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What would it take for .Mac to be worth the $99?

V

vniow

macrumors G4
Original poster
Jul 18, 2002
10,266
1
I accidentally my whole location.
Of course this is for the people who haven't already payed up for it.
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Even though I don't have broadband, I'd use the online storage for some backup and image hosting and stuff, but i'll be damned if that's all I would do for $99 a year.

If there were some discounts on some Apple software than I might be inclined to put some money back for it, and there was some talk in another thread about Panther being full price for non .Mac members and free to .Mac members.

What would .Mac have to offer to compel you to cough up $99 for it?
 
You get anti-virius, drop-stuff, and other little goodies too. I signed up and think it was well worth it, but i only paid $49.99 when it first came out. Its well worth 50, 99 is a bit of a strech.
 
It would need to be free like the original iTools.

The virus scan is useless for me (have any of you actually had a virus on a mac before?), the 100 megs is useless because I have my own web site at 60 dollars a year (with PHP and CP5 and lots of other goodies). I could see paying 30 bucks for this, but nothing more.
 
.Mac is a solid investment, if you just use it. Come on, I post all the music I produce and I can access it over my schools wireless to bring into the studios. I can take tracks that I'm working on in my MIDI class and store them on my iDisk when I need to take them home. I even used it for a secondary backup of all my tracks while they replace the Macs in that lab over the weekend.

My .Mac email will be with me long after I move and get a new ISP. I've had a dozen email addresses, and this is the only one that has lasted more than three years. It'll be there when I finish my degree and switch locations again.

Come on, now. These two features pay for themselves.

Dan
 
.Mac is really not that great a deal for tech people who already have web space. But for Mom and Dad America it's great and a really good deal. Probably kind of fun too. I'm still in my first year so I only paid $50 this time but I'm not sure if I'm willing to pay the $99 after that. i had an open mind and decided to try it out for year but it's turned out to not be worth it. to make it worth $99 it would have to have some features that i just can't get with my regular webhost, who right now gives me 100mb and
5 email addresses, plus support for PHP, cgi, etc. for $10.00 per month. I think Virex is a joke and Backup is useful but nothing more than an automated FTP utility and could easily be replaced with an AppleScript or some freeware. The iCards are lame at best. I might consider paying if .Mac offered a very easy to use live streaming server so we could have our own broadcasts and they would have to be included in the iTuned Radio tuner stations. That might convince me.
 
i get more storage, better scripting support, UNLIMITED email addresses and my own domain for £60 p/a (about $43 i think). What's the point in .mac?! so it says mac.com, big deal!

username.mac would be a cool url, but justifying a .mac TLD would be next to impossible so i can't see that happening
 
The virus scan is useless for me (have any of you actually had a virus on a mac before?)
Click to expand...

This is true, but you can still pass on viruses through email, and it has picked up a couple on my machine that I recived from PC using freinds and they would have been passed on after I forwarded the message, had not the virus software took care of it.
 
nothing. the only part of it I want is the email. if that cost a small anual fee, I'd happily pay for it. But as its not available separately, I am forced to go elsewhere.
 
If I got a certain amount of free music downloads from Apple's soon to be released music download service, then I would sign up.
 
It would have to have more storage, the php4 and mySQL databases as mentioned by other people to be considered worth paying for. When it was free, it was really good... when they decided to charge for it, it became useless to me. Especially since I pay just a little more then the cost of a .Mac account and get... 750MB server space, 25GB/month throughput, three mySQL databases, php4, cgi, unlimited email accounts, pop and smtp email access as well as webmail (so that I can get my email from anywhere with an internet connection, even without my computer). Plus, I get 24/7 support. I can also get the package upgraded, or downgraded, if needed. The cost per month reflects the package I am on as well.

Oh, and I pay monthly, not all at once. Even though I expect to be paying for a year or so in advance in April, to get a lower rate, and to make it so that I won't have to worry about the monthly bills.

I also get unlimited sub-domains. That has allowed me to break up my site to keep it better organized. I have one sub-domain for the main site, one for the discussion boards and one for the online store. They can be easily interlinked (I need to place a link on the store to the discussion boards soon) so nagivation is easy. Can you even do sub-domains with a .mac account?? Such as sub.domain.com??

Something else, even when I had my free .Mac account (iTools and iDisk before) it was rather slow. My site, on the other hand, has more then enough pipelines running to it that I don't have that issue. If it does slow down, it's usually something with the internet in general, or lines are being worked on that is causing it.

All-in-all, even with a few issues that has pissed me off, I'm happy with my web host. Much more so then if I was using a .Mac url for my site.

Oh, and being able to select your url suffix is nice... provided someone else hasn't taken it already. I lucked out and the .com wasn't taken yet... I might have to check the additional popular suffixes soon to see if I can get those as well... heh
 
Originally posted by AlphaTech
It would have to have more storage, the php4 and mySQL databases as mentioned by other people to be considered worth paying for. When it was free, it was really good... when they decided to charge for it, it became useless to me. Especially since I pay just a little more then the cost of a .Mac account and get... 750MB server space, 25GB/month throughput, three mySQL databases, php4, cgi, unlimited email accounts, pop and smtp email access as well as webmail (so that I can get my email from anywhere with an internet connection, even without my computer). Plus, I get 24/7 support. I can also get the package upgraded, or downgraded, if needed. The cost per month reflects the package I am on as well.

Oh, and I pay monthly, not all at once. Even though I expect to be paying for a year or so in advance in April, to get a lower rate, and to make it so that I won't have to worry about the monthly bills.

I also get unlimited sub-domains. That has allowed me to break up my site to keep it better organized. I have one sub-domain for the main site, one for the discussion boards and one for the online store. They can be easily interlinked (I need to place a link on the store to the discussion boards soon) so nagivation is easy. Can you even do sub-domains with a .mac account?? Such as sub.domain.com??

Something else, even when I had my free .Mac account (iTools and iDisk before) it was rather slow. My site, on the other hand, has more then enough pipelines running to it that I don't have that issue. If it does slow down, it's usually something with the internet in general, or lines are being worked on that is causing it.

All-in-all, even with a few issues that has pissed me off, I'm happy with my web host. Much more so then if I was using a .Mac url for my site.

Oh, and being able to select your url suffix is nice... provided someone else hasn't taken it already. I lucked out and the .com wasn't taken yet... I might have to check the additional popular suffixes soon to see if I can get those as well... heh
Click to expand...

It's nice to see you around AlphaTech. I agree completely. iTools and iDisk was nice while it lasted, but I simply wasn't willing to divvy up $100/year for a service I wasn't using that much anyway. When I had iDisk, I occasionally downloaded a file off of it, or uploaded a file, but it took SO LONG!:mad::rolleyes: I just signed up for a free e-mail address from my ISP, and never looked back. $99 dollars a year would have to buy me a new computer to get me to pay up. .Mac is a bad idea and I feal sorry for the fools who paid:eek: for .M$c.

Just my 2 ¢
 
I think more people would use the .mac if they could pay monthly. Being forced to pay for the full year at one time is just wrong... Especially when there are more then a few services out there that give you more space, email addresses and the other services that are actually worth paying for.

Dot5Hosting has a plan for $7/month that gives you 250MB of space, more then enough bandwidth and additional features, such as free unlimited email addresses... Being able to use your ftp application is also a plus.
 
My mom is 78 and 700 miles away. .Mac's integration with iPhoto is really very nice. I can have the latest pics and movies of her granddaughter online in no time, and it's easy for her to look. It saves me time over a "regular" domain. The virus actually came in handy... found Klez and some old Mellissa that "could" have pissed off my PC friends. iChat is useless to me, as is iCal. Backup is nice, and the Mail program needs help before I'll dump Entourage. And the "@mac" address? Priceless in the hands of a proud, productive mac user.
But $99.00? Sure, no problem, as log as I get it for $49.00... which I will since I am in education and someone else pays for it anyway! Would I pay 99 for it myself.... perhaps, but I make a good buck. Apple should make it 49.00 or add some kick-ass new features. What features? I dunno... waiting for Apple's geniuses to release it.
 
Let's see, more MB for mail, more web storage(my web host I get 150 MB for $55 and $99 can get you 350 MB Plus you get your own mail server with however much room you want as long as it dosen't excede your MB limit) Suport CGI(Dose it?) PHP, etc. and let it be able to move QUICKLY instead of being VERRY slow.
 
What does .mac give me really? There's no real "show stopper" feature. And we earn less in Australia... less money to spend.

If Apple wants a "subscriber base, maybe link it to ongoing free upgrades to the OS, give free months based on things bought (eg: buy QT Pro and get some months, buy a Mac and get months, but a few CDs and get months, etc).
 
More space (though I don't use it, it would make me feel better.)
The email is great, I never get any spam at all. Hotmail should DIE, and Yahoo!'s email should die as well.
The price is steep though, $100 a year is a little expensive for what you get. The cards are kind of gay- sorry, I like Apple products but not enough to litter my cards with advertisements for them. The virus program kind of sux too. Backup is alright I suppose.
Every so often they release software that's a special for .Mac members, like the boardgames, which is OK, but better software would be nice.
How about a discount on Apple Care? I'd probably drop $100 if they gave me a good price on that.
 
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