Apple Ends Complimentary 20 GB Storage Plan for Former MobileMe Members

[BaldiMac]

I'm disappointed with Apple's lack of standing behind their products. This being one of the instances that just doesn't make sense to me. Why would you take something away from people who rightfully paid for a service through your company. The users using their 25GB's weren't really "harming" the company in any way by not paying. Apple makes most of their money in hardware any way, why come after the users who are happily using your product.

It just leaves me with a sting and a disgusting after taste in my mouth which this new or should I say, old policy ending, is the direct cause of.

They gave you a free benefit for two years after the service you paid for ended. Why do you think we are entitled to more?

Google gives all users, 30GB's of space, FREE.

Not free. Ad supported. And again, total free iCloud storage is over a terabyte when you include shared photo streams.

I don't understand, Google is their direct competitor, why would they be so naive to expect customers to pay for something that they can get free somewhere else. Yes iCloud is it's own service, just as is the advantages and features you get with Gmail. They should broaden the iCloud given amount to at least 10GB's. All of their devices come with 8GB's or higher anyways, if you wanted to back up your device in the Cloud like they intended, why not give people at least 10GB's so they actually have the ability to do so.

Different business models. Google is making money directly from their services through advertising. Apple doesn't care if you are using someone else's service for email.

This shouldn't be about how much money they can make off of a service, it should be about their customer care and a way to show their dedication to the customer base.

That's exactly what iCloud is!

 

[rmwebs]

Again, 5GB plus storage for 501,000 photos.



Gmail is 15GB of ad supported space.

The 15GB is good for Google Drive, which is ad free So you can setup a Google account, get Google Drive for mac working, and never see an advert.

Then the upgrade prices are dirt cheap compared to Apples (Which is 200% more expensive and 100% less reliable).

Apple suck at online services, lets not sugar coat it.

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And again, total free iCloud storage is over a terabyte when you include shared photo streams.

If we want to play that game...

Android Devices.

Google Drive - 30GB Storage (no adverts as the actual Google Drive web ui and apps have none)
Flickr Photo Sync - 1TB free storage.

Service reliability and price wise Google/Yahoo win here. Their upgrade costs are a hell of a lot cheaper too.

 

[BaldiMac]

The 15GB is good for Google Drive, which is ad free So you can setup a Google account, get Google Drive for mac working, and never see an advert.

Which has nothing to do with what I said.

Apple suck at online services, lets not sugar coat it.

Hyperbole is fun.

If we want to play that game...

Android Devices.

Google Drive - 30GB Storage (no adverts as the actual Google Drive web ui and apps have none)
Flickr Photo Sync - 1TB free storage.

Service reliability and price wise Google/Yahoo win here. Their upgrade costs are a hell of a lot cheaper too.

I'm not sure what your game has to do with anything I said. I can access Flickr or Google Drive on my iPhone as well.

 

[Hawkeye411]

Apple: "Our thanks to you for being a loyal paying original customer and putting up with our early crappy product is to not grandfather you but to decrease your storage and charge you more money!!! Aren't you lucky!!!!!!"

 

[BaldiMac]

Apple: "Our thanks to you for being a loyal paying original customer and putting up with our early crappy product is to not grandfather you but to decrease your storage and charge you more money!!! Aren't you lucky!!!!!!"

Or... Apple: "Our thanks to you for being a loyal paying original customer and putting up with our early crappy product is to offer you two years of upgraded storage for free with iCloud."

 

[jettredmont]

I started with iTools then went to .mac then to MobileMe. I've been pleased with the service Apple has provided over the years though I probably didn't take advantage of some of the iTools features like I should have. I've enjoyed the free storage space the past 2 years and I have started paying for the extra 20gb today. When you have 3 iPods, 4 iPads and 2 iPhones (soon to be 3) in the house you need a decent amount of space for backups. On top of that I use my iPad as my laptop and have a lot of iWork files stored on iCloud.

I payed $99 for .mac and MobileMe. $40 for iCloud seems like a bargin!

Why backup your mobile device to the cloud? Local backups work great, are free within margin of error (5 cents per GB per year if you allow a full $100 to by a 1TB drive and throw it away after two years ...), and are blazingly fast. Granted, $40/year isn't much (I paid $99/year for a few years then found that Amazon would occasionally sell "last year's" .Mac then MobileMe "activation" cards for $60-65, which of course worked just fine to add another year on the subscription), but I just don't see any benefit of it.

It's not like there's much of a chance I'd lose my hard drive and my mobile device at the same time (but I still offsite rotate along with my other local backups just because it would be more of a pain not to).

Just don't get iCloud backups of iPhones/iPads. Contacts etc are already synced, so even in the "new device from the Apple Store" scenario I'm up and running instantly (then restore everything else from backup when I get home) ...

In any case, while I appreciated the extra storage being there for the past two years, I never broke 600MB (I have 4.46GB of 5GB space right now). Just don't see what I'd use 25GB for since there isn't a dropbox-style file upload/download option there.

 

[macUser2007]

BS. iCloud accounts are free to all comers. No need for a device.

To take full advantage of an iCloud account you need an iOS device of some sort....

Right. You can get an account, you just can't really do anything without an Apple device....

And your point is?

 

[McGiord]

Apple should provide at least the same amount of GB that the device have, it's never free, it is part of the cost of owning an Apple product.
iPhone 64GB, at least 64GB in iCloud.
iPad 128GB...128GB iCloud.
They could start with the iDevices, and for those who pay for the yearly plan will get more.
Bundle the iTunes Match subscription with extra iCloud storage $25/year and double your iCloud capacity.
After some solutions are tested and everyone is happy/hook on Apple release the TimeMachine in the cloud service for our Macs.

 

[BaldiMac]

Right. You can get an account, you just can't really do anything without an Apple device....

Except for email.
And contacts.
And calendar.
And notes.
And reminders.
And access to iTunes media.

But other than that...

 

[kolemccarthy]

Apple should provide at least the same amount of GB that the device have, it's never free, it is part of the cost of owning an Apple product.
iPhone 64GB, at least 64GB in iCloud.
iPad 128GB...128GB iCloud.
They could start with the iDevices, and for those who pay for the yearly plan will get more.
Bundle the iTunes Match subscription with extra iCloud storage $25/year and double your iCloud capacity.
After some solutions are tested and everyone is happy/hook on Apple release the TimeMachine in the cloud service for our Macs.

I completely agree, it may seem a bit much for them to offer but it really wouldn't be much for them to take a "hit" like that.

 

[dtjay7]

The 5GB is tied to your Apple ID. If you use the same Apple ID to log into multiple devices, then the 5GB is shared. If you use different Apple ID's per device, then each one gets 5GB.

If you are using multiple devices under the same ID, be sure to check your iCloud backups. Delete any old ones, especially a device you no longer use.

Thanks for the information. That would work but I already have my @mac address for iCloud and @yahoo for my iTunes store account. I wish there was a way to combine the two uses.

 

[jebbe]

It's not 'SHOULD'. People are simply pointing out that it would be nice for Apple to stop being so tight. They have fallen behind.

- All (Official) Android devices get 15GB Google Drive storage, and because its Android you have the option of setting Flickrs 1TB free account as your default photo storage. Win: Android

- With Windows Phone you get access to 7GB of Sky Drive (IIRC some of the phones give you an extra 7GB on top of that just for the phone)

- Blackberry have a deal, and integration with Box.net to give users an extra 10GB storage (on top of Box.net's 10GB free account)

As it stands Apple's 5GB is pathetic when compared with the competition. Especially with it's half-assed/locked-down implementation with no filesystem access.

Well if you know anything about Apple, they could care less what their competitors are doing. And they've never been one to give things out for free, and a majority of their customers probably still don't even know what iCloud really even is.

I've tried to explain Dropbox and various other things to the non-tech savvy and they couldn't care less. Hell even me being someone who's owned every iPhone, and have been working with computers for 10+ years I don't even really care about iCloud.

I backup everything to my computer cause to me it's more reliable and it makes more sense to do that anyways, or maybe just cause I've been doing that for so long before iCloud even existed.

 

[garylapointe]

Apple should give us 5gigs per device.

That makes me a little cRaZY. If I set them up on different iCloud accounts I'd get 5GB per device, but since I'm "a power user" with multiple devices, I can't have two devices that need 3GB of backup each since 3+3 > 5

Plus, I have to buy 20GB more to store all that and I don't need that much space (even with iPhone, iPad, MacBook Pro and MacBook Air).

Gary

 

[mgmusicman94]

YAY! I am over by 12 gig now.

If only they would send you like 10 warnings to reduce your storage before it was cut off... Oh wait!

 

[Fission]

DropBox gives you 5GB as well, your point?

Didn't buy ANYTHUNG from Dropbox to get that 5gb...I'd pay if we could upload whatever we wanted Dropbox style...

 

[dumastudetto]

If only they would send you like 10 warnings to reduce your storage before it was cut off... Oh wait!

Storagegate! How will Apple respond to this developing scandal?

 

[MyopicPaideia]

That's what I was saying - each device tied to your icloud gets 5GB. When you remove icloud from the phone, it takes away 5GB.

Nope, just checked my own again to make sure I wasn't wrong. Each Apple ID gets 5GB, whether that ID is tied to 5 devices or 1. Devices have nothing to do with iCloud storage capacity.

 

[haruhiko]

They should have given us 5GB PER DEVICE registered under the account

 

[OllyW]

I was excited about this as well but the picture files are reduced and are not the original size.

Oh well, not so useful after all.

 

[rmwebs]

Well if you know anything about Apple, they could care less what their competitors are doing.

I assume you mean they couldn't care less, And clearly they could, otherwise iOS7 wouldn't have had such a significant overhaul. A company that doesn't aspire to beat its competitors won't last long.

And they've never been one to give things out for free, and a majority of their customers probably still don't even know what iCloud really even is.

Nope, they haven't. They didn't get where they are by being generous that's for sure. However they can't ignore the fact that right now iCloud is pretty poor and is essentially still MobileMe, just with new features and bugfixes.

They also cant ignore the fact that if you buy any other major smartphone you get a much better cloud service for storing mobile and desktop documents, contacts, etc with a lot more space, and lower upgrade costs.

That's fact, not opinion - Google, MS, Amazon, Blackberry (Box.net) are all massively cheaper than Apple with regards to cloud storage, and they are all a lot more reliable (in terms of uptime) and accessible from a lot more devices.

I've tried to explain Dropbox and various other things to the non-tech savvy and they couldn't care less. Hell even me being someone who's owned every iPhone, and have been working with computers for 10+ years I don't even really care about iCloud.

Of course they couldn't care less...the average joe just wants something that works. Which iCloud does until you fill it up. The average joe will pay Apple's 200% higher fee for space, or will more likely just ignore it and turn iCloud syncing off.

iCloud isn't aimed at the average joe though, as the average joe couldnt give a damn about contact/calendar syncing. Technically the average joe is also a Windows user, so the iCloud features are even more useless to them.

I backup everything to my computer cause to me it's more reliable and it makes more sense to do that anyways, or maybe just cause I've been doing that for so long before iCloud even existed.

I used to do this, however it requires iTunes to be running, which I refuse to use these days due to it's well known issues. As it stands I don't back my phone up, as I don't need to anymore. My photos copy to iPhoto via iCloud - that's the only part of iCloud I use. My contacts are synced up via Google.

I then use Google Drive for storing any files or documents I want on my phone/mac and spotify for music.

The reliability of this is far superior to what I've experienced with iCloud, which has been atrocious with regular outages as many will know.

 

[samcraig]

you wrote

Which has nothing to do with what I said.

In response to

"The 15GB is good for Google Drive, which is ad free So you can setup a Google account, get Google Drive for mac working, and never see an advert."

Which was in response to your comment "Not free. Ad supported. And again, total free iCloud storage is over a terabyte when you include shared photo streams."

So please explain how that has nothing to do with what you said?

 

[BaldiMac]

you wrote



In response to

"The 15GB is good for Google Drive, which is ad free So you can setup a Google account, get Google Drive for mac working, and never see an advert."

Which was in response to your comment "Not free. Ad supported. And again, total free iCloud storage is over a terabyte when you include shared photo streams."

So please explain how that has nothing to do with what you said?

Because I was responding to a comment about Gmail and iCloud email, not Google Drive.

 

[samcraig]

Because I was responding to a comment about Gmail and iCloud email, not Google Drive.

But his comment wasn't specific to gmail - his was general, no?

Doesn't matter. I wrote earlier in this thread that I agree that Apple has no obligation to offer anything free - and was very generous in giving users a lengthy "stay" on extended storage.

I do think their prices are out of line with their competition. One could argue that they have "no" competition because iCloud is so heavily integrated into iOS and their devices. And that clearly is why they don't (seemingly) care about what others charge.

 

[BaldiMac]

But his comment wasn't specific to gmail - his was general, no?

I'm saying that my comment was specific to Gmail. Hence, his response was a non sequitur. Here was the conversation:

I already have 4GB of emails. Hello? I may even run out of email space. Gmail is 15GB free space.

Gmail is 15GB of ad supported space.

The 15GB is good for Google Drive, which is ad free So you can setup a Google account, get Google Drive for mac working, and never see an advert.

Which has nothing to do with what I said.

Doesn't matter. I wrote earlier in this thread that I agree that Apple has no obligation to offer anything free - and was very generous in giving users a lengthy "stay" on extended storage.

I do think their prices are out of line with their competition. One could argue that they have "no" competition because iCloud is so heavily integrated into iOS and their devices. And that clearly is why they don't (seemingly) care about what others charge.

I agree. I also see it as a way to limit heavy iCloud users. It's not exactly known for being the most reliable of services.

 

[unplugme71]

Nope, just checked my own again to make sure I wasn't wrong. Each Apple ID gets 5GB, whether that ID is tied to 5 devices or 1. Devices have nothing to do with iCloud storage capacity.

nevermind, you lost the initial point of the first post

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As I said in a later post, you can create up to 100 shared photostreams with 5,000 pics each. So that is 501,000 photos. Which is about a terabyte of photo storage at 2.5 MB /photo.





I'm not talking about iTunes Match. That's a paid service. I'm referring to the fact that any media that you purchase from iTunes is available for download or streaming through iCloud and does not count against your iCloud storage limit.

they must have changed it. Originally it was just 1000 photos