As always, the answer is in the middle somewhere. I adminned a UNIX lab that provided e-mail, web, login, shell, printing services to students for free. It was hell. Free prints = lots of wasted paper. About 60% of the paper we put into the printer becomes scrap paper and never leaves the lab. People tend to break hardware...fast. People also try to cheat the system.
But also, .Mac is overpriced...bottom-line. If it was $60-70/year for the current subscription plan + whatever is down the road, that would be acceptable to me. If a more flexible baseline service was offered starting at $20/year for just e-mail, then the .Mac thing would be much less unsavory.
Okay this is the think. Apple, alltough they made a 32 million profit this quarter, its normally a buisness "rule" that for every bad year (apple had 2 ?), one need 4 good years to make up for it. Thats 5-6 years in the future.
On that note. Im a student, and 100 dollars a year isnt a big deal, its a deal, but its not big. And I can see that this might piss people off, its the same with SMS messaging. In the beginning og SMS technology (In Europe at least) SMS was free. You could send as many as you wanted, no charge, no nothing. Then suddenly, after the telecompany figured it could charge about 25 cents a message, they would earn a LOT of money! and 25 cents is a lot for 160 characters.
This too pissed people off, and made people ban their phone company and SMS alltogether. Look today. Charging for SMS is normal, in fact if you find a company that gives out FREE SMS messages, tell me!
Its the same with Internet Services. These services used to be free - because they used to be cheaper to operate and maintain. The same with broadband. a year ago, ADSL offered unlimited time and unlimited downloads. Today more and more companies are charging per megabyte, or planvise. I pay 80 australian dollars (40 USD) for a 256/128 ADSL line per month, with a maximum download of 1 GB. Exsess usage is overprized at 16 cents (.08 USD) per MB.
This is something we just have to get used to. Heck, even large news sites are starting to charge for their news, giving out only a handfull of news, or delayed news to whoever chooses not to pay.
I sorry too, but this is the way things are going. Apple arent meaner than anyone else. 100 dollars for their services arent massive, neither unfeasable. 100 gives you a bunch of useful services with the worlds best ease of use.
In fact, im pretty sure that if a lot of people give apple FEEDBACK, Apple might consider giving out a lightweight email service to all Mac users. (Maybe a Pop3 only account with 2 MBs).
Its the same with Internet Services. These services used to be free - because they used to be cheaper to operate and maintain. The same with broadband. a year ago, ADSL offered unlimited time and unlimited downloads. Today more and more companies are charging per megabyte, or planvise. I pay 80 australian dollars (40 USD) for a 256/128 ADSL line per month, with a maximum download of 1 GB. Exsess usage is overprized at 16 cents (.08 USD) per MB.
This is something we just have to get used to. Heck, even large news sites are starting to charge for their news, giving out only a handfull of news, or delayed news to whoever chooses not to pay.
I sorry too, but this is the way things are going. Apple arent meaner than anyone else. 100 dollars for their services arent massive, neither unfeasable. 100 gives you a bunch of useful services with the worlds best ease of use.
In fact, im pretty sure that if a lot of people give apple FEEDBACK, Apple might consider giving out a lightweight email service to all Mac users. (Maybe a Pop3 only account with 2 MBs).
Just my hundred bucks on the case...</strong><hr></blockquote>
I think you are being a little generous. Here in Japan prices for ADSL are heading down quick. We used to get 1.5Mbit ADSL for about $40USD a month. That dropped to $25USD a month for 8Mbit ADSL. Now that has dropped to about $20USD a month and the new 12Mbit ADSL is $25/month. There is no mention with any provider I know of of any limit per month in terms of hours or GBs used.
It is perfectly reasonable for Apple to charge for .Mac the way they have outlined it. Personally, I think it is a little too expensive. Also, they should provide a lite version for a much smaller fee.
I think you are being a little generous. Here in Japan prices for ADSL are heading down quick. We used to get 1.5Mbit ADSL for about $40USD a month. That dropped to $25USD a month for 8Mbit ADSL. Now that has dropped to about $20USD a month and the new 12Mbit ADSL is $25/month. There is no mention with any provider I know of of any limit per month in terms of hours or GBs used.
It is perfectly reasonable for Apple to charge for .Mac the way they have outlined it. Personally, I think it is a little too expensive. Also, they should provide a lite version for a much smaller fee.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Okay. here in Australia this is the way it is, as of a year or so ago. Internet is getting more and more expensive. Charging for GBs downloaded is getting more and more normal. Im Norwegian (but study and live in Australia), and the ISPs in norway tried to use the same charging scheme. Allthough, there was a lawsuit and the company wasnt allowed to do this, due to the way the product was marketed when it was introduced a year ago. Ive heard that French, British and Swedish companies are looking into the same scheme of charging for internet usage, through ADSL/Cable.
I do also agree that Apple ought to have a light .mac plan, .mac mail, 20MB iDisk and Homepage for 30 og 40 USD, but no iSync and iCal support.
Can we move this to the "don't let the door kick you on the way out" thread? Sounds like too many people droning on about how they miss there .mac email address and how horrible it is to cough up $49 the first year, and $99 after that. Question, if you are posting here, you must have internet right? If your so hard up, cut the internet off!!! Wow, look at that, now you have $15 or so extra every month. PS, just because there is a recession doesn't mean we are all the grasshopper, some of us ants plan for stuff like this with something called savings. .Mac here I come.
If you want free email go to Yahoo or Hotmail that simple, and as far as .mac goes I think it is good. Obvisouly we are going to see better things happen with itools now that you will have to pay a small fee. And who knows I bet Apple will give free trial accounts to people that buy new Macs which will still give them plenty of time to see if it is for them or not. In a way being able to just upload your photos and not have to do any thing else saves you lots of time and for you people that got the time to sit around and manage your photos one by one on a web page is nuts. Apple has been giving software away for a while now its about time they make some kind of money for the stuff they have been doing.
some of u are such conceited pr*cks. "dont let the door hit you on the way out." hey, f*ck u. some of us dont have the extra money laying around. i too am a student, and get my internet access as part of my university fees. thats one of the perks of going to college. but hey, i have a mac--WHICH COSTS A LOT COMPARED TO WINTEL COUNTERPARTS. a lot of my friends always say, "hey, u payed too much just for a damned apple." but i know better. i got a better overall computer, and i see it as being worth the added price--part of that added price is towards things like itools and FREE email (anyone actually paying for email is stupid). but now all this bullsh*ts coming out. i DONT have that extra cash lying around. hell, i barely have enuff to feed myself everyday...
so all of u ignorant asses who are going around saying that people who dont like this are cheap, i give u a big fu*k you. morons...
I had a .mac address. Did I print it on business cards or even use it? No. Because I knew this would happen.
You're clue for the day...
THE INTERNET IS NOT FREE ANYMORE!
The "free" model on the Internet is dead. It was a virus that killed thousands of dot coms that believed that "If it's free, they will come." Well we did but we didn't give anything back to them...they died...back to business as usual. If you can't afford Apple's new services...spend the $100 bucks on an anti-virus program and <a href="http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=Mac+hosting&btnG=Google+Search"; target="_blank">go here for the rest...</a> <img src="graemlins/hmmm.gif" border="0" alt="[Hmmm]" />
I just got an e-mail from Apple about my iTools account and how I'm losing it after Sept 30, etc. They mention several times about new features that will be released with Jaguar.
[quote].Mac will just keep getting better. In fact, there are several great new services coming with the release of Mac OS X v10.2. So stay tuned.<hr></blockquote>
I'm hoping it's more than iCal and iSync. Wait until after August 24 and see what they come up with. If they give me something better and don't offer just e-mail, I'll fork over $50. If I had a high-speed line I would have no problem since I could actually get 100MB of stuff on my iDisk.
The backup software works with CD and DVD too, which in itself is a good incentive. I have no need for Retrospect but copying files to CD-Rs and calling it backing up is a bit tedious.
you know DCQ, i'm having a little trouble here. you say you're that hard up for cash, but you're still paying for an ISP?
i know what it's like to be between jobs, i was looking for quite a while, newly married and completely broke. my wife and i fought over spending money on pissant stuff, and we had to cut a lot of things out of our lives.
i can tell you one of the first to go was an ISP. go to your library (free) and use their internet (free).
get rid of cable (at least $30 a month if you have it)
start eating lots of rice. $20 per 50lb. bag.
there are a lot of ways to make money last, i'm just not seeing this $50 for a year as such a huge deal.
yeah, i said $50, 'cause if you're already an iTools member, that's what you'd pay.
so you can't scrape up $4 a month? i find that hard to believe.
sorry for the lack on consideration, but it sounds like a lot of pissing and moaning to me about next to nothing. hell, skip out on one full fare movie and that's two months of .mac.
<strong>you know DCQ, i'm having a little trouble here. you say you're that hard up for cash, but you're still paying for an ISP?
i know what it's like to be between jobs, i was looking for quite a while, newly married and completely broke. my wife and i fought over spending money on pissant stuff, and we had to cut a lot of things out of our lives.
i can tell you one of the first to go was an ISP. go to your library (free) and use their internet (free).
get rid of cable (at least $30 a month if you have it)
start eating lots of rice. $20 per 50lb. bag.
there are a lot of ways to make money last, i'm just not seeing this $50 for a year as such a huge deal.
yeah, i said $50, 'cause if you're already an iTools member, that's what you'd pay.
so you can't scrape up $4 a month? i find that hard to believe.
sorry for the lack on consideration, but it sounds like a lot of pissing and moaning to me about next to nothing. hell, skip out on one full fare movie and that's two months of .mac.
give me a break.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Alcimedes ...boy haven't we all been through those days of LOTS of rice and cutting costs any way. The battle here is simple...Mac users want Apple to eat the costs and Apple wants the users to eat it. It will boil down to what's the value to the user. Nice post
Comments
But also, .Mac is overpriced...bottom-line. If it was $60-70/year for the current subscription plan + whatever is down the road, that would be acceptable to me. If a more flexible baseline service was offered starting at $20/year for just e-mail, then the .Mac thing would be much less unsavory.
On that note. Im a student, and 100 dollars a year isnt a big deal, its a deal, but its not big. And I can see that this might piss people off, its the same with SMS messaging. In the beginning og SMS technology (In Europe at least) SMS was free. You could send as many as you wanted, no charge, no nothing. Then suddenly, after the telecompany figured it could charge about 25 cents a message, they would earn a LOT of money! and 25 cents is a lot for 160 characters.
This too pissed people off, and made people ban their phone company and SMS alltogether. Look today. Charging for SMS is normal, in fact if you find a company that gives out FREE SMS messages, tell me!
Its the same with Internet Services. These services used to be free - because they used to be cheaper to operate and maintain. The same with broadband. a year ago, ADSL offered unlimited time and unlimited downloads. Today more and more companies are charging per megabyte, or planvise. I pay 80 australian dollars (40 USD) for a 256/128 ADSL line per month, with a maximum download of 1 GB. Exsess usage is overprized at 16 cents (.08 USD) per MB.
This is something we just have to get used to. Heck, even large news sites are starting to charge for their news, giving out only a handfull of news, or delayed news to whoever chooses not to pay.
I sorry too, but this is the way things are going. Apple arent meaner than anyone else. 100 dollars for their services arent massive, neither unfeasable. 100 gives you a bunch of useful services with the worlds best ease of use.
In fact, im pretty sure that if a lot of people give apple FEEDBACK, Apple might consider giving out a lightweight email service to all Mac users. (Maybe a Pop3 only account with 2 MBs).
Just my hundred bucks on the case...
<strong>
Its the same with Internet Services. These services used to be free - because they used to be cheaper to operate and maintain. The same with broadband. a year ago, ADSL offered unlimited time and unlimited downloads. Today more and more companies are charging per megabyte, or planvise. I pay 80 australian dollars (40 USD) for a 256/128 ADSL line per month, with a maximum download of 1 GB. Exsess usage is overprized at 16 cents (.08 USD) per MB.
This is something we just have to get used to. Heck, even large news sites are starting to charge for their news, giving out only a handfull of news, or delayed news to whoever chooses not to pay.
I sorry too, but this is the way things are going. Apple arent meaner than anyone else. 100 dollars for their services arent massive, neither unfeasable. 100 gives you a bunch of useful services with the worlds best ease of use.
In fact, im pretty sure that if a lot of people give apple FEEDBACK, Apple might consider giving out a lightweight email service to all Mac users. (Maybe a Pop3 only account with 2 MBs).
Just my hundred bucks on the case...</strong><hr></blockquote>
I think you are being a little generous. Here in Japan prices for ADSL are heading down quick. We used to get 1.5Mbit ADSL for about $40USD a month. That dropped to $25USD a month for 8Mbit ADSL. Now that has dropped to about $20USD a month and the new 12Mbit ADSL is $25/month. There is no mention with any provider I know of of any limit per month in terms of hours or GBs used.
It is perfectly reasonable for Apple to charge for .Mac the way they have outlined it. Personally, I think it is a little too expensive. Also, they should provide a lite version for a much smaller fee.
<strong>
I think you are being a little generous. Here in Japan prices for ADSL are heading down quick. We used to get 1.5Mbit ADSL for about $40USD a month. That dropped to $25USD a month for 8Mbit ADSL. Now that has dropped to about $20USD a month and the new 12Mbit ADSL is $25/month. There is no mention with any provider I know of of any limit per month in terms of hours or GBs used.
It is perfectly reasonable for Apple to charge for .Mac the way they have outlined it. Personally, I think it is a little too expensive. Also, they should provide a lite version for a much smaller fee.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Okay. here in Australia this is the way it is, as of a year or so ago. Internet is getting more and more expensive. Charging for GBs downloaded is getting more and more normal. Im Norwegian (but study and live in Australia), and the ISPs in norway tried to use the same charging scheme. Allthough, there was a lawsuit and the company wasnt allowed to do this, due to the way the product was marketed when it was introduced a year ago. Ive heard that French, British and Swedish companies are looking into the same scheme of charging for internet usage, through ADSL/Cable.
I do also agree that Apple ought to have a light .mac plan, .mac mail, 20MB iDisk and Homepage for 30 og 40 USD, but no iSync and iCal support.
Student discount would be nice too
so all of u ignorant asses who are going around saying that people who dont like this are cheap, i give u a big fu*k you. morons...
I had a .mac address. Did I print it on business cards or even use it? No. Because I knew this would happen.
You're clue for the day...
THE INTERNET IS NOT FREE ANYMORE!
The "free" model on the Internet is dead. It was a virus that killed thousands of dot coms that believed that "If it's free, they will come." Well we did but we didn't give anything back to them...they died...back to business as usual. If you can't afford Apple's new services...spend the $100 bucks on an anti-virus program and <a href="http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=Mac+hosting&btnG=Google+Search"; target="_blank">go here for the rest...</a> <img src="graemlins/hmmm.gif" border="0" alt="[Hmmm]" />
[quote].Mac will just keep getting better. In fact, there are several great new services coming with the release of Mac OS X v10.2. So stay tuned.<hr></blockquote>
I'm hoping it's more than iCal and iSync. Wait until after August 24 and see what they come up with. If they give me something better and don't offer just e-mail, I'll fork over $50. If I had a high-speed line I would have no problem since I could actually get 100MB of stuff on my iDisk.
The backup software works with CD and DVD too, which in itself is a good incentive. I have no need for Retrospect but copying files to CD-Rs and calling it backing up is a bit tedious.
I'm going to wait, try it yourself.
i know what it's like to be between jobs, i was looking for quite a while, newly married and completely broke. my wife and i fought over spending money on pissant stuff, and we had to cut a lot of things out of our lives.
i can tell you one of the first to go was an ISP. go to your library (free) and use their internet (free).
get rid of cable (at least $30 a month if you have it)
start eating lots of rice. $20 per 50lb. bag.
there are a lot of ways to make money last, i'm just not seeing this $50 for a year as such a huge deal.
yeah, i said $50, 'cause if you're already an iTools member, that's what you'd pay.
so you can't scrape up $4 a month? i find that hard to believe.
sorry for the lack on consideration, but it sounds like a lot of pissing and moaning to me about next to nothing. hell, skip out on one full fare movie and that's two months of .mac.
give me a break.
<strong>you know DCQ, i'm having a little trouble here. you say you're that hard up for cash, but you're still paying for an ISP?
i know what it's like to be between jobs, i was looking for quite a while, newly married and completely broke. my wife and i fought over spending money on pissant stuff, and we had to cut a lot of things out of our lives.
i can tell you one of the first to go was an ISP. go to your library (free) and use their internet (free).
get rid of cable (at least $30 a month if you have it)
start eating lots of rice. $20 per 50lb. bag.
there are a lot of ways to make money last, i'm just not seeing this $50 for a year as such a huge deal.
yeah, i said $50, 'cause if you're already an iTools member, that's what you'd pay.
so you can't scrape up $4 a month? i find that hard to believe.
sorry for the lack on consideration, but it sounds like a lot of pissing and moaning to me about next to nothing. hell, skip out on one full fare movie and that's two months of .mac.
give me a break.</strong><hr></blockquote>
Alcimedes ...boy haven't we all been through those days of LOTS of rice and cutting costs any way. The battle here is simple...Mac users want Apple to eat the costs and Apple wants the users to eat it. It will boil down to what's the value to the user. Nice post