RIP Apple MobileMe: Data still available for a ‘limited time’
Apple’s first major and failed attempt at cloud computing — MobileMe — is officially on the outs.
As promised and expected, Apple shut down its MobileMe web service Sunday, but is still allowing users who haven’t transitioned over to iCloud to transfer all of their data for a “limited time.” Apple began notifying users months ago about the shutdown, offering tutorials on how to change over their account to iCloud.
In June 2011, Apple released iCloud, a cloud storage and cloud computing technology, that was planned to ultimately replace MobileMe. At the time, late Apple CEO Steve Jobs admitted that MobileMe was a complete failure. According to past reports, people close to the situation said Jobs was in fact furious about the poor performance of MobileMe. The mail system was slow, syncing was inconsistent and users simply didn’t want to ditch their Gmail account for a MobileMe accounts.
One of the most popular features of MobileMe was the iDisk — a cloud-based hard drive that appeared as an icon in Finder or on a users desktop that allowed them to easily drag and drop any file type into their cloud hard drive.
“I switched over a long time ago,” one MacRumors forum commenter said about the final transition to iCloud, “but I would have thought that a proper iDisk replacement would have happened by now. It had its problems but it worked well enough most of the time.”
Interestingly enough, iDesk may appear to still be syncing.
“My iDisk keeps syncing,” Rob McCallum said on Twitter. “iDisk doesn’t exist anymore. Where’s it sending data?”
With iDisk officially out, as part of MobileMe, expect more users to switch to the more convenient DropBox application.
“Copying the contents of my iDisk to DropBox,” Jason Snell, editor of Macworld magazine, wrote on Twitter. “It was inevitable.”
While people may be upset about iDisk, no one is missing MobileMe. Apple is expected to greatly improve iCloud with its next-generation mobile operating system, iOS 6, and its next Mac operating system, Mac OS X Mountain Lion.
Maybe we’ll see a reincarnated iDisk in that release.
