Apple's iMessage service experiencing another disruption

Apple says "some" users are unable to send and receive texts on the proprietary platform but does not indicate how widespread the outage is.

(Credit: Apple)

Updated at 5 p.m. PT with service restored. Apple's iMessage service is again experiencing issues, the third major disruption in the past two months.
The proprietary text messaging platform used between iOS devices, as well as Macs, is not allowing some users to send or receive messages from other users.
Apple's latest support status update from 1:34 p.m. PT says that "some users are unable to use iMessage" and promises a quick solution but does not go into further detail about the scale of the issue. The same status page also indicates that "some" FaceTime users are also unable to use that service but that all other services are functioning normally.
Both the iMessage and FaceTime services were restored this afternoon, according to a 4:41 p.m. status update.
CNET has contacted Apple for more information and will update this report when we learn more.
This is the third disruption in recent weeks. Outages in October and September left many users with the same message sending issues. Frustrated users turned to Twitter to voice their displeasure with the service:

Kendall Jenner @KendallJenner

not receiving any texts... iMessage, you're annoying!

18 Nov 12

Apple introduced iMessage as part of iOS 5in October 2011, offering users on the iPhone, iPod, and iPad a way to communicate with one another for free as long as they had an Internet connection. Apple added the functionality to its Macs as part of Mountain Lion in July.