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Apple to Offer Free MobileMe Service to Some iOS Users?

Folks, I am a huge Mac fan and utilize the majority of their products for my needs. One thing I have never been is a one dimensional thinker. Don't mistake being loyal with that, but not all of Apple products are the best. Mobile Me is one that I have not been all that impressed with to say the least. I paid for it and figured it was the biggest waste of money for what I used it for. Wife can sync droid for free with Google, etc... and there are multiple free quality emails out there. I never understood what I paid for and I after I dropped it....my life has not changed one bit whatsoever.

Can't say it is not good for some, but Apple is well behind the curve with others in this area for sure. Instead of penny pinching, they should do like the rest and stop for this type of feature. One thing the company has done, is charge for everything and anything...then when doing something like this get their customers all excited as if they are "hooking" us up. When in reality it is no "hook" up at all. It is what everyone is doing already.

They need to make money like the rest and I don't believe in the freeloader mind set, but I think this service is pennies compared to the marketing hassle cost and that is why no one is going after selling this like Apple does.
 
Free, would be nice, although I've just purchased my 3rd MobileMe extension minutes ago from eBay for $49.99.

That's the usual price I pay (once paid $54 from Amazon), and I think it's fair for the services that I receive.
 
GMail Supporters,

I like Google Mail. It's great.

I just want to make sure that you do understand why it is free, right?

Google is far, far into the data mining experience.

They're not violating anybody's privacy or anything, but the whole point in providing these kinds of services to the public free of charge has to do with being able to spot trends in what the people are doing, and move to take advantage of the marketing opportunities, being able to provide products and services ahead of the curve and make huge sums of money selling your information to other people looking to get ahead of the curve.

I think that Apple's MobileMe should also be free, and its services epanded. I don't know why they'd have built a North Carolina data facility so huge that it rivals the infamous Dulles Equinix Proxy unless they're going to rapidly expand their services in such a fashion.
 
ItsGavinC said:
Free, would be nice, although I've just purchased my 3rd MobileMe extension minutes ago from eBay for $49.99.
Click to expand...
Just did the same thing. I hope they go free, and I expect that they will, but I expire on Dec 10 and didn't want to run the risk of having to scramble.
 
George Knighton said:
GMail Supporters,

I like Google Mail. It's great.

I just want to make sure that you do understand why it is free, right?

Google is far, far into the data mining experience.

They're not violating anybody's privacy or anything, but the whole point in providing these kinds of services to the public free of charge has to do with being able to spot trends in what the people are doing, and move to take advantage of the marketing opportunities, being able to provide products and services ahead of the curve and make huge sums of money selling your information to other people looking to get ahead of the curve.

I think that Apple's MobileMe should also be free, and its services epanded. I don't know why they'd have built a North Carolina data facility so huge that it rivals the infamous Dulles Equinix Proxy unless they're going to rapidly expand their services in such a fashion.
Click to expand...

You are absolutely correct that they make the majority of there revenue from advertising and releasing our emails to 3rd parties, but at the same time, the email filters that they provide automatically filter it all out. All companies, including Apple do what they can to earn revenue, that is part of being in America and living the American Dream.

If anyone that uses the internet in any way, shape, or form, thinks that they are safe and secure from 3rd parties...better wake up and realize that there is no such thing!:eek:
 
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/532.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0.5 Mobile/8B117 Safari/6531.22.7)

I'm guessing it's only 3G device users.
 
This is probably going to compete with Microsoft's "Skydrive" or whatever they call it. I believe they give 25GB of free storage to Windows Live account holders for them to store their documents and other files.

It'd really push the competition in this area of digital services if Apple did the same for iDisk, but 50GB of free storage, including the extras like Push services, Find my iPhone and the other stuff. :D
 
rockinred said:
Folks, I am a huge Mac fan and utilize the majority of their products for my needs. One thing I have never been is a one dimensional thinker. Don't mistake being loyal with that, but not all of Apple products are the best. Mobile Me is one that I have not been all that impressed with to say the least. I paid for it and figured it was the biggest waste of money for what I used it for. Wife can sync droid for free with Google, etc... and there are multiple free quality emails out there. I never understood what I paid for and I after I dropped it....my life has not changed one bit whatsoever.

Can't say it is not good for some, but Apple is well behind the curve with others in this area for sure. Instead of penny pinching, they should do like the rest and stop for this type of feature. One thing the company has done, is charge for everything and anything...then when doing something like this get their customers all excited as if they are "hooking" us up. When in reality it is no "hook" up at all. It is what everyone is doing already.

They need to make money like the rest and I don't believe in the freeloader mind set, but I think this service is pennies compared to the marketing hassle cost and that is why no one is going after selling this like Apple does.
Click to expand...

Well, if you have an iPhone and iPad and Mac and want to keep all of your email, contacts, calendars synced up on all of them, then I think it's great. I guess that isn't something that you need in your family. I've been using it for the last couple of years and i'm very happy with it. there are other ways to achieve those things, although I don't think they work as well and can be a bit kludgy.

If all you are looking for is cloud storage, then there are better choices for that.
 
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Just signed for the .me email address. iPhone and MobileMe goes hand to hand. Without it, feels different.

Just wish it was called .mac Not .me :(
 
What happens to your mail address if you cancel a MobileMe subscription? Would I be able to get it back one it gets free?

I'm on trial and got a great address but I'm only interessted in it, if MobileMe gets free. Otherwise I got a nice yahoo address as well :)
 
phpmaven said:
Well, if you have an iPhone and iPad and Mac and want to keep all of your email, contacts, calendars synced up on all of them, then I think it's great. I guess that isn't something that you need in your family. I've been using it for the last couple of years and i'm very happy with it. there are other ways to achieve those things, although I don't think they work as well and can be a bit kludgy.

If all you are looking for is cloud storage, then there are better choices for that.
Click to expand...

Well, I guess that was kind of my point. I did need the service to an extent and here my wife was getting that feature for free. so I got kind of perturbed over it. I tried to use the other features like like sharing photos on the disk space and never really could find a use for it, as not everyone in the family was tech savvy etc...

The email address worked fine, but nothing better than the rest. I still use it to sync and buy apps, etc... but I can't use for email, which is not that big of a deal. I just used a different one.

In a nutshell, there is no way that I felt the service was worth that amount just to sync things up. I am absolutely positive that many use this for work and it is a necessity like you stated above, but for most common users; it is a bit overpriced to be paying for this when no one in the market is except us. Just because Apple has us by the you know what with using the multiple products. So with all that being said, it is not worth much to me and I have found viable work arounds, but I would be satisfied with it being free like the rest in the industry are. Believe me, I am no cheapie, I have given Apple my fair share of money easily and I am easily considered a top non-business consumer. I have also converted many people over to their products.
 
George Knighton said:
GMail Supporters,

I like Google Mail. It's great.

I just want to make sure that you do understand why it is free, right?

Google is far, far into the data mining experience.

They're not violating anybody's privacy or anything, but the whole point in providing these kinds of services to the public free of charge has to do with being able to spot trends in what the people are doing, and move to take advantage of the marketing opportunities, being able to provide products and services ahead of the curve and make huge sums of money selling your information to other people looking to get ahead of the curve.

I think that Apple's MobileMe should also be free, and its services epanded. I don't know why they'd have built a North Carolina data facility so huge that it rivals the infamous Dulles Equinix Proxy unless they're going to rapidly expand their services in such a fashion.
Click to expand...

While I completely agree with your point of view about Google and their free services, what makes you think your data is in any better hands with Apple nowadays? They already link your iTunes purchases and Apple ID to serve you the best ads on your iOS device, possibly location based even. No reason to assume they would stop short of anything Google would do.

So in that sense I am with SFC Archer .. if you use the internet .. your data is out there and is going to be used in some way or the other.

T.
 
robby818 said:
Likewise with Contacts, the fields in Address book do not correspond perfectly to the fields in Google contacts so there can be missing information in Google contacts.
Click to expand...

Yes, this is true. In Address Book, I have email addresses for services like TwitPic, Evernote, Tumblr, Instapaper, etc., and when syncing to Google, only a few of those email addresses show up in my contact information. What I ended up doing is making new contact entries for each of those services so that all of those email addresses end up in my Google Contacts.
 
rwilliams said:
Yes, this is true. In Address Book, I have email addresses for services like TwitPic, Evernote, Tumblr, Instapaper, etc., and when syncing to Google, only a few of those email addresses show up in my contact information. What I ended up doing is making new contact entries for each of those services so that all of those email addresses end up in my Google Contacts.
Click to expand...

Actually, you have it all backwards. If you use "other" on the iPhone...all will transfer to Google Contacts without a problem. The problem arises when you code them as they truly are in Google and sync them back to iPhone then APPLE does not recognize or allow you to categorize. Another great control milestone by Stevie boy.

Apple effectively removed customized labels on the last update...super job Stevie:rolleyes:
 
In 2006 ".Mac/MobleMe" was a great value. The service has gotten a bit better, and I like all of the iPhone and iPad integration. PC Integration could be better (like syncing your iDisk for example...) The price per gigabyte hasn't kept pace with the industry though.

In late 2010 MobileMe has fallen behind on the value they provide for the dollar. Everyone else is giving away gigabytes, and extra gigabytes cost a tiny fraction of what you pay Apple for MobileMe storage.

I wish Apple would do some market research and correct the storage price. A lot of us would like to store/backup our Photos and Music on MobileMe -- but we are forced to use a third party storage provider because of cost.

Given the revenue being generated by Apple products, you'd think that they wouldn't need a huge margin on web services. They could charge a fair price and tighten the lock-in on their Apple ecosystem.
 
MNTwinsFan said:
Just signed for the .me email address. iPhone and MobileMe goes hand to hand. Without it, feels different.

Just wish it was called .mac Not .me :(
Click to expand...

When I give my email at apple stores, I usually say something like "@Mac.com, not the stupid me one". It's so self centered to have me in your email account. Sends the wrong message to others you give it to.
 
they really should make it free, or at least partially free.

I thought about paying 99 dollars a year, then I got dropbox for free and spanning sync for a single pay 65 dollars. It took all of 15 minutes to set up.

I would rather have an Apple integrated service, at least for contacts and calendars, that worked over the air and instantly with my iphone and laptop, but this is way cheaper and works about 90% as well.
 
I paid $74 for a family membership this year. We have two active users. I think that is a reasonable amount for the syncing of my calendars and contacts between my Macs and being able to post photos to a site very easily from my iPhone.

Last year I paid $100 for my renewal.
 
Full of Win said:
When I give my email at apple stores, I usually say something like "@Mac.com, not the stupid me one". It's so self centered to have me in your email account. Sends the wrong message to others you give it to.
Click to expand...

Nope not at all...that's what Stevie wanted...hes so self centered and arrogant that his .me fits him to a "T". I am surprised you never figured out the irony;)
 
User accounts

Here's a fun thought - the new entry tier MobileMe account serves as a user account for any iOS device. Like user account on a Mac, but all preferences live in the cloud.

Want to lend your friend your iPad but prefer he doesn't stumble upon those steamy emails from his girlfriend? Just log out of MobileMe. When he logs into your ipad with his MobileMe it automatically switches to his email, calendar, etc. He can even sync with itunes while she heads out for a "night with the girls."

This would be a great selling point for office environments that want to share a handful of devices among 20 or so employees.
 
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