When Phil Schiller, Apple’s senior VP of Worldwide Product Marketing, introduced MobileMe onstage at the WWDC keynote in June, the audience was wowed into believing that the most stylish hardware and software company had transformed itself into a formidable Internet service provider right before its eyes.
MobileMe not only promised to be exceedingly functional – an “Exchange for the rest of us” that would synchronize our emails, contacts, calendar appointments and photos across devices using push technology – it was also exceedingly beautiful. By applying its legendary design expertise to the SproutCore JavaScript framework, Apple had created a browser-based hub that not only empowered consumers with device flexibility; it also raised the notion that Apple would become a major player in cloud computing, even if MobileMe was technically only an upgrade to the six-year-old .Mac service.
But alas, the transformation has proven itself to be more of a slog than Apple had hoped. After a false start, persistent outages, and all-around bugginess, Steve Jobs has admitted to employees in an internal email that “it was a mistake to launch MobileMe at the same time as iPhone 3G, iPhone 2.0 software and the App Store,” and “the MobileMe launch clearly demonstrates that we have more to learn about Internet services”. This is an atypical admission by a company known for its well-maintained image of impeccability. It also raises the question of whether Apple will be able to metamorphize as services and software move online around it.
Apple is certainly not without its previous Internet successes, namely the iTunes Store with its paid music and movie downloads. The store’s success appears to be why Eddy Cue, Apple’s VP of iTunes, has been put in charge of all Apple Internet services following the MobileMe mess. But it has yet to be seen whether Cue can translate his experience deploying an Web-connected desktop app within a proprietary framework (iTunes) into a more distributed, browser-based platform that competes with the likes of Live Mesh and SugarSync. And then there is the question of whether Google will ever add desktop syncing to its webtop services, competing even more directly with the MobileMe offering.
Hey TC how come you guys now have PointRollAds.htm trying to download on my PC? Last week it was something else trying to download. I know you guys are in it for the money but this crap is getting old.
Still, a good starting point and on the right track…
I’m not sure what you’re talking about, but MobileMe is neither a good start, nor is it on the right track.
With all the problems that Apple’s having, you’d think that MobileMe was a fledgling offering that launched a little before it was ready. It’s not. MobileMe is essentially a rebranded .Mac, so most of the plumbing should have been there already. That’s not to say that everything should have gone perfectly, but it the re-launch should have gone a lot better.
The real problem is the track that they’re on. Apple’s decided to charge $99/year for what Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, and many others give away for free. When you’ve got a free web service that’s in perpetual beta, you can get away with lackluster performance. When you officially product-ize it, promote it, and put a dollar amount on it, people will rightfully expect that it will work. Not only should it work, but it should present a value to the customer, an experience beyond what they can otherwise get for free. MobileMe customers certainly haven’t been getting their dollar’s worth so far.
Apple should have launched MobileMe as a free beta to all .Mac subscribers three months ago. They could have had time to work out the bugs, and then went ahead with the public launch when it was ready. Unfortunately, because they like to keep everything a secret until the day it goes on sale, MobileMe crashed, burned, and put off a lot of potential customers.
Between the MobileMe problems and the incredibly buggy iPhone 2.0 firmware, Apple has done themselves a horrible disservice. Apple has always marketed the idea that their stuff “just works”. Recently, they’ve been coming up really short.
Why is everything today considered a cloud computing play? Mobile Me has nothing to do with the cloud. It’s just a website prettied up with a Javascript framework. At most it’s exposing additional web service hooks for mobile devices or the desktop. Do we really need to categorize everything as a flavor of the day when it’s really not. We’ve seen this with e-commerce, content management, social networks, blogs, cloud computing. Most of these are just websites with some specialized features.
these questions had long bothered me but i was reluctant to voice my skepticism for fear that i might end up sounding clueless.
For all the complaints, as a longtime mac.com user I am more then happy with MobileMe. Yes it has some Ops issues to work out but the service overall has been good for me. I love the ability to push contact info from the website to the iphone and vice versa. Simple enough my wife uses it and loves it, and she is a longtime Palm user. I can’t wait until this service morphs into the next stage.
Contents of a leaked internal email from Jobs do not constitute an “admission” by “the company”. His comments do not raise a question of whether or not Apple can “metamorphize” (just say “fix the problems”, because “metamorphize” is barely considered a real word). Since when does ‘maybe we shouldn’t have launched when we did’ equate to ‘we screwed up and who knows if we’ll be able to recover’?
I purchased .mac just before the Mobile Me rollout because of the new “push” services. I am VERY disappointed that what was shown during the keynote (Push from desktop > Online > iPhone) is NOT what has been released. If I wanted to sync my desktop data with my iPhone data every 15 minutes I would have stuck with my original solution and never wasted my money on Mobile Me.
Mobile Me is NOWHERE close to being “Exchange for the rest of us”. I feel ripped off and lied to. What was promised is NOT what was delivered. If I could get my money back I would drop Mobile Me in a heartbeat.
I would use “metamorphose” instead of “metamorphise” — it’s more common, and listed in more dictionaries.
Eddy used to run both .Mac and iTunes, so I think he’ll do fine.
I loved it for about two days, and then the s**t hit the fan. For starters, the system wouldn’t accept my credit card (the dropdown for an August expiration was hard-coded as month #6, not #8) for a renewal. So then I just bought a boxed version, but then the system could not activate the code (to this day, I have not had luck with it). To further complicate matters, MobileMe does not support CalDAV. So, now that iCal and Google are playing nice, I switched up all of my calendars so that they would sync. Small problem though, MobileMe doesn’t allow it. All of my calendars got wiped on my iPhone. Fortunately (and thanks to Google and a local backup) I was able to rollback everything. For now MobileMe is one big MobileF**kYou!
Too much coverage over MobileMe… Too many flaws.
http://blabtech.blogspot.com
I agree with techdude.
oookay, so I guess I’m in the minority. I don’t use the desktop sync functionality so perhaps that is the focus of most people’s problems?
Yes.
Hahaha…Apple’s only claim to fame is the iPod. It’s the Walkman of this generation and everyone thinks that because they got ONE product “right” (and even that can be argued) everything else they touch turns into gold.
Serves Apple right by embarrassing them in front of the tech world and mainstream media. Microsoft, their biggest rival, has been doing online stuff for YEARS and still have issues…so Apple thinks it can just come along and do everything perfect on its first try? Whatever.
Oh, and @me.com sucks. What a horrible, horrible name. .mac was so much better and gave Mac elitist a reason to pay $99/yr.
What I find interesting is that Apple is starting to run into the same problem other companies are running into when launching products. That would be large scale adoption of the product. This leads to problems when more people than anticipated try to use it.
When a mass number of people start to use things it will show more and more bugs. The same IS going to happen as the mac gets more popular. More and more bugs are going to be fleshed out. This is a good thing and is something that is always happening with windows because of how widely it is used. Apple does have one advantage though. Everything is closed.
Wow, saying that the iPod is the ONE product Apple got right is a pretty bold statement.
I don’t think that Scott was implying as much about the quality of Apple products as he was about their commercial success. Apple has never had mass market success. While not a perfect comparison, the Apple II was outsold by the Commodore 64 by more than 5 to 1. Global market share for Macs has never been more than 3% or so.
If it hadn’t been for the success of the iPod, Apple might not be around today. They’ve sold far more iPods in 7 years than computers sold in all of Apple’s 32-year history. About half of all their revenue comes from iPod/iTunes.
So, from purely a sales perspective, it’s really not a stretch to say that the iPod is the only thing that Apple has done right. Certainly since the Apple II. Many believe that Apple would have been bankrupt by now without it (though it could be argued that it was the first iMac that set Apple on the right path).
Reading the comments I just have to pipe in…
.Mac has been around for a very long time with minor glitches. The feature set was and continues to be well worth the $100 per year. Yes other services out there are free but they are a subset.
What is up with this whole elitist thing? I have been hearing the inflammatory “Macs SUCK!” thrown in my face since 1989! And one “right” product? Yeah whatever.
Agreed on the “me” thing. Anything marketed that has me and my in it is somewhat childish.
Agreed that as Apple gets larger they need to learn to write scalable software better. And they will unfortunately rush stuff out the door quicker. MobileMe is version one and relative to the rest of the industry, the bugs are on par.
MobileMe is riddled with bugs. Unfortunately it is acceptable for any software company to release software before it is time. And since Apple has gone from underdog to goldenchild any glitch is vehemently attacked.
http://www.plaxo.com does it for free, does it better
No syncing bookmarks, keychains, etc
No integration with iLife
I am certain there is more.
Plaxo seems more focused on on the social networking crap everybody is using because they ain’t talking to their neighbors. Sorry for digressing.
they should keep working on it till they get it right
the real question, my friends, is when shall Google release such a product for Google Apps