How Do You Like MobileMe For Free?
sanziro.com
How Do You Like MobileMe For Free?
1–10 of 15 posts
Re: How Do You Like MobileMe For Free?
#2I would rather it just cost less as opposed to entirely free. If there were a paid alternative to GMail, I would move away from that too.
Paying for something reduces the likelihood that the provider will do unscrupulous things with my data for financial gain. Or at least I feel like they’d be less likely. And ignorance is bliss, right?
Re: How Do You Like MobileMe For Free?
#3How will it be any different from the other providers ?
That would be the key, being free is not really a differentiator any more.
Re: How Do You Like MobileMe For Free?
#4I have wondered if this was in the cards for a while now. I have had trouble reconciling it with a few things though. On one hand, from a competition standpoint, there is an argument to be made that google is providing free cloud-based sync for all users. Therefore, Apple needs to be competitive with them. However, Apple rarely (never?) releases products as loss leaders. They are always interested in breaking even or (ideally) extracting a small amount of revenue from every offering. I can't see them generating sufficient revenue using advertising, but perhaps iAd would be one way to do it.
On the other hand, the cost of hosting email, calendars, address book sync, etc... is fairly small. I could see a dropbox-like scenario where you get a small amount of free storage (plenty for contacts, calendars, and recent email). Then you pay for additional storage and/or access to premium streaming content. That offering could be built into the purchase price of most Apple gear without a dramatic price increase.
Re: How Do You Like MobileMe For Free?
#5I would rather it just cost less as opposed to entirely free. If there were a paid alternative to GMail, I would move away from that too. Paying for something reduces the likelihood that the provider will do unscrupulous things with my data for financial gain. Or at least I feel like they’d be less likely. And ignorance is bliss, right?
I dunno, I pay for extra storage on GMail (and the rest of Google's services) and I don't think it removes the ads. It's just extra storage.
Re: How Do You Like MobileMe For Free?
#6How will it be any different from the other providers ? That would be the key, being free is not really a differentiator any more.
Provided it retains improved integration with OSX, I think it'd be sufficiently different.
Having iDisk to provide net storage to iPhone OS devices would be a fairly big deal by itself. (Assuming they include over-the-air backup and fix the workflow issue.)
Re: How Do You Like MobileMe For Free?
#7I would rather it just cost less as opposed to entirely free. If there were a paid alternative to GMail, I would move away from that too. Paying for something reduces the likelihood that the provider will do unscrupulous things with my data for financial gain. Or at least I feel like they’d be less likely. And ignorance is bliss, right?
I feel similarly. I started paying for extra gmail storage after reading a story of how one guy's gmail just ceased to be one day. I hope that somehow by paying, gmail has a small motivation to keep mine in existence. Probably wrong, but it makes me feel better.
Re: How Do You Like MobileMe For Free?
#8I would rather it just cost less as opposed to entirely free. If there were a paid alternative to GMail, I would move away from that too. Paying for something reduces the likelihood that the provider will do unscrupulous things with my data for financial gain. Or at least I feel like they’d be less likely. And ignorance is bliss, right?
There is such an alternative: hosted Exchange. ActiveSync is an almost ubiquitous protocol.
Add on the fact that it's currently usually businesses that use it, and I feel even safer that my data won't be fucked with or social networked (cough buzz) on a whim. Maybe on a little more, but probably not a whim :)
It's what I use and love.
Re: How Do You Like MobileMe For Free?
#9How will it be any different from the other providers ? That would be the key, being free is not really a differentiator any more.
Provided it retains improved integration with OSX, I think it'd be sufficiently different. Having iDisk to provide net storage to iPhone OS devices would be a fairly big deal by itself. (Assuming they include over-the-air backup and fix the workflow issue.)
"Assuming they include over-the-air backup and fix the workflow issue" - hence why rsync wins.
Re: How Do You Like MobileMe For Free?
#10I have wondered if this was in the cards for a while now. I have had trouble reconciling it with a few things though. On one hand, from a competition standpoint, there is an argument to be made that google is providing free cloud-based sync for all users. Therefore, Apple needs to be competitive with them. However, Apple rarely (never?) releases products as loss leaders. They are always interested in breaking even or…
The real value for most people with Mobile Me will be the calendar and contact sync. If Apple made that free it would offer a lot of value to iPad and iPhone users. Especially for the PC users, because there is no Address Book equivalent to manage contacts on Windows.
But I do agree with you on your first point. Apple does not create products as loss leaders. It just doesn't seem to be a part of their culture to create a product that cannot be profitable on its own.