Apple confirms iCloud to retain web apps, but ax iDisk and iWeb
Apple on Friday offered some additional transparency on its MobileMe to iCloud transition, specifying which features will safely make the jump to the new service and which will be lost forever -- namely iDisk, Gallery and iWeb.
In an FAQ on the matter, Apple reiterated that it's depreciating its MobileMe service, noting that customers who owned an account as of June 6, 2011 will see their service extended through June 30, 2012, at no additional charge. After that date, the MobileMe service will be shuttered forever.
Though there had been some concern over the fate of MobileMe's web applications, Apple also confirmed that it will be transitioning web mail, contacts, calendar, bookmarks, Find My iPhone, and Back to My Mac to iCloud.com this fall.
However, features such as iWeb publishing, MobileMe Gallery and iDisk will not make the cut. Also axed from the new service will be syncing of Mac Dashboard widgets, keychains, Dock items, and System Preferences -- though these will remain accessible until MobileMe shuts down next year.
In place of these missing features, Apple will offer users of its free iCloud service iTunes in the Cloud, Photo Stream, Documents in the Cloud, Automatic downloads and purchase history for apps and books, and Backup and restore.
MobileMe users who retain me.com or mac.com email address will be able to keep those addresses and move their mail, contacts, and calendars, as well as their bookmarks, to the new service. Instructions on how to do so will be provided closer to iCloud's launch this fall.
For those MobileMe account holders who've made use of their MobileMe Gallery or iDisk, Apple recommends that those users remember to save copies of the photos and files saved on those services before June 30, 2012, at which time they will no longer be accessible.
The FAQ also addresses several MobileMe-related account questions, such as moving individual accounts from a MobileMe family pack to iCloud, purchasing additional storage, and receiving refunds for unused or unactivated MobileMe subscriptions.
In an FAQ on the matter, Apple reiterated that it's depreciating its MobileMe service, noting that customers who owned an account as of June 6, 2011 will see their service extended through June 30, 2012, at no additional charge. After that date, the MobileMe service will be shuttered forever.
Though there had been some concern over the fate of MobileMe's web applications, Apple also confirmed that it will be transitioning web mail, contacts, calendar, bookmarks, Find My iPhone, and Back to My Mac to iCloud.com this fall.
However, features such as iWeb publishing, MobileMe Gallery and iDisk will not make the cut. Also axed from the new service will be syncing of Mac Dashboard widgets, keychains, Dock items, and System Preferences -- though these will remain accessible until MobileMe shuts down next year.
In place of these missing features, Apple will offer users of its free iCloud service iTunes in the Cloud, Photo Stream, Documents in the Cloud, Automatic downloads and purchase history for apps and books, and Backup and restore.
MobileMe users who retain me.com or mac.com email address will be able to keep those addresses and move their mail, contacts, and calendars, as well as their bookmarks, to the new service. Instructions on how to do so will be provided closer to iCloud's launch this fall.
For those MobileMe account holders who've made use of their MobileMe Gallery or iDisk, Apple recommends that those users remember to save copies of the photos and files saved on those services before June 30, 2012, at which time they will no longer be accessible.
The FAQ also addresses several MobileMe-related account questions, such as moving individual accounts from a MobileMe family pack to iCloud, purchasing additional storage, and receiving refunds for unused or unactivated MobileMe subscriptions.
Comments
edit: Just read through the FAQ, looks like Apple is still not allowing us to do this.
If I use different accounts for iTunes and MobileMe, can I merge them into a single account and use it with iCloud?
No. You cannot merge two accounts into one. However, you will be able to move your MobileMe account ([email protected]) to iCloud and, if you choose, you can continue to use a different iTunes account for store purchases and iTunes in the Cloud.
My understanding of Documents in the the Cloud is only apple files will use the feature. iPad for keynote currently can access ppt files on iDisk. I wonder how they will handle non-apple files now that you can't store data directly in the cloud view a cloud disk?
In place of these missing features, Apple will offer users of its free iCloud service iTunes in the Cloud, Photo Stream, Documents in the Cloud, Automatic downloads and purchase history for apps and books, and Backup and restore.
No way Google can ever come close to this sort of seamless transition. Best to stick with a proven company.
No way Google can ever come close to this sort of seamless transition. Best to stick with a proven company.
Apple manages to delete people's data with almost every transition they do.
If they don't get you on the data migration, they'll get you with some flakey syncing when you're not looking.
Data processing is not one of Apple's strengths.
Backup like crazy before zero day.
15 iWeb users cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced...
Sadly I am one of those 15. Loved iWeb for ease of maintaining blog on own domain. Hmmm? might be time to finally migrate to a "real" web site builder app...
15 iWeb users cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced...
Sadly I am one of those 15. Loved iWeb for ease of maintaining blog on own domain. Hmmm? might be time to finally migrate to a "real" web site builder app...
You people are acting like iWeb will stop working.
What's wrong with you? Apple just isn't doing any site hosting anymore. Your websites can still be sent to any FTP ANYWHERE using ANY other hosting straight from iWeb itself.
I can kind of get iDisk. They are trying to replace that with the document feature. I also get that iDisk probably costs money for them. But why not sync keychanges and preferences? They are already syncing bookmarks? What would it be to add that?
I bet people will develop apps for you to do that.
iDisk gone. So how do we get large un-emailable non-apple files like powerpoint presentations into keynote for iPad/iPhone?
My understanding of Documents in the the Cloud is only apple files will use the feature. iPad for keynote currently can access ppt files on iDisk. I wonder how they will handle non-apple files now that you can't store data directly in the cloud view a cloud disk?
As far as I can tell, the plan is to make MobileMe users switch to using Flikr or Picasa for online galleries, Dropbox for file sharing, and MS Office since we'll never be able to usefully exchange iWork files with anyone, apparently not even with other iWork users without iDisk? Seriously, how is this a step forward again?
I know Photostream is useless to me - unless you can tag the pictures from each device that you want shared. I know I have NO interest in having development screenshots from my iPad show up on my phone - or sharing them with my parents.
And the document sharing is completely useless for working on a team (small company). Not to mention my iTunes userid is different than my MobileMe id since our family computers all share the iTunes id. Oh yeah, better move my mail over to gmail to boot, huh?
Argh. It's simple, but it sounds like a step backwards on several fronts.
You people are acting like iWeb will stop working.
What's wrong with you? Apple just isn't doing any site hosting anymore. Your websites can still be sent to any FTP ANYWHERE using ANY other hosting straight from iWeb itself.
Well it sounds like iWeb as a tool is being sidelined/killed too (no update in the last iLife), so you may not want to plan on that as your authoring solution long-term.
I'm really bothered by the keychain syncing being lost. This is truly a fantastic feature as I have 4 macs and the keychain syncing feature is indispensable. If I change a password for a website on one machine, it will automatically have the info on another machine when I am on the road, out of town. I hope Apple reconsiders this valuable feature.
I thought it was great until it decided to sync corrupted keychains across my machines, but boy I wish they would have worked through the bugs instead of getting rid of the features.
The gallery was also useful for showing photos to clients the interface was great for this - I guess there are other services we can use.
I personally use MobileMe and .Mac before it to make sure that where ever I was I could access my Mail, calendars, bookmarks - I now use Back To My Mac more than the online apps so I really hope they keep it. Also things like bookmarks and keychains are really valuable to me and I liked the auto sync backup - I never had to worry. I really disappointed Apple isn't going to sync keychains anymore - I guess Back To My Mac is on the scrap heap too. I'm starting to really hate this one size fits all approach from Apple, and I wonder if people are ever going to bother using new services from Apple just in case they get used to them and Apple pulls them when Steve says so.
I can see why noone useless ping - what is the point it won't last!!!!!!!!!
I thought it was great until it decided to sync corrupted keychains across my machines, but boy I wish they would have worked through the bugs instead of getting rid of the features.
I have been using 1Password and it syncs with my laptop using Dropbox. There is an app for iDevices, but I haven't tried it. I do like it better than Keychain.
I use my iDisk for filesharing with clients, I hope we can share documents with PC users and share more than just .doc type files. If not I may need to upgrade to the paid version of Dropbox which costs as much as MobileMe and it is only that one feature.
I use Wordpress for Galleries, so that bit won't matter too much to me, I am a web designer and wouldn't touch iWeb with a ten foot pole, wonky code that puts out, I don't understand it. Maybe Apple will create a wonderful WYSIWYG with html5 and CSS3 included and not their strange web object code, I don't have time to learn yet another web language.
The irony is that I chose to put all my family history stuff up with iWeb and MobileMe because I thought Apple is such an established company that I'd never have to worry about them going out of business and abandoning me and all my hard work.
Steve, I'm begging you, sell iWeb to some responsible Mac developer who will keep improving and modernizing as the Mac OS and the interwebs evolve.
I know Photostream is useless to me - unless you can tag the pictures from each device that you want shared. I know I have NO interest in having development screenshots from my iPad show up on my phone - or sharing them with my parents.
Yeah photostream misses the mark.
I can take a photo on my iPhone, and it'll make it to my Mac. And viceversa I can import a SLR photo on my Mac and it'll make it to my iPhone. But it doesn't do anything of value beyond that.
The photos are already being moved. It would be possible with a little bit of metadata and folder layout to do a full photo sync via iCloud (as long as every device syncs within a month of the photos being made).
That still wouldn't address my current uses. My wife publishes her albums to galleries so that we can get them on the AppleTV (her primary Mac is in our office). We regularly send a gallery to our parents so they can see the grand kids. I guess it's time to look at Flickr.
What would be really valuable to me is having a single photo album (controlled by my wife) that I use as my primary album - while staying separate for all the other iCloud features.
You people are acting like iWeb will stop working.
What's wrong with you? Apple just isn't doing any site hosting anymore. Your websites can still be sent to any FTP ANYWHERE using ANY other hosting straight from iWeb itself.
But, who will make updates and fixes to iWeb? I doubt Apple will do this. iWeb is not the best app out their but for ease of use, it is very good. I do not want to learn to program or code, I just want to have a simple, easy to use website building app.