MobileMe Revamp to Focus on Streaming Data From Individual Machines, Not Cloud?

[Small White Car]

As a desktop user, I love it.

I guess all your laptop users can just suck it.

Ha, but seriously, I think we should change Macrumors.com to Macguesses.com for the next month. Seriously, I've never seen such wild guesswork over an Apple product before.

Even all the iPad guesses were somewhat consistant. But this new data center? It's got everyone making random &#$* up!

LOL exactly. Bad idea. And that's not even getting into the security implications of opening up your computer backend to the WWW.

Well, that's not that much of a problem. I use 'back to my mac' all the time and I haven't heard of any huge problems with that service.

 

[AdeFowler]

Does anyone with a blog now get their opinions on the front page?

 

[asphalt-proof]

I would love for Apple to offer a NAS. Hopefully it would also allow you to sync your iOS apps as well. I know there are some NAS's out there that are compatible but I haven't had the guts to buy one because I really don't want to have to futz around with it too get it to work. Maybe there are some out there that require zero maintenance. Anyone?

 

[Mattsasa]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_2_6 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8E200 Safari/6533.18.5)

$30 a month for data? Carriers should pay you to buy this phone!

Edit: oops wrong thread.

 

[nagromme]

That big data center is for something. Probably something connected to the various rumors, but I bet none of them have it quite right.

My guess is that they want an optional way for people to own an iPad without tethering to a computer ever. Software updates are one thing, but probably not hard to solve since OS X has always been able to update itself. Backups are another. I think the new data center is for (among other things) offsite backups of iPad data.

And Apple ALREADY has backups of your iTunes music, video, and apps (since you bought from there to begin with; and Apple might even keep a backup even of items that are no longer for sale). But your app data, settings, contacts etc. need a place to back up to.

I do think that could turn out to be just one part of the new options, though.

(I personally don’t want to stream everything... but as one low-cost option for those who want it, I have no objection. I can still do things the way I want!)

 

[CubusX]

This is already old...

So the small nano iPhone will be called "iPhone PC" .... the Personal Cloud Edition?

More like: iPhone PC: iPhone: Piece of Crap

The iPhone is about status, why dummy it down???

 

[Penfold2711]

So how will that work with the iphone will we have to keep device with music on also i still as everyone else have reservations about the bandwidth even with unlimited internet your capped and if you go over the fair usage policy then your billed so this could end up very costly, specially as i said in the UK where they will try and squeeze every last penny out of you mobile bills will sky rocket

 

[dmm219]

sounds fine to me. But might be a problem for people with slow network connections and people that don't want (or can't) leave their machine on for 24/7.

Apple has shown in the past not to care about these people...

exhibit 1: ATV 2

 

[SkippyThorson]

Wifi Classic on the way, anyone? An iPod that only has Wifi to load up songs from the cloud, and just enough storage for the OS, which still keeps the size of the Classic.

As a desktop user, I love it.

I guess all your laptop users can just suck it.

Long live the desktop!

Translation : For the new, smaller iPhone to work, you will need an open PC at all times. Nice.

No - in order to load your iPhone Nano with all your crap, you'll need an open PC (or a cached cloud) - your iPhone will still function. It's not like you'd otherwise have a brick.

 

[dantiston]

So there may be some kind of power efficient apple home server product coming to go with this? I'd guess ARM powered. Could be very slick...

There's already a home server and MobileMe already does this -- it's called Back to My Mac and the Time Capsule. On any mac connected to the internet, you can already have your iTunes library stored at home and streamed over the internet with MobileMe. I use it all the time with my mac at work, no need to store my music on their machine -- now maybe they'll extend that streaming capability to iDevices, along with a new solid-state time capsule? Maybe? Please no more Time Capsule failures?

 

[eternlgladiator]

OK maybe I'm crazy and this has probably been said but what happens when I'm carrying my macbook pro in my bag, on a plane, or its just asleep somewhere. How do I stream music then? I'm sure there's an easy work around for it being asleep but a major problem arrises when my computer isn't online. This sounds great in theory but it probably needs a ton or work. I would imagine that the basic service like streaming from your connected computer is free but a storage on the cloud service would cost money.

 

[ranReloaded]

THE CLOUD IS A LIE

Seriously... People have to get real and stop all this crap about the cloud. Stream your music library 24/7? We are still decades before that becomes even likely, telco-wise...

 

[shaunp]

Security

It's all well and good Apple 'saying' that we can access our itunes from anywhere, but personally I wouldn't open up my firewall for this given Apple's dismissive stance on security.

Also if Apple want to stream to multiple devices, isn't it about time they built a NAS rather than having a desktop PC on all the time - i.e. something with lower power consumption and with some form of disk redundancy.

 

[CalCanuck]

Avoids Legal Issues with Media Companies

My guess is if they do it this way it avoids the legal issues the media companies might have it they allowed you to upload your music to a server then stream to your devices. If the content never actually leaves your home computer what can they do.

 

[sk58781111]

slivka, now you're just making stuff up and trolling. kiss my white arse.

 

[NebulaClash]

Apple will upgrade and promote time-capsule, or something like that.

Not a complete computer you need to run 24/7, but just a small harddisk with amazing capabilities, focussing on cloud stuff.

Also, this will give the users more of a safe feeling, I for one don't like the idea of áll my personal settings on 1 central point (that doesn't take away that apple has got your login info for mobileme and a hacker could still break in your files)

Yes, I think you nailed it. Apple could sell hardware advertised as a home-based cloud solution. You control it, you own it, it's not on someone else's machine somewhere you have no control over. It's not a prime target for data thieves the way some central cloud server farm would be. So while it's true that a thief could break into your home, that thief would first have to think of you as a target, and for most of us that would never happen.

Apple sells hardware, it's brain-dead easy to set up and use, it becomes the cloud for the rest of us.

 

[Piggie]

If this runs on a NAS, or a new Apple NAS box then fair enough.

But for Gods & Jesus Christ Sake, please don't let is have to run via iTunes and need your PC or Mac up and running for this to work.

If I'm going to have my PC running, I may as well use my PC to do the job in the 1st place.

 

[justperry]

I have tons of music in my iTunes library that I didn't purchase from iTunes (but sill own legal) .... that needs to be stored somewhere (and I don't think they will give us free access to music we purchased at other places)

Agreed but there are probably millions of people who don't have more than a few gigs or even 10s of Gigs.

 

[Gotta Hankerin]

Thank goodness I still have my unlimited data plan!

 

[newagemac]

After the ipad, I said I would never buy a laptop again. An iMac gives me far more pixels and is much more powerful for a lower cost when doing real work and the smartphone or iPad can handle all my mobile needs. Even a Mac Mini+iPad combo often makes more sense than a laptop these days. Desktop computers can be left on 24/7 and act as servers. This would be the perfect solution.

 

[Paradigm]

100Gb is not enough for me. My iTunes library is 1.2Tb large! I have it on a 2Tb Time Capsule, and the free space is 812Gb. Over 68,000 songs, more the 60 movies, almost 100 tv shows.

 

[Kevo79]

the music which you buy from itunes is already on their server so who needs 100 gb

bingo!

 

[BDRhodes]

A media cloud solution, either as a home-server/TC/NAS type of device or at the big data center, is exactly what the future of the MacBook line needs. It answers the chief problem of the MacBook Air: low levels of local data due to that slick SSD, not enough room for all the media we accrue. Which means being able to store all your media in the cloud lets Apple produce the hardware they dream of and lets you have all the media you want.

The MBA is, after all, being described as the future of the wider MB series. MobileMe is the solution to the MacBook Air even more than to iOS devices.

 

[Wang Foolio]

Time Capsule evolving into a media server, backup device and wireless-N router would be pretty cool, actually. If you could pay a Mac Mini kind of price for all of that functionality, I'd consider the upgrade.

Personally, I still don't think the industry is capable of all the cloud computing stuff that buzzes around. If Obama's plan to throw billions at the wireless network pays off, then maybe within a few years it'll be possible. I'm not saying it's crazy to be working on it now, but it's a bit early to expect everyone to stream all their content at the same time many ISP's are throttling back or gouging the crap out of people for bandwidth consumption.

Cloud makes sense conceptually. ISP's should have the right to charge people based on what they use (every other industry gets to do this). These two concepts are obviously in conflict with each other, and will make the transition difficult.

Maybe Apple will find a way to market a personal LTE base station next, so that you can fire it up and get free data plan and media transfer

 

[john789]

It all sounds good to me....all i care at this point is WHEN ARE THEY MAKING A GOD DAMN ANNOUNCEMENT???? C'mon Apple!! wheres the ipad 2? Like....i dont even care about the so called iphone nano.