More .Mac Exclusives - Free Web Designs and $20 off Contribute 2

[MacRumors]

Apple has added a new member benefit (http://www.mac.com/1/memberbenefits.html) to its .Mac service (http://www.mac.com/):

.Mac members get 13 .Mac-exclusive web page designs (a US$49 value) free, plus US$20 off the US$99 price of Contribute 2 (http://www.macromedia.com/software/contribute/) web publishing software. Create a full-featured site using the templates and Contribute, or use Contribute alone to edit existing web pages.


This offer expires on January 21, 2004.

Apple recently added (http://www.macrumors.com/pages/2003/09/20030925213200.shtml) three other offers (VersionTracker Plus, iBlog, $30 off FireWire drives) for .Mac subscribers in late September.

[iJon]

damn, they just keep giving us the hook up dont they.

iJon

[OKComputer]

awesome.... .:rolleyes:

come on apple, 49.99 and Im sold for another year

[NuMan]

I have yet to see any benefits of .mac for me? Can anyone that uses it explain how it helps you?

[Freg3000]

I am so glad I paid 100 for renewal. This is great.

I love Apple. :D

[Chad4Mac]

So glad they are offering this.

I'm way to impatient to create a webpage so this will work perfect for me. And to top it off, it syncs to .Mac.

Man, I could do this with my eyes closed!

Chad4Mac

[rohitp]

At these prices, why can't it include Mac OS upgrades?

[pbooktebo]

I went into an Apple store about a month ago, and a clerk told me he could give me a 69.99 price on a renewal (that would also include all the other rebates and gifts). I wasn't ready to buy right then, so I didn't do it.

I was ready last week, so I went back in, hoping to be offered the same deal. At first it didn't happen, but after a few minutes a manager told me that the .Mac price for those buying a new machine was 69.99, but that they'd honor that price for people renewing. I jumped at it and now I've got it.

I don't think that the Apple stores are heavily pushing this, and they may not offer it to everyone but it was there for me and a $30.00 savings is nothing to sniff at (and, to be honest, that price moved me from indecision to a quick buy).

[howard]

i would rather have the price drop then all these added features that i personally wouldn't use...don't get me wrong its great to keep adding features...and if there are some out there that i don't know about that i would use i would consider getting .mac...but for $100 i can live without it

[Flowbee]

Originally posted by rohitp
At these prices, why can't it include Mac OS upgrades?

You mean why doesn't a $99 .mac subscription include all of the current member benefits + a $129 OS upgrade?

Hmmm... that's a really good question. :rolleyes:

PS - I think they should throw in a free iPod, too.

[Freg3000]

Originally posted by Flowbee
You mean why doesn't a $99 .mac subscription include all of the current member benefits + a $129 OS upgrade?

Hmmm... that's a really good question. :rolleyes:

PS - I think they should throw in a free iPod, too.

Yeah really. People have been suggesting this lately. I can see some discounts, but what do you want, free OS upgrades that cost more than the entire service?

I hope most people see the impracticality of that.

[cnladd]

Originally posted by Flowbee
You mean why doesn't a $99 .mac subscription include all of the current member benefits + a $129 OS upgrade?

Hmmm... that's a really good question. :rolleyes:

PS - I think they should throw in a free iPod, too.

Totally off-topic. I don't know what I dig more: your nickname or that pic that fits it perfectly.

Now, more to the point: is there a benefit to joining .Mac, over and above "rolling your own" service? I host my own servers, and am about to do the DNS magic that makes Mac OS X think that MY servers are really .Mac servers; that 100MB of space for iDisk is too limiting for me.

What other benefits do I get, besides bookmark syncing, with .Mac service that would be better than rolling my own? I don't mind paying $100, but I want to make sure that the services are worth it, and that I won't be too limited by what's offered that I'd wish I did it myself anyways...

Any advice, anybody?

[bertagert]

cnladd,

Whats this magic trick you have? I've never heard of it.

[Powerbook G5]

I personally love .Mac. Ever since getting it, I've gotten tons of free software, games, and utilities, I have the iDisk which makes it easy for me to share all of my pictures and stuff with my girlfriend and parents at home without having to uploads tons of files in email, I have a great email address, finally was able to get rid of AOL for good, and every day I seem to discover a new thing to enjoy with the service. I definitely think it was worth the $69 and plan on renewing it next year when my subscription is up.

Not to mention...free solitaire! :D ;)

[cnladd]

Originally posted by bertagert
cnladd,

Whats this magic trick you have? I've never heard of it.

In general, you set up your own WebDAV server and then have your DNS server or a host file redirect all traffic going to www.mac.com or idisk.mac.com over to that new server. The OS thinks that it's really .Mac, so all of the functions built into the OS will continue to work.

Unfortunately, since you're directing .Mac traffic to a different host that means that you can no longer access real .Mac services.

Check out this site for full instructions on how to do this: http://www.drijf.net/dototto/ Check out the links at the bottom of that page (especially setting up the pseudo-.Mac server) for completing the OS integration.

[tacomancini]

How bout more than 100MB standard. I mean a year ago storage was more expensive... shouldn't .mac up the amount of storage in relation to the lowering costs of drives. I am sure near the limit. I love all the perks... but c'mon more storage please... and a year of only the same 7 web page themes for movies.
that said I love my .mac account.... but I too have access to more server space elsewhere...It's just not as brainless.

[Squire]

One of the few complaints I had was with the limited homepage templates. Perhaps this new offering will give you more options. One of the biggest perks for me has been the Mac Training programs they offer in QuickTime. As a fairly recent switcher, I found the OS X training to be a real plus. I hope they continue to add more training programs. After all, it doesn't cost them anything.

Squire

[tacomancini]

to get at the templates.... then after the trial period is over you have to buy contribute 2 for 79 bucks

[Nebrie]

Originally posted by cnladd
Totally off-topic. I don't know what I dig more: your nickname or that pic that fits it perfectly.

Now, more to the point: is there a benefit to joining .Mac, over and above "rolling your own" service? I host my own servers, and am about to do the DNS magic that makes Mac OS X think that MY servers are really .Mac servers; that 100MB of space for iDisk is too limiting for me.

What other benefits do I get, besides bookmark syncing, with .Mac service that would be better than rolling my own? I don't mind paying $100, but I want to make sure that the services are worth it, and that I won't be too limited by what's offered that I'd wish I did it myself anyways...

Any advice, anybody?

You clearly have not noticed this but here it is once more:

*.mac was never and will never be designed for people like you.*

Plain and simple, .mac was not created for you and you don't need it. Raise of hands how many mac *normal* mac users who could care less what a "server" is are capable of rolling their own .mac service? .mac is *web services for the rest of us*. If you can roll your own, great, use it. But if not, you can sign up for .mac and have Apple take care of everything. If you know Final Cut Pro, great, you can make great movies. If not, there's iMovie. .Mac is not meant to compete with geek services.

I believe the reason that Apple will not lower the price is that they know that in the next few years, they will be adding great things to .mac to justify it's value and do not want to keep escalating the price every single year. Until then, their strategy is to give away stuff to justify it's value.

[cnladd]

Originally posted by Nebrie
You clearly have not noticed this but here it is once more:

*.mac was never and will never be designed for people like you.*

Plain and simple, .mac was not created for you and you don't need it. Raise of hands how many mac *normal* mac users who could care less what a "server" is are capable of rolling their own .mac service? .mac is *web services for the rest of us*. If you can roll your own, great, use it. But if not, you can sign up for .mac and have Apple take care of everything. If you know Final Cut Pro, great, you can make great movies. If not, there's iMovie. .Mac is not meant to compete with geek services.

It may be my interpretation, but the way you've stated this is unwarranted.

You make it sound as if my intention was to brag about "rolling my own", to pan .Mac services, or both. There's also an implication that I'm complaining about lack of features. That just simply isn't the case.

I'm a switcher, though not from Windows but from commercial UNIX. While I can roll my own easily enough, the value I find in Apple is the simpler, easier way of doing things that are normally complex. I would much prefer to have an all-inclusive provider for everything and, more importantly, like Apple's design simplicity and prefer to support Apple where I can.

I was merely curious as to the value of their other .Mac services and was wondering if it outweighs the loss of near-limitless iDisk capacity gained from rolling my own. If it does, I'll sign up in an instant. That's why I was asking for people's advice and opinions on their services--not a curt response on how "people like me" were never meant to use the service.

[Awimoway]

Since I signed up with .mac, I've gotten loads of free software, great junk mail filtering, a new job, new car, a beautiful girlfriend, and a dog that doesn't pee on my carpet even when I'm too drunk to let it out. Coincidence? I think not.

[cnladd]

Originally posted by Awimoway
Since I signed up with .mac, I've gotten loads of free software, great junk mail filtering, a new job, new car, a beautiful girlfriend, and a dog that doesn't pee on my carpet even when I'm too drunk to let it out. Coincidence? I think not.

If .Mac gave me a dog, too, will it eat my cat that does pee on the carpet?

[Graefe]

Originally posted by howard
i would rather have the price drop then all these added features that i personally wouldn't use...

With always increasing secondary benefits I begin asking myself, if Apple is actually selling a software/service package rather than .mac itself.

[rdowns]

Originally posted by NuMan
I have yet to see any benefits of .mac for me? Can anyone that uses it explain how it helps you?

For starters, I like having a .mac email address.

Features I use:

my bookmarks being available to me elsewhere
creating photo web pages easily for my family
the $100 worth of free Kodak prints last year
iDisk so I can acces files away from home
backing up certain things to IDisk
Accessing it through Windows from work
a few decent free games
$20 off my new bluetooth kb
30 off a FireWire 80B drive

There are more but I think $100 is well worth it for the convenience and integration with my mac.

[Blackcat]

I think people aren't renewing, hence the recent rush of incentives.

Make it $79/year and I think people might renew. Better still, $8.95/month is less painful.

[maxtrax]

.Mac is a lousy $8.25 a month, and for that you get an IMAP email account, the simplicity of Backup for small important files, all the iPhoto integration, that works flawlessly and makes it simple to share photos etc. via homepages... The Screen Saver thing is great too. Free Virus software, bookmark syncing, not to mention syncing your iPod and as many Macs as you want, numerous games and some coupons as well. I just don't get all the complaining, and people wanting everything for free. Some of you people act as if Apple owes you this and they should just give it to you for nothing just because. It's a service they provide and it is better than what many others offer. If you don't need it, then don't subscribe! Yes you can pay $5/month for a hosting service and get more than 100 megs, and more than 1 email account included, but for the extra $3.25, look at all the additional services that .Mac gets you. I just cannot really believe how ridiculous some of you are about the measly fee they charge for all this great stuff, and it is only gonna get better with Panther. Sorry for venting, but I do feel a little better now. Thanks.

[jayscheuerle]

Originally posted by Blackcat
I think people aren't renewing, hence the recent rush of incentives.

Make it $79/year and I think people might renew. Better still, $8.95/month is less painful.

Exactly.

Apple figures if they toss in $100 of crappy incentives, boneheads will pony up thinking they're getting the service for nothing. They're too stubborn to price it at a point that wouldn't need incentives to be bought (let's say $59/yr) and Apple never likes to admit they're wrong about anything...

[jocknerd]

I let my account expire. $99 was too much for me. A lot of others say its worth it with incentives like $30 off of this product, $20 off of that product. But you've got to spend another $300 or so to get that $50 savings. Sorry. I don't subscribe to that thinking.

I still think that the .mac subscription base will fall significantly this year. Of course some of you think that anything Apple does or says is the gospel so you'll be glad to plunk down your $99. You'd probably plunk down $199 if Apple told you to.

Me? I like Apple products. I've got an iBook, an iPod. I just bought Panther. But I bought a Linksys wireless router instead of the AirPort. I don't buy something just because it has the Apple logo on it. It has to be a better value. The Linksys was far and away the better value over the $100 more AirPort. The same goes with .mac. $99 exceeds what I consider to be a good value for the product.

[Blackcat]

Originally posted by jayscheuerle
Apple figures if they toss in $100 of crappy incentives, boneheads will pony up thinking they're getting the service for nothing. They're too stubborn to price it at a point that wouldn't need incentives to be bought (let's say $59/yr) and Apple never likes to admit they're wrong about anything...

It's simple economics, 100 at $99 or 1000 at $79.

$59 might not cover costs I think.

[djdarlek]

Originally posted by tacomancini
i'm new to this posting malarky, and had to quote someone to work out how to post. Sorry.

Has nobody noticed that there is a way around paying the $100 for the .mac experience?

There are a few features that I would be lost without,

1: bookmark syncing - an amazing convenience for the 3 macs I use daily.
2: iCal syncing - ok, there are ways around this without .Mac, but you can't help but admire the simplicity (holey *****. My calander is like on my computer from my phone already and i aint done nothin!)
3: iDisk - a handy tool in a few unique situations. (obviously with Panther on its way, everyone is hoping Apple gives them a 60 gig .mac storage account so they can sync their entire comp. between 3 comps. - give it 10 years and it'll probably happen)
4: Address book syncing - again, priceless

however, have you noticed that if you sign up for the 60 day .mac trial account you can use all these features for free? Granted you lose your iDisk information when the trial ends, but if you work with the restrictions and don't mind losing a little bit of webspace (i mean how many of you would pay the $100 to host and run a website when there are so many cheaper alternatives out there?)

Every 60 days (6 times a year folks) I have to sign up for another trial .Mac account, re register everything and re-sync. It probably takes about 10 minutes every two months and saves me enough cash to buy more gadgets, yet you still get all the priceless .mac syncing features and that can't be a bad thing.

thats my piece, please don't rip me to shreds... as you can see <<<<<<< i am a newbie. :'(

dave

[jayscheuerle]

Originally posted by djdarlek
Has nobody noticed that there is a way around paying the $100 for the .mac experience?


Nice work Dave!

Legal enough, with a tinge of ethical sliminess! If the hassle of keeping up the charade is non-intrusive enough for you, then this is a great plan.

Of course, a 60 day trial wouldn't be necessary if the service was obviously worth the money....

wow... that was easy enough...:cool:

[New Guy]

The things I like about .Mac the most are being able to sync my adrresses and book marks between my home and work computers, tight, easy integreation between iPhoto and .Mac, having an e-mail address not associated with my ISP, and simple to use web design software and templates.

The last thing I want to do after working all day as a Graphic Designer is to have to work all night getting my homepage to look the way I want. Apple provides an easy solution that even my wife can use.

I can't tell you how many times I've needed to call someone fromm work and forgot the number at home or vice versa. Address book syncing solves that problem.

I've had 5 ISPs in 5 years. Not having to send all my contacts a new e-mail address every time is great.

I just had a baby girl and I take so many pictures of her that I want to share with family and friends. iPhoto makes it so easy (again, even my wife can do it) to post pictures to .Mac that I'd almost pay the $99 just for that.

So, do I think .mac is worth the $99? I think its getting there. With free iBlog (too bad I already bought it) and now discounted Contribute I see Apple making the effort to add value.

I was asked to fill out an Apple survey regarding .Mac and two suggestions I had were more/better templates and some sort of Blogging application like iBlog. Looks like they listened.

[sethwerkheiser]

Originally posted by NuMan
I have yet to see any benefits of .mac for me? Can anyone that uses it explain how it helps you?

I use a Windows machine at work, and I need to check my ISP email throughout the day (shh!). Yahoo and other free web email programs suck, but .mac works great and syncs nicely with Mail at home. PLUS, I get my fully synced address book at work too. I like it for those two things alone.

[Lancetx]

Originally posted by jayscheuerle
Exactly.

Apple figures if they toss in $100 of crappy incentives, boneheads will pony up thinking they're getting the service for nothing. They're too stubborn to price it at a point that wouldn't need incentives to be bought (let's say $59/yr) and Apple never likes to admit they're wrong about anything...

I couldn't agree more. Price it at $59 a year for the core service and ditch all these incentives and I'd sign up then. I honestly think they would get a lot more people on board that way.

[iPC]

.mac might be worth something more to me if I used more than one mac. sadly, i only use the iBook at home. my work computer is a win98 machine, my desktop at home is a linux machine, and my 2nd laptop runs linux, and the 3rd laptop runs win 3.11 (old 386 that I still have - office 4.7 pro baby!). the rest of the machines are old amiga's and mac plus'.

with this setup, the sync features are a waste, and 100MB storage is next to useless >> www.yzedf.com/index2.html << to see what i mean.

[ajkandy]

Back to the original topic of the post, I have to say Apple is unfortunately misrepresenting what Contribute is and does. I know because I use it every day.

Contribute is conceptually more similar to InCopy - it's a 'lite' editor for pre-existing page templates created in Dreamweaver or other 'real' web page editors. It's designed to give non-technical users a way to contribute content to a web site without ponying up for an expensive or hard-to-configure Content Management System (RedDot, Zope, etc.).

It's OK for quick edits - and painful for anything complex. Despite what the front page of .Mac says, there is NO - read that again - NO HTML editing capability in Contribute, and that's by design, so that Dull Normal users can't screw things up. If certain areas of a template are 'locked,' then you can't change them without using a different program like Dreamweaver anyway, for instance. And each new site you edit has to have a 'site connection' set up - not like HTML editors where you can just open the darn file!

That being said, Contribute does have some nice features like FlashPaper (a Flash equivalent to PDF) integration and PayPal built-in to create your own e-commerce site.

It's a great tool if you are a beginner and/or have lots of templates to start with, but if you prefer or need to roll your own, best to look elsewhere.

[Powerbook G5]

Originally posted by jocknerd
I let my account expire. $99 was too much for me. A lot of others say its worth it with incentives like $30 off of this product, $20 off of that product. But you've got to spend another $300 or so to get that $50 savings. Sorry. I don't subscribe to that thinking.

I still think that the .mac subscription base will fall significantly this year. Of course some of you think that anything Apple does or says is the gospel so you'll be glad to plunk down your $99. You'd probably plunk down $199 if Apple told you to.

Me? I like Apple products. I've got an iBook, an iPod. I just bought Panther. But I bought a Linksys wireless router instead of the AirPort. I don't buy something just because it has the Apple logo on it. It has to be a better value. The Linksys was far and away the better value over the $100 more AirPort. The same goes with .mac. $99 exceeds what I consider to be a good value for the product.

Just because I think .Mac is worth it does not mean that I think everything Apple does is gospel. What kind of flawed logic is that? For me, I got rid of AOL, which is already a big savings than a $70 subscription to .Mac for a year, I got two free software programs for free that I was thinking of getting anyway, I got two free games, and I use many of the features quite heavily. To me, that is worth well more than the cost. Just because you think it isn't worth it doesn't mean that everyone who subscribes to .Mac is a brainless zombie willing to do anything for Apple.

[lmalave]

Originally posted by New Guy
I've had 5 ISPs in 5 years. Not having to send all my contacts a new e-mail address every time is great.
And notice, .Mac email included the ability to forward the mail to another email address, so even if you really want your mail sent somewhere else, all your contacts can still use your @mac.com email address.

I was already paying for premium Yahoo! mail service to get features like that plus extra storage. I like .Mac because it gives me:

- The equivalent of Yahoo! Mail Plus services (POP access, forwarding, and extra storage). Cost: $30/yr
- The equivalent of a Yahoo! Geocities Plus website (no banner ads): $5 month or $60/yr.
- An online Address Book and iCal that integrates with iSync (Yahoo! has a similar Intellisync software for its online caledar and address book, but it only works on Windows).
- Free and actually quite useful software like Backup, Virex, StickyBrain, iBlog, etc. Getting the VersionTracker Plus was cool too.

So for me it's been worth it. If you'll notice, just the email and web hosting features compare quite favorably to Yahoo's "Plus" services: they're about the same price ($90/yr. vs. $99/yr), but .Mac gives you the ease of use and tight integration with OS X, not to mention the software freebies.

The major request I have for .Mac is more powerful iCal integration. I would like it to be more like the Yahoo Calendar, where I can actually edit it online.

[gopher]

Nice, except I've already spent money on my webpublishing packages. Where's CGI BIN, Server Side Include and PHP support, not to mention domain name hosting? Games (I guess if I had kids it would make sense)? Webmail without spam filtering? Anti-Virus (Norton Anti-Virus is less expensive in the long run since updates on definitions are free for life, and it detects PC viruses that hit your Mac before you are a carrier that infects networked PCs)? Bookmarks on website (oh but I'm getting that already)? Backup (see Carbon Copy Cloner, does more for nothing)? And how about a reliable server for both webhosting and e-mail, .Mac goes down more frequently than any webhost I know of. Is it worth $99 a year for games? Maybe.

[Powerbook G5]

Originally posted by gopher
Nice, except I've already spent money on my webpublishing packages. Where's CGI BIN, Server Side Include and PHP support, not to mention domain name hosting? Games (I guess if I had kids it would make sense)? Webmail without spam filtering? Anti-Virus (Norton Anti-Virus is less expensive in the long run since updates on definitions are free for life, and it detects PC viruses that hit your Mac before you are a carrier that infects networked PCs)? Bookmarks on website (oh but I'm getting that already)? Backup (see Carbon Copy Cloner, does more for nothing)? And how about a reliable server for both webhosting and e-mail, .Mac goes down more frequently than any webhost I know of. Is it worth $99 a year for games? Maybe.

Does it really go down that often? I've heard quite a few people complain about the reliability, but it's been pretty bulletproof as far as I've seen so far.

[Jeff Harrell]

Originally posted by NuMan
I have yet to see any benefits of .mac for me? Can anyone that uses it explain how it helps you? Yes.

As a freelancer, I use my .Mac email account extensively for both personal and business-related mail. It's IMAP, which is a huge deal for me. It's available both through Mail.app and through webmail.mac.com. It's fast and incredibly reliable. I can give out my address with impunity because somehow junk mail just doesn't get through. The address is short and sweet and easy to remember. And the service is 100% reliable.

(Don't believe the doom-and-gloom proclamations; I've send and received more than 5,000 emails through .Mac since signing up last year, and I've never lost one, nor had a single one delayed in transit. I honestly have no idea where the complaints that emerged a few months back were coming from.)

That's just email.

I also use iDisk extensively for shuttling files around securely. The other day I needed to take some fairly big PDF's to a client's office. Rather than burning them to a CD and carrying the CD, I just uploaded them to my iDisk, then downloaded them from one of the Windows computers at the client's office. I do that all the time.

I also use my iDisk's Sites folder to share a diary and photos with friends and family.

I use Backup every day to back up my most critical documents and my keychains to my iDisk.

I use iSync every day to keep my bookmarks, address book, and calendar synchronized across three Macs. Being able to get to my address book from any Internet-connected computer in the world is a huge plus to me. I also use the heck out of bookmarks.mac.com when I'm away from my computers.

And, of course, when Apple offers me free stuff, I take it. Much of the time the free stuff has been no big thing, but I got 100 free Kodak prints for signing up--those went into last year's Christmas cards--and I've passed many an hour playing Super Nisqually. I used the free DropStuff utility a lot until just recently; I've given up on StuffIt in favor of compressed disk images. And the other freebies have been a nice plus.

All in all, .Mac is more than worth the $49 I paid for it last year, and easily worth the $99 I just paid for it a few days ago to re-up for a second year.

[Jeff Harrell]

Originally posted by cnladd
Now, more to the point: is there a benefit to joining .Mac, over and above "rolling your own" service?Yes. If you "roll your own" service, then you have to, you know, roll your own service. With .Mac you don't have to. It Just Works™.

I understand that some people have more time than money. I don't, because when you're a freelance consultant your time is money. So every minute I spent diddling with some hacked-together bundle of Internet services would be a minute I couldn't spend on billable work (or, more importantly, the fun stuff that I do the billable work in order to pay for).

[billyboy]

I didnt think .mac looked particularly good on paper, but once I stomped up the cash and started using it, it has proved to be a great asset. The @mac.com name is worth about $5000 to me, it is so neat, and sticking photos on my homepage is tremendous too. Not quite sure how much that is worth, but its close to $100.

[Jeff Harrell]

Okay, I'm a little annoyed now.

I downloaded the Contribute trial to see what it's all about, and ran the installer. The result? See the attached picture.

This happened to me with one of the Adobe updates, too, though I can't recall which one at the moment. It absolutely infuriates me when installers refuse to run because I'm not an admin user. Of course I'm not an admin user, you dimwits! I want my computer to demand a password before I do anything stupid! Apple has a whole framework for authenticating the user; they use it in their own installer. Why can't MindVision get with the program? An installer should ask the user for a privileged username and password; it shouldn't just refuse to run until I log out and log back in. That's just absurd.

Even better are the ones that insist that all other programs must be closed before the installer can run. I think it was the InDesign 2.0.2 update that pulled that one on me. Talk about a blast from the past.

Why anybody still uses MindVision's products is absolutely beyond my comprehension.

Sorry for the off-topic rant. This sort of thing just makes me so damn mad.

I'll be happy to post my thoughts on Contribute the next time I log out and log in as the administrator... in six to eight weeks.

Sheesh.

[macMaestro]

All this stuff about tricking backup to use a different server has got me thinking. What if you could trick Panther into using a non-.Mac server as an iDisk. Suddenly you could have a folder accessible to all your computers that would automatically sync and all that other iDisk stuff that's new in Panther. It could be much larger than 100MB and you wouldn't have to pay $99 dollars a year for it. Just set up an old computer as a server and voila!

Would it work? I'm not the most admin minded person out there so I don't really know.

[digitalbiker]

I can't believe that there are users here who don't acknowledge the poor service reliability of .Mac and the email service.

I for one would much rather see Apple spend time improving service reliability, uping the idsk space, etc. rather than providing freebees that most people don't need. That would provide far more value to me.

I have three different isps and I would say that they are up and functional 95% of the time. Apple's .Mac is probably completely functional 75 - 80 % of the time. My wife, son, & I all have .Mac subscriptions and we are astounded at the number of times that the email server is down. I don't think I have ever lost any messages but there have been many times when I need to get to my idisk or needed to get an email sent and .Mac was down.
:mad:

[kryten2000]

I think I have gotten my moneys worth.If you break it down the services really work out to be like 8 a month.How can you beat that. Theres been a lot of really cool downloads avaiable too. I will
be renewing when my year is up. Cant wait for Panther for the idisk integration









Emac 700
384 ram
jbl Creatures
griffin powermate

[cnladd]

Originally posted by macMaestro
All this stuff about tricking backup to use a different server has got me thinking. What if you could trick Panther into using a non-.Mac server as an iDisk. Suddenly you could have a folder accessible to all your computers that would automatically sync and all that other iDisk stuff that's new in Panther. It could be much larger than 100MB and you wouldn't have to pay $99 dollars a year for it. Just set up an old computer as a server and voila!

Would it work? I'm not the most admin minded person out there so I don't really know.

That's really what the page for tricking Backup was about--it starts out with instructions on how to trick Mac OS X into using a non-.Mac WebDAV service for your iDisk. In my case, it's an 80GB drive.

It works on Panther.

The biggest problem is that once you do that you can no longer access .Mac. I like the idea of .Mac, I prefer the simplicity, I like the extra features and apps. I just don't know about the loss of iDisk space...

[lmalave]

Originally posted by gopher
Nice, except I've already spent money on my webpublishing packages. Where's CGI BIN, Server Side Include and PHP support, not to mention domain name hosting? Games (I guess if I had kids it would make sense)? Webmail without spam filtering? Anti-Virus (Norton Anti-Virus is less expensive in the long run since updates on definitions are free for life, and it detects PC viruses that hit your Mac before you are a carrier that infects networked PCs)? Bookmarks on website (oh but I'm getting that already)? Backup (see Carbon Copy Cloner, does more for nothing)? And how about a reliable server for both webhosting and e-mail, .Mac goes down more frequently than any webhost I know of. Is it worth $99 a year for games? Maybe.

Ok, well if you've already spent money elsewhere and are happy with it then what are you complaining about? The Yahoo! Geocities Plus that I was comparing it to I think would be the closest competitor, and it's $60/yr with no cgi-bin, SSI, PHP, or anything. Keep in mind Yahoo! and Apple are similar in that they are *profitable* and will definitely be around 10 years from now, unlike any number of hosting services that are hemorrhaging money and have no clue about how to run a solid business.

Domain name hosting would be a nice addon, though. But at any rate I'm already forwarding my .name domain to my .Mac web page. Yahoo! has domain name hosting available, which they basically just a rebranded service from another company. Apple could do the same.

[Jeff Harrell]

Originally posted by digitalbiker
I can't believe that there are users here who don't acknowledge the poor service reliability of .Mac and the email service.I speak only for myself, but I refuse to acknowledge any reliability problems because I haven't seen any. As I said above, I've used .Mac email to the tune of more than two dozen messages a day (send and received combined) for just over a year now, and I haven't had a single problem.

I'm sure you've had some kind of problem, but it certainly hasn't been a universal thing.

[FriarTuck]

Sorry this stuff doesn't meet some of your needs.

In my case, .Mac is hitting my technology sweet spot again and again and again.

It is becoming a key weapon in my arsenal as I try to recruit other non-expert users to the Mac platform. Nothing like throwing a video of their kid on your .Mac homepage about 10 minutes after shooting it to convert a parent to the digital hub.

[Spidermanjohn]

Using our iDisk account: We host four different competitive soccer team sites, two family sites and use iDisk to move large files from work to home, or home to work. Free antivirus, huge assortment of freeplay music (Approx. $1,000.00 street price), been a year and have never experienced any down time. The ease of use for my wife is a wonderful thing. She just started designing websites last year with Go Live. Never have used the website templates, just make a new folder with and index page and you have a custom site. I share large files with my family by using the .Mac Windows utility. The up and down speeds have always been great! I can’t say enough good things about our iDisk account.

I received a free account with my educational purchase of a new dual 867 last year. Just paid for my iDisk account today after my wife insisted we get more space.

I love it!

[lmalave]

Originally posted by lmalave

[lmalave]

Originally posted by lmalave
Ok, well if you've already spent money elsewhere and are happy with it then what are you complaining about? The Yahoo! Geocities Plus that I was comparing it to I think would be the closest competitor, and it's $60/yr with no cgi-bin, SSI, PHP, or anything. Keep in mind Yahoo! and Apple are similar in that they are *profitable* and will definitely be around 10 years from now, unlike any number of hosting services that are hemorrhaging money and have no clue about how to run a solid business.


Domain name hosting would be a nice addon, though. But at any rate I'm already forwarding my .name domain to my .Mac web page. Yahoo! has domain name hosting available, which they basically just a rebranded service from another company. Apple could do the same.

Besides, by that same rationale you could build yourself a white-box PC for far cheaper than you could buy any Mac. But the point is: not everybody has the skill, and even if they did, maybe they just don't want to bother (I fall into the latter category, I'm a highly skilled programmer but I do all my work on my iBook, not on any hosting service's servers). I mean, dear Lord, what percentage of people need PHP? Even if it was just to install a 3rd party guestbook app or something, what percentage of people know how to do even that?

[lmalave]

Originally posted by digitalbiker
I can't believe that there are users here who don't acknowledge the poor service reliability of .Mac and the email service.

I for one would much rather see Apple spend time improving service reliability, uping the idsk space, etc. rather than providing freebees that most people don't need. That would provide far more value to me.

I have three different isps and I would say that they are up and functional 95% of the time. Apple's .Mac is probably completely functional 75 - 80 % of the time. My wife, son, & I all have .Mac subscriptions and we are astounded at the number of times that the email server is down. I don't think I have ever lost any messages but there have been many times when I need to get to my idisk or needed to get an email sent and .Mac was down.
:mad:

I've never detected any problem. Have you used Yahoo? Yahoo mail is down on an almost daily basis. I was happy to replace Yahoo with .Mac, I think they are the most comparable services on the market right now. You really can't compare .Mac to an ISP that is also giving you dial-up or broadband access. They are *completely* different types of services.

[Powerbook G5]

Originally posted by digitalbiker
I can't believe that there are users here who don't acknowledge the poor service reliability of .Mac and the email service.

I for one would much rather see Apple spend time improving service reliability, uping the idsk space, etc. rather than providing freebees that most people don't need. That would provide far more value to me.

I have three different isps and I would say that they are up and functional 95% of the time. Apple's .Mac is probably completely functional 75 - 80 % of the time. My wife, son, & I all have .Mac subscriptions and we are astounded at the number of times that the email server is down. I don't think I have ever lost any messages but there have been many times when I need to get to my idisk or needed to get an email sent and .Mac was down.
:mad:

Why would I acknowledge reliability problems when I have had none? .Mac has never once been down for me and has been vastly more reliable than my school's email, AOL, and the one at home. I love it and still haven't seen any of these "reliability" problems crop up.

[bretm]

Originally posted by rohitp
At these prices, why can't it include Mac OS upgrades?

Because they cost more than .mac itself? Gosh, just a guess.

[bretm]

Originally posted by cnladd
Totally off-topic. I don't know what I dig more: your nickname or that pic that fits it perfectly.

Now, more to the point: is there a benefit to joining .Mac, over and above "rolling your own" service? I host my own servers, and am about to do the DNS magic that makes Mac OS X think that MY servers are really .Mac servers; that 100MB of space for iDisk is too limiting for me.

What other benefits do I get, besides bookmark syncing, with .Mac service that would be better than rolling my own? I don't mind paying $100, but I want to make sure that the services are worth it, and that I won't be too limited by what's offered that I'd wish I did it myself anyways...

Any advice, anybody?

It's all listed on their website. If you don't like it don't buy it. Just quit bragging about how good you are at webhositng and all. Isn't your time worth something? How liong did it take you to figure all that out? If you sold space on your servers, negotiated marketing deals with other companies for discounts, supplied the software to make it all connect (backup, virus software, safari bookmark syncing, ipod syncing, cell phone syncing, ical publishing/syncing, computers with an easy setup system in the system prefs, iDisk, etc.) how much would you charge?

[pbooker]

Originally posted by digitalbiker
I can't believe that there are users here who don't acknowledge the poor service reliability of .Mac and the email service.

Nothing to do with not acknowledgement.. but I've never experienced a problem with it.

It's been said over and over - if you know how to roll your own, then don't get .Mac. If you like having it done for you in a nice, neat package - pay the $99US for the .Mac account.

Back to the original article, can anyone tell me if I can get the Contribute templates "out of" Contribute and into the copy of Dreamweaver I own instead?

[JoeRadar]

Originally posted by OKComputer
come on apple, 49.99 and Im sold for another year
Buy a new Mac and then it is only $69 :p

When I renewed, I also got a $20 discount (I think) from the Apple store. So yes, I renewed for $49 :)

[beware_phog]

I wonder when people aren't going to start asking why computers aren't free with their .mac subscriptions. Do you free loaders think that software creations costs nothing? Are you the same people who think music costs nothing so sharing it is OK?

If you don't like what .mac has to offer, then don't buy it. I think it is great. Makes the basic tasks easy. Just like computing should be.

[Dahl]

Originally posted by FriarTuck
It is becoming a key weapon in my arsenal as I try to recruit other non-expert users to the Mac platform. Nothing like throwing a video of their kid on your .Mac homepage about 10 minutes after shooting it to convert a parent to the digital hub.
Good point. I expect my mom to change to Mac, when she soon sees her grandson in iChat AV. I think Mac users, who "nudge" friends and family to Macs are a great way to get new switchers.

About .Mac, I'm still thinking about it, but I really don't need another email address, even if it is short. My name is my email address, how can you beat that ? I also prefer a blog, photos etc on my own site, not mac/whatever.html or something. Can you choose your own url ?

I would like to see some homepages using .Mac templates, is there a list or directory ?

[jayscheuerle]

Originally posted by beware_phog
I wonder when people aren't going to start asking why computers aren't free with their .mac subscriptions. Do you free loaders think that software creations costs nothing? Are you the same people who think music costs nothing so sharing it is OK?

If you don't like what .mac has to offer, then don't buy it. I think it is great. Makes the basic tasks easy. Just like computing should be.

And if enough people thought like you, Apple wouldn't find it necessary to sweeten the re-subscription deal so often and so much.

Once you decide .Mac isn't worth the money for what it provides, it's great show to watch Apple's desperate attempts to keep their subscription base from falling further down, knowing full well that it's all a matter of price point, not features.

It's just not my cup of Kool-Aid...;)

[steveh]

Originally posted by Blackcat
Make it $79/year and I think people might renew. Better still, $8.95/month is less painful.

Which would save them -$8.40 over the current $99/yr.

*Some* people would see that as a feature. Maybe.

[reyesmac]

I wish Apple updated .Mac itself for speed improvements and new features as much as it does its free iApps. What they do instead is update .Mac thru the Mac OS and you end up having to pay $129 to update your $99 .Mac services. Thats messed up.
Instead of giving away stuff, how about come up with new things to do with .mac? Use that $99 to pay for some research and development and not just to pay for bandwidth costs.
For some people .mac is worth the money, but when you compare how they update it to how they update their other programs, something doesn't add up here. Did they think they could just offer what they have now and thats it? No .mac 2.0 version?

[cnladd]

Originally posted by bretm
It's all listed on their website. If you don't like it don't buy it. Just quit bragging about how good you are at webhositng and all. Isn't your time worth something? How liong did it take you to figure all that out? If you sold space on your servers, negotiated marketing deals with other companies for discounts, supplied the software to make it all connect (backup, virus software, safari bookmark syncing, ipod syncing, cell phone syncing, ical publishing/syncing, computers with an easy setup system in the system prefs, iDisk, etc.) how much would you charge?

Don't read more into my post than I had written, please. I wasn't bragging, I was asking a valid question. As I've stated before I would prefer the simplicity of .Mac over rolling my own.

And no, it isn't all on their site. Yes, the features listed are there (except for upgrade prices for more iDisk space -- nowhere to be found when I searched), but that's not what I was asking about. I want to know what others' experiences have been--especially the experience of other users who are capable of "rolling their own", yet still opted for .Mac service.

As for what I would charge if I were to have done all that Apple did with .Mac? Likely a bit more than $99/year, though on a monthly basis. I'm near certain that the service is costing them far more than what they're charging on a per-user basis. The .Mac service isn't a profit center for them, it's likely a cost center (i.e.: partly or mostly subsidized) and is used as a means to attract more users and retain mindhare with existing users.

[ddbean]

I got my .mac subscription for low $35 through my local ind. Apple reseller when I ordered my Dual G5, so I can't wait to start using it... All I need now is APPLE to come through and build/ship my order.

It's great to see how most of you are using it and like it. It did seem like a lot of money (full price) when I first read about it, but now I read what all you can do with it, doesn't seem that bad of a deal at full price, just glad I can have my first year at much lower price.

[Powerbook G5]

Originally posted by ddbean
I got my .mac subscription for low $35 through my local ind. Apple reseller when I ordered my Dual G5, so I can't wait to start using it... All I need now is APPLE to come through and build/ship my order.

It's great to see how most of you are using it and like it. It did seem like a lot of money (full price) when I first read about it, but now I read what all you can do with it, doesn't seem that bad of a deal at full price, just glad I can have my first year at much lower price.

Enjoy your new G5, and yes, I find it to be a great service that does nothing but add that much more functionality to OS X and your user experience in general. I hope you find it to be just as beneficial as well.

[jaw04005]

Originally posted by Powerbook G5
Does it really go down that often? I've heard quite a few people complain about the reliability, but it's been pretty bulletproof as far as I've seen so far. I'm a .Mac renewal, and my particular email account goes down a few times a month at least for hours at a time. Just yesterday, it was down for the majority of the morning. Now, I don't know if that is because I was an early iTools user and my name resides on an "older server" or what, but that aspect could certainly be improved. If they are doing "routine maintenance" then they need to due that maintenance at times other than premium times. On the other hand, my Earthlink Mail account has only went down twice since I subscribed 3 years ago to their service.

[hayesk]

Originally posted by jocknerd
I let my account expire. $99 was too much for me. A lot of others say its worth it with incentives like $30 off of this product, $20 off of that product. But you've got to spend another $300 or so to get that $50 savings. Sorry. I don't subscribe to that thinking.

.Mac also gives a lot of stuff for free. I believe there is more free stuff than there are discounts.

I still think that the .mac subscription base will fall significantly this year.

I think a lot won't renew, but they'll get a lot of new subscriptions too. I believe it will be somewhat constant. Maybe a slight rise or fall, but nothing earth-shattering.

Of course some of you think that anything Apple does or says is the gospel so you'll be glad to plunk down your $99. You'd probably plunk down $199 if Apple told you to.

Or perhaps other people's needs aren't exactly the same as yours. Can you not comprehend that?


Me? I like Apple products. I've got an iBook, an iPod. I just bought Panther. But I bought a Linksys wireless router instead of the AirPort. I don't buy something just because it has the Apple logo on it. It has to be a better value. The Linksys was far and away the better value over the $100 more AirPort.

Does the linksys have a Rendezvous print server built-in? That's why I bought the Airport. Otherwise, I would have gotten a cheaper router too, but Apple provided better value - for me.

The same goes with .mac. $99 exceeds what I consider to be a good value for the product.
Sure, if you don't like it. But you seem to think that other people shouldn't think it is good value. Those people (including myself) have different needs than you do.

[LimeiBook86]

I have been with this since iTools. I love it! The e-mail is great, the bookmark feature I love. The address book is great. I don't care much for iCal but that's just me. The free stuff is what i go for, the games are great. I don't think $30 off a $300 product is good though. Dot Mac should have Apple Software discounts, like Panther! I know I can't afford .Mac and Panther in one year. I am just a high school student. I love .Mac and as long as it keeps getting better I'll still be here. Apple is good at this but they need to listen to thier subscribers a little more. Actually I saw the iBlog request in Apple's Dot Mac forums and then a week later it was avaliable. This is a good sign. Keep it up Apple. :)

[SiliconAddict]

Originally posted by tacomancini
How bout more than 100MB standard. I mean a year ago storage was more expensive... shouldn't .mac up the amount of storage in relation to the lowering costs of drives. I am sure near the limit. I love all the perks... but c'mon more storage please... and a year of only the same 7 web page themes for movies.
that said I love my .mac account.... but I too have access to more server space elsewhere...It's just not as brainless.

OK you are thinking on a really basic level here. Hard drive storage size has increased in the last year but also consider the cost of SCSI drives, that are most likely being used. They aren't cheap. Consider how much it costs to backup all this info on a daily, weekly, or even monthly basis. Consider the costs of cooling the room that is housing the servers that hold all your data. What about the cost of the actual site where the servers are located? DU think that's free?
There is a lot more going on behind the scenes then how many MB's you are getting.
While I agree that 100MB is a tad small the price is pretty good. Personally I think they should give everyone a CD-R's worth of storage. (e.g. 700MB) But in such an instance the price would go up, and rightly so.

[SiliconAddict]

Quick question guys. I've been going over the www.mac.com site with a fine toothed comb and can't find any info on this. Can you get more then one e-mail account? I see that you can upgrade the amount of storage you can have for an e-mail account but no mention of purchasing a second e-mail account.

[Edit: Never mind. I'm blind. Found it in the FAQ as a * 10 bucks is a dang good price :) ]

[SiliconAddict]

One final note about .Mac. I have to ask. What the **** was Apple thinking with the utility that you can install on Windows to access some of the features of .Mac

The software only works on Windows XP. While there are some cool features on XP there really isn't anything all that different between XP and 2K. It’s as if Apple is actively promoting the use of XP which IMHO blows like hurricane Isabel. If nothing else they should have made it compatible with Windows 2000. Really bad decision on Apple’s part.

[Powerbook G5]

Originally posted by SiliconAddict
One final note about .Mac. I have to ask. What the **** was Apple thinking with the utility that you can install on Windows to access some of the features of .Mac

The software only works on Windows XP. While there are some cool features on XP there really isn't anything all that different between XP and 2K. It’s as if Apple is actively promoting the use of XP which IMHO blows like hurricane Isabel. If nothing else they should have made it compatible with Windows 2000. Really bad decision on Apple’s part.

Have you tried it on Win 2k to see if it might work? From my understanding, the two are virtually identical besides the addition of extra multimedia enhancements to XP. If this is the case, there shouldn't be much of a reason why 2k wouldn't work with .Mac, either.

[JayBee]

Originally posted by joshuawaire
I'm a .Mac renewal, and my particular email account goes down a few times a month at least for hours at a time. Just yesterday, it was down for the majority of the morning. Now, I don't know if that is because I was an early iTools user and my name resides on an "older server" or what, but that aspect could certainly be improved. If they are doing "routine maintenance" then they need to due that maintenance at times other than premium times. On the other hand, my Earthlink Mail account has only went down twice since I subscribed 3 years ago to their service.

Yeah, I hear ya. I'm a big .mac fan, but their email reliability could be improved. However, just thought I'd point out - .mac is available GLOBALLY. When do you propose isn't a "premium time"?

;)

[Shaktai]

Originally posted by Blackcat
Make it $79/year and I think people might renew. Better still, $8.95/month is less painful.

$8.95 a month? How is that less painful? That adds up to $107.40 a year. If it makes it less painful to think in monthly terms for you, then it is $8.25 a month.

.Mac is a matter of choice. I had to think long and hard about renewing, but in the end the value offered and the convenience was worth it to me. If you use what it offers, then it is worth it.

[SiliconAddict]

Originally posted by Powerbook G5
Have you tried it on Win 2k to see if it might work? From my understanding, the two are virtually identical besides the addition of extra multimedia enhancements to XP. If this is the case, there shouldn't be much of a reason why 2k wouldn't work with .Mac, either.

Yep

[Powerbook G5]

Damn, that sucks. Win 2000 is the best version of Windows I've used, too.

[Archaeopteryx]

Originally posted by Blackcat
I think people aren't renewing, hence the recent rush of incentives.

Make it $79/year and I think people might renew. Better still, $8.95/month is less painful.

For $8.95 a month, their site better come with some darn good porn!

[SiliconAddict]

Originally posted by Archaeopteryx
For $8.95 a month, their site better come with some darn good porn!

Dang. I bet that's it. This January Apple is going to announce a partnership with Playboy. Playboy content directly into your iDisk ;) They will call the new feature iCandy. :D

[gopher]

Originally posted by SiliconAddict
Dang. I bet that's it. This January Apple is going to announce a partnership with Playboy. Playboy content directly into your iDisk ;) They will call the new feature iCandy. :D

And the funny thing about that, is that the number one industry in the internet is pornography!

But Apple's mainstay in education would forbid its getting associated with that.

[SiliconAddict]

Originally posted by gopher
And the funny thing about that, is that the number one industry in the internet is pornography!

But Apple's mainstay in education would forbid its getting associated with that.

Not if they spin off a new division called Apple: Core - Hot Wench division. I can hear it now. *AOL voice* You’ve got hot wench!!

PS- Sorry I was at our local renaissance fest about a week ago. Got the word suck in my head :D
PPS- I do hope everyone is noticing the ;) I’m not a chauvinistic ***. :o

[SeaFox]

Originally posted by cnladd
Totally off-topic. I don't know what I dig more: your nickname or that pic that fits it perfectly.

Now, more to the point: is there a benefit to joining .Mac, over and above "rolling your own" service? I host my own servers, and am about to do the DNS magic that makes Mac OS X think that MY servers are really .Mac servers; that 100MB of space for iDisk is too limiting for me.

What other benefits do I get, besides bookmark syncing, with .Mac service that would be better than rolling my own? I don't mind paying $100, but I want to make sure that the services are worth it, and that I won't be too limited by what's offered that I'd wish I did it myself anyways...

Any advice, anybody?

Ya know. I see someone like this in every .Mac discussion on MacCentral.

Someone want to know why he should get .Mac and says he can't use PHP or his own domain on .Mac and that iDisk is too small and then he mentions he runs his own server.

.Mac is a consumer service for the most part. If you're at a level where you have your own server .Mac is not for you, and it should be just as obvious to you. You can already do your own IMAP mail, iDisk space, ect. with what you have and can be far more flexible in your website. So why are you asking us to sell you on .Mac. It doesn't make any more sense for you to get it from our point of view either.

[SeaFox]

Originally posted by joshuawaire
I'm a .Mac renewal, and my particular email account goes down a few times a month at least for hours at a time. Just yesterday, it was down for the majority of the morning. Now, I don't know if that is because I was an early iTools user and my name resides on an "older server" or what, but that aspect could certainly be improved. If they are doing "routine maintenance" then they need to due that maintenance at times other than premium times. On the other hand, my Earthlink Mail account has only went down twice since I subscribed 3 years ago to their service.


I find the reliability of my .Mac mail is influenced greatly by who it is I connect to the internet with. When I was on Earthlink, .Mac mail was virtually flawless. But now I'm using AOL to connect (because it's free for me right now) and I routinely have problems accessing me messages with Outlook Express. If you contact AOL "tech support" they say you aren't allowed to use other mail programs while on their service and bid you good-day. So I think a lot of the problems people have with .Mac are related more to their internet connection that the actual .Mac servers.

[gopher]

Originally posted by SeaFox
I find the reliability of my .Mac mail is influenced greatly by who it is I connect to the internet with. When I was on Earthlink, .Mac mail was virtually flawless. But now I'm using AOL to connect (because it's free for me right now) and I routinely have problems accessing me messages with Outlook Express. If you contact AOL "tech support" they say you aren't allowed to use other mail programs while on their service and bid you good-day. So I think a lot of the problems people have with .Mac are related more to their internet connection that the actual .Mac servers.

Well the reliability extends to webmail, it wasn't always possible to log on there either. Don't know what the matter was. I've been on Earthlink DSL, Comcast, Starpower, and a very reliable DSL company called Atlantech.

[digitalbiker]

I have problems no matter how I connect and if you log in through Apple's web page, go to support, there is a .Mac status link.

Most of the time when I am having problems if I check the status it says that .Mac is having problems. So I doubt that how you connect makes much difference.

Apple just tends to have a lot of trouble keeping their servers up and running. That was exceptable when iDisk and email were free for life. But now that we are all paying customers I think that their reliablity problems are inexcusable.

Apple also needs to improve support. I find their bulletin board help system extremely slow and usually worthless.

[ianstanley]

In my opinion it's well worth it.

On the Contribute subthread in this message:


With reguards to contribute. It is an excellent content editor but needs a formal design using a tool like dreamweaver or a prebought template. It does, however, allow you to write sites collabouratively and for one or more persons [say editors] to administer the sites restricting the ability of others [say content writers].

It does work well with iDisk under Jaguar. I heard about a few problems under panther -but since installing it works fine for me.

I have a question however -- has anyone managed to get it working with a set of local files eg the Panther mirror of the iDisk

If i could get it working with panther's local copy of iDisk then it would be the iDeal tool.