What in the world makes people think that Apple would spend all the money for a server farm in North Carolina and then give the services away for free?
Exactly - the revamp of mobileMe is always just 2 weeks to a month away according to some source. I'm sure it will happen, it would amuse me if it actually happened when it was actually least expected.
This newer info about the 60-day trial is different. Plus, I think Apple will want to use the new NC data center as a key feature for when they announce their 5th iPhone (inarguably their flagship product) and iOS 5.0, which I think will be needed to utilize some of the new features they?ll be adding to MobileMe.
The two drawbacks of Dropbox are that it's not built-into every Mac and iOS device by default. So you have to do your homework, find out about the website and service, register and install it, etc. And the fact that you need to "manage" a seperare folder. If Dropbox was part of the OS and part of a free Mobile Me service it would be awesome just having your stuff backed up and in-sync completely automatically. That's the promise of this dream. You buy a new Mac or iOS device, you enter your Apple ID and password and all your stuff is setup. That day can't come soon enough.
Absolutely, but that?s the case with any 3rd-party app.
On top of that, there is a learning curve to understand how clever it is. I know technical people that still can?t understand how a 1.5GB movie was ?uploaded? in a under 5 seconds. Or that when they deleted it on their end, it deleted it from everyone?s PC that is linked to that folder. Or that when they delete a folder they remove themselves from the shared folder.
One ?pro tip? is to create folders that you share with just you and another person and to name that folder your name and the other person?s name so that it?s a secure, easy to remember name. After they join that share you rename the folder from Finder to just their name and it won?t affect the name of the folder on their end. Of course, sometimes you have a large file taking up a great deal of your Dropbox space that you want to share with many people. The best solution I?ve found is to simply create a new folder for that particular share (named after the item itself, or something along those lines) and then invite a bunch of people. In the invite instruct them to remove themselves from the share when they are done, but not to delete the items in the shared folder.
The two drawbacks of Dropbox are that it's not built-into every Mac and iOS device by default. So you have to do your homework, find out about the website and service, register and install it, etc. And the fact that you need to "manage" a seperare folder. If Dropbox was part of the OS and part of a free Mobile Me service it would be awesome just having your stuff backed up and in-sync completely automatically. That's the promise of this dream. You buy a new Mac or iOS device, you enter your Apple ID and password and all your stuff is setup. That day can't come soon enough.
I completely agree.
I have an iPhone and a Macbook, and I'd love an Air, but until all my data and processes can run seamlessly across them all, it's not worth the hassle of managing it all. Sometimes I think a combination of Dropbox ( because iDisk is awful ) and Back to my Mac might work, but there are so many inconsistencies and holes.
I'm not greedy and I don't want infinite bandwidth streaming all over, but I want to tell 'my system' what devices I have and how I consume my content and have it do all the management, including working out what needs to be backed up so I have the right number of copies and no more. Perhaps something with MobileMe Smart(Folders, Playlists, Mailboxes, etc) plus a global Finder.
Absolutely, but that’s the case with any 3rd-party app.
It is, but I believe we've come to a point in history where free automatic syncing simply needs to be a standard core device-feature. Synching used to be "cool", now it's becoming necessary.
I have an iPhone and a Macbook, and I'd love an Air, but until all my data and processes can run seamlessly across them all, it's not worth the hassle of managing it all. Sometimes I think a combination of Dropbox ( because iDisk is awful ) and Back to my Mac might work, but there are so many inconsistencies and holes.
I'm not greedy and I don't want infinite bandwidth streaming all over, but I want to tell 'my system' what devices I have and how I consume my content and have it do all the management, including working out what needs to be backed up so I have the right number of copies and no more. Perhaps something with MobileMe Smart(Folders, Playlists, Mailboxes, etc) plus a global Finder.
I have an iPhone and a Macbook, and I'd love an Air, but until all my data and processes can run seamlessly across them all, it's not worth the hassle of managing it all. Sometimes I think a combination of Dropbox ( because iDisk is awful ) and Back to my Mac might work, but there are so many inconsistencies and holes.
I'm not greedy and I don't want infinite bandwidth streaming all over, but I want to tell 'my system' what devices I have and how I consume my content and have it do all the management, including working out what needs to be backed up so I have the right number of copies and no more. Perhaps something with MobileMe Smart(Folders, Playlists, Mailboxes, etc) plus a global Finder.
Your comment is a bit disjointed here, but I like the idea of a "global Finder". Except Apple wouldn't market it, or shouldn't, as that. That could simply say you enter your Apple ID and all your stuff is with you and in-sync wherever you go. Been able to enter your Apple ID in a new copy of any of the iWork apps on the iPad and have all your Mac projects just show up would be awesome. And more importantly then, having all your changes sync across between both OS's.
Offer valid until, does not mean when the offer ends there must be an immediate announcement. The whole point here is they are trying to slow down the purchase of this service after that date, because they are coming with something within 60 days on that point. Or it could just simply be an offer. We'll see what happens. In the meantime stop reading into everything you see or read so much.
I don't know about anyone else, but I find my Backup to my .Mac account is faster and more stable in the past couple of months.
I have two locations from which I backup my MBP. One using up to 10Mbs down/512Kbs up and at home 25 Mbs down/1Mbs up.
Certainly the higher speed service at home is significantly the better of the two. And as I have warned one client of mine, the 'so-called' High Speed at 3 MBs down/256 Kbs up he was sold on is ridiculously slow in comparison. And it gets worse for them depending on the time of day.
I notice that all the discussion surrounding the Apple NC datacentre has focussed on MobileMe going free and on services such as syncing files, calendars, email etc., but I haven't yet seen anything on Apple providing server-side functionality and infrastructure for iOS developers.
I am dabbling in writing an iOS app and as an indie developer I don't have a huge number of resources available to me (at least until my future app hits the big time!. Some people will slam me for this, but I would welcome an offering from Apple that would allow me to keep my app, both client and server, in an Apple ecosystem.
I would be interested in other peoples' thoughts?
"Apple Orange" perhaps?
Watch this, then gently petition Apple to copy it and target the API directly at iOS developers.
I've been ranting about this platform syncing stuff for ages.
It actually brings up the idea again of the iHub/iCenter/iHome/Apple Unity/iCentral/iPivot/iCasa/iMesh (think Apple TV with a hard disk).
Something that offers Media/iTunes storage and streaming, shared TimeMachine and data sync between all devices and the cloud.
For this to work really well something needs to fill the gap between now and when blistering fast Internet connections are ubiquitous.
However I'm still not 100% sure the mainstream is ready for their own home server, regardless of how appliance-like it is!
That said, I can say with a degree of confidence some form of Apple platform synchronization will be available, baked into the OS, this year. It will offer somewhere between 5GB and 25GB of free storage and sync all user data.
The reason I'm so confident in this statement is that Windows 8 is going to be released in 2012 and it will have that level of cloud-integration at a minimum... and I just can't see Apple letting Microsoft get there first on something this big.
I experienced that and it admittedly sucked. I think the difference now would be that 1) Apple owns two big data centers, 2) Apple sells a lot of mobile devices, 3) offering these services now, unlike before, would cost Apple essentially nothing because of reason 1, 3) Apple wasn't competing with Google then, and 4) Apple could make money off the service if it wanted via its purchase with iAds (I doubt Apple would though).
I for one would go back in a heart beat. The main reason is I trust Apple more with my personal information. Apple isn't in the business of selling your information like Google. You are not Google's customer. You are the commodity that is being sold. Everything Google does is for you to give it your personal information that it can then sell to advertisers. For instance, Google's Chrome calls home like every hour. By comparison, Safari and Firefox do not. With Apple you are the customer. Apple wants to sell you more hardware, and value added on services make its hardware more attractive. You didn't read Wikileak stories about Apple's servers being hacked and China gaining lots of confidential information.
iTools, .Mac, and MobileMe all offered better services then Google. I just wasn't willing to pay for them because I felt resentment about Apple promising those services for free and then charging for them. I understand why Apple did it though. Apple's primary mode of income was from Macs at the time. Offering the free services was costing Apple money because it didn't have a large data center and it had to pay for data transmission. Further, it had a good relationship with Google and didn't mind if people utilized Google's free services.
Making the services free will assist Apple tremendously because lots of people will dump Gmail for MobileMe because Apple has a lot of people who love anything it offers and the service is better. This will put a small dent in Google's ad revenue because it will lose the data it gets from people's email information. It will create good will amongst Apple's customers.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Hal 9000
As anyone with an original mac.com account form the 1990´s will tell you, Apple might be trying to do a free offer for this service only to SCREW you down the line just like they did before with the Mac.com email address.
I for one will not fall for this, given how burdensome it is to move back and forth between email addresses, including having to notify all your contacts. What´s the point if in 2013 they will once again come up with the old "now we have to charge you because it has become to expensive to give away" argument.
What in the world makes people think that Apple would spend all the money for a server farm in North Carolina and then give the services away for free?
TBell - good analysis, but have to challenge you on this part ...
Quote:
Originally Posted by TBell
You didn't read Wikileak stories about Apple's servers being hacked and China gaining lots of confidential information.
If you remember last summer, iTunes got hacked Big Time - least by Apple Standards
Believe a significant number of Credit Cards/User Data/etc was stolen in some fashion
Even cleaned me out of $20.00 I had lying around from a Gift Certificate
(which Apple made good on, and reimbursed, ty)
And, to my knowledge, was coming from China, or least through it
(mine sure did, was 20 Chinese Pop Songs they downloaded, then they sent me an email bragging about it afterward, ha ha)
But, to be fair, think most of the damage was to Accounts with Simple Passwords
(mine was, any fool could have easily guessed it, and did - smile)
Now, I believe, Apple requires all iTunes Accounts to have "Industrial Strength" Passwords
.
And on a related matter ...
Don't get me started on China Hacking the Internet
Can thank Microsoft for opening that door
When they GAVE the China Government the API's and Keys to Holy of Holies
In order to ensure China would go with Microsoft, and not Linux/Unix/Open Source
Same deal with Russia - look up the 'hack job stories' about some International Researchers working in Siberia (somewhere) who had to deal with the fallout from Russian Authorities, with Microsoft's help, claiming the Scientists computers were using "pirated" software.
Yea, no need to hack too hard if those who designed the 'safe' give the 'thieves' the 'combinations to the lock' - dig ?
AND - read about the China Government "data dump" when, last Fall I believe, they "took over" the Internet and routed about 70% of all Global Traffic through China. Lasted for about 10 minutes before 'whoever' in the 'control centers' figured out what was going on and pulled the plug.
Don't know for sure, but willing to bet that could not have been possible without 'help' from Microsoft, in some fashion either in the past or present.
I believe Apple's new MobileMe will be based on SugarSync's cloud based sync. This is the best syncing and storage system available, and it is even cross platform. Any file and folder can be stored in a cloud and synced among computers and devices. I have files on my iMac in the office, and any change on the document there will automatically be synced with the same file on my iMac at home or my Macbook on the go, or for that matter iPhone or iPad. It works completely flawless. I have only used it for 3 weeks and I am completely hooked.
Comments
Exactly - the revamp of mobileMe is always just 2 weeks to a month away according to some source. I'm sure it will happen, it would amuse me if it actually happened when it was actually least expected.
This newer info about the 60-day trial is different. Plus, I think Apple will want to use the new NC data center as a key feature for when they announce their 5th iPhone (inarguably their flagship product) and iOS 5.0, which I think will be needed to utilize some of the new features they?ll be adding to MobileMe.
The two drawbacks of Dropbox are that it's not built-into every Mac and iOS device by default. So you have to do your homework, find out about the website and service, register and install it, etc. And the fact that you need to "manage" a seperare folder. If Dropbox was part of the OS and part of a free Mobile Me service it would be awesome just having your stuff backed up and in-sync completely automatically. That's the promise of this dream. You buy a new Mac or iOS device, you enter your Apple ID and password and all your stuff is setup. That day can't come soon enough.
Absolutely, but that?s the case with any 3rd-party app.
On top of that, there is a learning curve to understand how clever it is. I know technical people that still can?t understand how a 1.5GB movie was ?uploaded? in a under 5 seconds. Or that when they deleted it on their end, it deleted it from everyone?s PC that is linked to that folder. Or that when they delete a folder they remove themselves from the shared folder.
One ?pro tip? is to create folders that you share with just you and another person and to name that folder your name and the other person?s name so that it?s a secure, easy to remember name. After they join that share you rename the folder from Finder to just their name and it won?t affect the name of the folder on their end. Of course, sometimes you have a large file taking up a great deal of your Dropbox space that you want to share with many people. The best solution I?ve found is to simply create a new folder for that particular share (named after the item itself, or something along those lines) and then invite a bunch of people. In the invite instruct them to remove themselves from the share when they are done, but not to delete the items in the shared folder.
The two drawbacks of Dropbox are that it's not built-into every Mac and iOS device by default. So you have to do your homework, find out about the website and service, register and install it, etc. And the fact that you need to "manage" a seperare folder. If Dropbox was part of the OS and part of a free Mobile Me service it would be awesome just having your stuff backed up and in-sync completely automatically. That's the promise of this dream. You buy a new Mac or iOS device, you enter your Apple ID and password and all your stuff is setup. That day can't come soon enough.
I completely agree.
I have an iPhone and a Macbook, and I'd love an Air, but until all my data and processes can run seamlessly across them all, it's not worth the hassle of managing it all. Sometimes I think a combination of Dropbox ( because iDisk is awful ) and Back to my Mac might work, but there are so many inconsistencies and holes.
I'm not greedy and I don't want infinite bandwidth streaming all over, but I want to tell 'my system' what devices I have and how I consume my content and have it do all the management, including working out what needs to be backed up so I have the right number of copies and no more. Perhaps something with MobileMe Smart(Folders, Playlists, Mailboxes, etc) plus a global Finder.
Absolutely, but that’s the case with any 3rd-party app.
It is, but I believe we've come to a point in history where free automatic syncing simply needs to be a standard core device-feature. Synching used to be "cool", now it's becoming necessary.
I completely agree.
I have an iPhone and a Macbook, and I'd love an Air, but until all my data and processes can run seamlessly across them all, it's not worth the hassle of managing it all. Sometimes I think a combination of Dropbox ( because iDisk is awful ) and Back to my Mac might work, but there are so many inconsistencies and holes.
I'm not greedy and I don't want infinite bandwidth streaming all over, but I want to tell 'my system' what devices I have and how I consume my content and have it do all the management, including working out what needs to be backed up so I have the right number of copies and no more. Perhaps something with MobileMe Smart(Folders, Playlists, Mailboxes, etc) plus a global Finder.
this!!!!!!!!!!!
I completely agree.
I have an iPhone and a Macbook, and I'd love an Air, but until all my data and processes can run seamlessly across them all, it's not worth the hassle of managing it all. Sometimes I think a combination of Dropbox ( because iDisk is awful ) and Back to my Mac might work, but there are so many inconsistencies and holes.
I'm not greedy and I don't want infinite bandwidth streaming all over, but I want to tell 'my system' what devices I have and how I consume my content and have it do all the management, including working out what needs to be backed up so I have the right number of copies and no more. Perhaps something with MobileMe Smart(Folders, Playlists, Mailboxes, etc) plus a global Finder.
Your comment is a bit disjointed here, but I like the idea of a "global Finder". Except Apple wouldn't market it, or shouldn't, as that. That could simply say you enter your Apple ID and all your stuff is with you and in-sync wherever you go. Been able to enter your Apple ID in a new copy of any of the iWork apps on the iPad and have all your Mac projects just show up would be awesome. And more importantly then, having all your changes sync across between both OS's.
Contacts, Calendars, E-Mail, Work, Bookmarks, Widgets, Keychains, Notes, Preferences, Documents, Locations, Apps and Homescreen layouts.
http://www.ingledow.co.uk/2011/03/09...bileme-update/
I wrote this article on why I think the MobileMe update and iOS 5 announcement will come on April 18th or 19th 2011.
http://www.ingledow.co.uk/2011/03/09...bileme-update/
Offer valid until, does not mean when the offer ends there must be an immediate announcement. The whole point here is they are trying to slow down the purchase of this service after that date, because they are coming with something within 60 days on that point. Or it could just simply be an offer. We'll see what happens. In the meantime stop reading into everything you see or read so much.
I have two locations from which I backup my MBP. One using up to 10Mbs down/512Kbs up and at home 25 Mbs down/1Mbs up.
Certainly the higher speed service at home is significantly the better of the two. And as I have warned one client of mine, the 'so-called' High Speed at 3 MBs down/256 Kbs up he was sold on is ridiculously slow in comparison. And it gets worse for them depending on the time of day.
I notice that all the discussion surrounding the Apple NC datacentre has focussed on MobileMe going free and on services such as syncing files, calendars, email etc., but I haven't yet seen anything on Apple providing server-side functionality and infrastructure for iOS developers.
I am dabbling in writing an iOS app and as an indie developer I don't have a huge number of resources available to me (at least until my future app hits the big time!
I would be interested in other peoples' thoughts?
"Apple Orange" perhaps?
Watch this, then gently petition Apple to copy it and target the API directly at iOS developers.
It actually brings up the idea again of the iHub/iCenter/iHome/Apple Unity/iCentral/iPivot/iCasa/iMesh (think Apple TV with a hard disk).
Something that offers Media/iTunes storage and streaming, shared TimeMachine and data sync between all devices and the cloud.
For this to work really well something needs to fill the gap between now and when blistering fast Internet connections are ubiquitous.
However I'm still not 100% sure the mainstream is ready for their own home server, regardless of how appliance-like it is!
That said, I can say with a degree of confidence some form of Apple platform synchronization will be available, baked into the OS, this year. It will offer somewhere between 5GB and 25GB of free storage and sync all user data.
The reason I'm so confident in this statement is that Windows 8 is going to be released in 2012 and it will have that level of cloud-integration at a minimum... and I just can't see Apple letting Microsoft get there first on something this big.
I for one would go back in a heart beat. The main reason is I trust Apple more with my personal information. Apple isn't in the business of selling your information like Google. You are not Google's customer. You are the commodity that is being sold. Everything Google does is for you to give it your personal information that it can then sell to advertisers. For instance, Google's Chrome calls home like every hour. By comparison, Safari and Firefox do not. With Apple you are the customer. Apple wants to sell you more hardware, and value added on services make its hardware more attractive. You didn't read Wikileak stories about Apple's servers being hacked and China gaining lots of confidential information.
iTools, .Mac, and MobileMe all offered better services then Google. I just wasn't willing to pay for them because I felt resentment about Apple promising those services for free and then charging for them. I understand why Apple did it though. Apple's primary mode of income was from Macs at the time. Offering the free services was costing Apple money because it didn't have a large data center and it had to pay for data transmission. Further, it had a good relationship with Google and didn't mind if people utilized Google's free services.
Making the services free will assist Apple tremendously because lots of people will dump Gmail for MobileMe because Apple has a lot of people who love anything it offers and the service is better. This will put a small dent in Google's ad revenue because it will lose the data it gets from people's email information. It will create good will amongst Apple's customers.
As anyone with an original mac.com account form the 1990´s will tell you, Apple might be trying to do a free offer for this service only to SCREW you down the line just like they did before with the Mac.com email address.
I for one will not fall for this, given how burdensome it is to move back and forth between email addresses, including having to notify all your contacts. What´s the point if in 2013 they will once again come up with the old "now we have to charge you because it has become to expensive to give away" argument.
What in the world makes people think that Apple would spend all the money for a server farm in North Carolina and then give the services away for free?
Well ... "free" may be a reach
But ... "really cheap" has a proven history
Read about ...
Gillette Razor Blades - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Razor_blades
And ...
Loss Leader - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loss_leader
.
Always remember ...
Apple never skates to where the puck is, but where it will be, yea ?
What we're seeing now, and in the not too distant future
Are 'things' Apple/Steve been working on for 20 to 30 years
.
.
You didn't read Wikileak stories about Apple's servers being hacked and China gaining lots of confidential information.
If you remember last summer, iTunes got hacked Big Time - least by Apple Standards
Believe a significant number of Credit Cards/User Data/etc was stolen in some fashion
Even cleaned me out of $20.00 I had lying around from a Gift Certificate
(which Apple made good on, and reimbursed, ty)
And, to my knowledge, was coming from China, or least through it
(mine sure did, was 20 Chinese Pop Songs they downloaded, then they sent me an email bragging about it afterward, ha ha)
But, to be fair, think most of the damage was to Accounts with Simple Passwords
(mine was, any fool could have easily guessed it, and did - smile)
Now, I believe, Apple requires all iTunes Accounts to have "Industrial Strength" Passwords
.
And on a related matter ...
Don't get me started on China Hacking the Internet
Can thank Microsoft for opening that door
When they GAVE the China Government the API's and Keys to Holy of Holies
In order to ensure China would go with Microsoft, and not Linux/Unix/Open Source
Same deal with Russia - look up the 'hack job stories' about some International Researchers working in Siberia (somewhere) who had to deal with the fallout from Russian Authorities, with Microsoft's help, claiming the Scientists computers were using "pirated" software.
Yea, no need to hack too hard if those who designed the 'safe' give the 'thieves' the 'combinations to the lock' - dig ?
AND - read about the China Government "data dump" when, last Fall I believe, they "took over" the Internet and routed about 70% of all Global Traffic through China. Lasted for about 10 minutes before 'whoever' in the 'control centers' figured out what was going on and pulled the plug.
Don't know for sure, but willing to bet that could not have been possible without 'help' from Microsoft, in some fashion either in the past or present.
.
Great post, TBell.
Ditto!
Ditto, I'm due to renew early next month.
Me too!!
Maybe Apple buy SugarSync.
This is really what MobileMe should be.