FaceTime/iMessage).

It's not even default behavior to use the same account. You are required to make an explicit decision during setup whether or not you want to use the same Apple ID for iCloud and the App Store.

I thought I had to have a new device to make a new ID?

How do you do it actually?

In iOS 7, you do it under Settings/iTunes & App Store; tap "Apple ID: [whatever]" and choose "Sign out", and once signed out you'll be presented with options both to sign in under an existing Apple ID, and to create a new one. (I didn't actually do so, so there could possibly be a hoop or two to jump through which I didn't see, but I tend to doubt that.)

I cannot even find any guidance from Apple on recommended patterns for which Apple IDs should be shared, which should be individual, and so on. This isn't even a configuration option, it's a hack that happens to work. (And there's no guarantee that Apple won't change their model tomorrow, since they've never given any guidance on what those multiple AppleIDs are supposed to mean.)

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4895

You can even use multiple accounts on a single iOS device to purchase stuff. So you can "share" apps with someone by logging in as yourself and then downlading the app.

If I've been using 1 Apple ID on my devices for the past ~4 years, how do I create two separate accounts without losing data or access to media?

Serious Question.

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4895

That doesn't really seem to transfer existing app purchases between accounts (so updates continue to work etc). It also doesn't mention moving documents&settings&calendars from one icloud to another?

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