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Apple Starting to Restore MobileMe Email Access, Some Email Lost

I think one of the main reasons for this is they way Apple handle beta testing. Everything is secret and it always this "you have to register yada yada yada NDA yada yada yada". If the thing were tested properly, they would probably figured out the main problems. One way to test services is to advertise it as a FREE service for anyone but make it perfectly clear that it is a beta test, that they want you to try it out but don't rely on it,that they want your feedback, that it is time limited, that all data will be destroyed after the test, and that the real thing later on will require a proper registration and cost money. But no, instead they test it within a very small group of people (was it even tested outside Apple HQ?), there is no open beta testing, even the free trial of the real version requires registration and credit card info. Which of course means that they have no idea what they will be hit with when the public start to sign up and demand that it work properly.

If there are other problems (lack of redundancy in hardware and/or lack of data protection against hardware failure because of some unexpected event), then it is even worse. Then they are not qualified enough to run a service like this, not to mention one that they charge for.
 
8CoreWhore said:
Akamai is running the show. zzzzzzzzzzzz:cool:
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I can't say alot, but I do know, that Akamai is working hard on expanding their servers right now. Don't know if this has anything to do with mobileme, since I only started hearing about said company about a week ago ( I was on vacation :)).
 
My biggest criticism of Apple over the years has been their complete silence when things go wrong, so at least this particular 'cloud' has a slight silver lining. Let's hope it's a sign of things to come. However…

I doubt any previous Apple product has had such lousy press coverage. It's a cold day in July when Mossberg and Pouge slate Apple, and Steve Jobs can't be impressed. Sadly I wonder if this new open Apple is a reaction to bad press rather than to the complaints of the loyal paying punter. :(

I guess I'm one of the lucky ones as, so far, my Mobile Me experience has been positive. But Apple should be ashamed and embarrassed by this whole fiasco. Please just fix it and learn from it.
 
After this - the whole Mac Vs. PC stuff should be crammed. I've used MSN Email for 7 years - and I've NEVER had an outage. I'm sure they have happened, but it was so small and for such a short time, it was not noticeable by me.

I could so see the Microsoft reps using this to help hold on to customers thinking of making the Apple switch.
 
At least they've finally started to do something about it. I think I've been lucky and have only had intermittent outages over the past couple weeks.

They should have been more forthcoming from the beginning. Right now it feels like they've been lying to all of us for a while. :(
 
Someone's going to be getting fired I think. This is a very public humiliation for Apple - something they've not had to endure for a fair old while, with releases of products going quite smoothly and with any issues being glossed over very quickly with their excellent customer support.

Hope they sort it out soon - Mobile Me looked pretty appealing to me but I won't go near it till it's all stabilized.
 
I'm constantly left unsurprised that small firms take excellent redundancy/backup precautions (their life depends on it!), while some bigger corporations base their operations on assuming some centralised set of servers/software/procedures will always work. And so Google, which follows the smaller firm model of off-the-shelf servers repeated n-fold, wins.

Random suggestion: Apple to have a (regularly load-tested) standby cluster making a hot mirror (2) of the main mailstore (1) which could be put online within, say, 15 minutes of any outage, providing a reduced functionality interface to mail. Additionally, any mail injected into the mailstream is copied separately (3) to this cluster by the MX server, so that if something horrible happens to the main database, etc. There's three potential backends from which mail can be read, plus non-serving backup locations (4) which can synchronise with active stores if restore is needed. If using (1) or (3) on the standby frontend, switch to appropriate reduced functionality (automatically) to make up for the extra processing/bandwidth requirements - e.g. receive only, limits on attachment size, etc. All failovers should happen automatically.

A key ingredient here is to have keen ADC members, in return for free MobileMe accounts, to test such functionality. But SJ needs to get away from portraying this irritating "can do no wrong, so no testing needed" image that might sell well to the Nike crowd but will just scare away those who want to enjoy doing real business with Apple systems/services. The latter segment does not profit from a vendor's combination of rumo(u)r and surprise.
 
Nice that this has Steve's attention, but Apple is going to have to do more to restore confidence and goodwill:

  • Make all MM services work as they're supposed to
  • Give more than a 30-day extension to current paid subscribers, say one year

They should also consider dropping the price from the current $99 to, say, $50.
 
mattrobs said:
Oh it's going to be a bloodbath once this is over.
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O-buck.jpg
 
Wow! This is truly horrible. One of the biggest tech screw ups from a big company in years.

The affected customers might have grounds for a class action lawsuit.
 
Eh, Apple will sort the MobileMe system eventually. The service uses newer technology and will stabilize as it is used. They definitely could have used a beta period where some adventurous (Read: A lot of people..) could have tested it for stability before launch.

Backups are extremely important and I make sure I have backups of all my data that I need unless I can live without it. ;)
 
saab said:
I think one of the main reasons for this is they way Apple handle beta testing. Everything is secret...
Click to expand...

I don't think you could have said it better. While I understand the need for secrecy and Apple's marketing blitz behind new product launches. A product should not be marketed as a final version with the problems that MobileMe had. It would have been much better to release a beta product to the larger public and allow them to "opt-in" to using the Beta version to help test and provide feedback on features and functionality before flipping the switch and converting everyone over.
 
OS X Dude said:
What was that all about then? In the UK, Live worked seamlessly (I joined last christmas to Live too).
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Just for a taste:
http://www.joystiq.com/2007/12/30/major-nelson-speaks-about-recent-xbox-live-issues/


Pretty much all those people getting a 360 and signing up for an account made the M$ serves crash and burn. They ended up giving away a free arcade game to everyone. It ended up lasting well over a week. That Major Nelson dude had a blog where he posted all the updates and what was being done to fix it.

I have to say it was a pain.
 
Why should it take SJ's "supposed" intervention for them to update customers of the status of MM?

I think this is just the PR people leveraging the big guy's likeability to keep the angry natives calm and by the looks of it, it's already started working.

This kind of tool requires intense beta testing before public consumption. The need for buzz may have resulted in people losing valuable emails, data, etc.
 
Yari Yari...to think all these (activation/mobile me issues) could've been avoided by simply bolstering their server farm. If you want to join the big leagues then for pete's sake PREP for it!.

Also i dunno why they're wasting time shipping the 8GB iPhone 3Gs when its crystal clear that majority want the 16GB...its an iPod after all (people always want the higher capacity as evident from the 4GB/8GB iPhone models) so just forget the 8GB and ship 16GB in lots of quantities.

Its really not rocket science. Begs the question what the hell they're thinking, its just one of those 'scratch your head' moments
 
I'm really trying to move from Gmail to MobileMe, but two things are not contributing:
- I don't know if I have unread messages inside a folder at the me.com (this is ridiculous)
- I can't create server rules

So, I'll keep trying.. if they don't "fix" it.. I'll stay with my Gmail account.
 
Well, I'm looking for a job in the San Francisco area. I heard Apple has a position open for someone who can wash the blood stains out of Apples carpet after Steve Jobs's rampage. Candidates with skills in disposing of bodies and body parts are strongly preferred.

Is that Job still available?

Well, I guess we will end up with a better mobileme. I guess Apple has realized you can't run a service like this on too limited resources with people who are not up to the job like they did in .mac times.
Mobileme was supposed to be their entry into the enterprise/business market.
 
Okay, I know this is a real inconvenience. People have lost their mail. Or whatever.

The thing I don't get is how simple it is to prevent this in the first place.

I just have a Yahoo mail account, configured to work with Mail. I have it keep a copy of the message on the server as well as on my laptop.

I know that after the 18th some people were unable to access the mail from their MobileMe software. Obviously that's when it gets more complicated.

To be honest though as much as MobileMe may be fairly useful you can do everything that it offers separately and at fraction of the cost in the long run.

My two cents.
 
Apple and Google should just merge and have google deal with all the internet stuff while Apple concentrates on the software/hardware stuff. Google can't do hardware/software (android looks like... well you know), and apparently apple can't really handle all the internet stuff (mobileme/iPhone activations).

Of course, this will never happen.

But still. :)
 
The 1% figure is an outright lie and it's shameful that Apple continues to quote it. Just acknowledge that the majority of users are experiencing difficulties of some kind and that a small population has suffered catastrophic data loss. Without real transparency, these bs "updates" are meaningless.
 
I want a free year!

I will be asking for a free year of service and I think we all should! Any suggestions for how we can unite an uprising against apple? I personally lost about $3000 of work in the last week and apple wouldnt even bounce emails back to the sender so they would know there is a problem.
 
Okay, obviously there are severe issues with MobileMe and Apple needs to fix them. In fact, they never should've been issues in the first place.

However, the people here claiming there should be a class action lawsuit or a year of free service or whatnot are off their rockers. Seriously, you guys were relying on a brand-new service (from the people who ran .Mac) for mission-critical e-mails? You guys are insane. You pretty much deserve whatever happened to you, because if you thought this transition was going to be seamless (or even pretty) you were nuts. :rolleyes:

I understand the anger, but some people here are really taking it over-the-top.
 
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