MobileMe Enters the Info Highway

Yesterday, July 9, Apple's .Mac status page indicated that the MobileMe transition started last night, a change from earlier notification indicating full service availability by 5 a.m. EDT. But MobileMe wasn't live until Thursday afternoon EDT. So far, I can access iDisk storage, but not other services, like e-mail.

MobileMe replaces .Mac, which Apple launched in mid-2002 as replacement for iTools. The iTools service was free, while .Mac cost $99 a year, the same as MobileMe. But there is a difference: Apple finally is offering some value for that 100 bucks. I subscribed to both services, but often questioned the value of that yearly fee—particularly after Google started offering comparable services for free.

But I stuck with .Mac because I liked my e-mail address and found the service to be surprisingly spam-free. By contrast, my Gmail and Hotmail accounts collect lots of junk mail. MobileMe promises to be a much better value, because of synchronization capabilities, the value of which cannot be overstated. As I've written before, sync is the killer application for the Web-connected world. The question: Can MobileMe deliver great sync?

Apple delivers better sync than any other major high-tech company. The best example is iTunes, which now has multiple sync capabilities—to Apple TV, iPhones, iPod Touches, Macs and Windows PCs. Apple's sync success is a marvel, considering how poorly others have executed in this area, particularly Microsoft.

But the real test of Apple sync will come over the next few days. Can Apple servers handle the load? I'm skeptical. First transition is now, with the switchover from .Mac and the sync light going on for all those Macs and PCs. Release of iPhone 2.0 software will flip the switch for iPhone 2G and iPod Touch owners that either already have .Mac or are getting MobileMe. The load will be heaviest starting July 11, after the iPhone 3G goes on sale.

But early indications aren't good. Apple started the .Mac to MobileMe transition around 11 p.m. EDT Wednesday, a 2-hour delay, with expected completion by 5 a.m. EDT on Thursday. I could still log into .Mac at 11 p.m. EDT. By 12:11 a.m., the service was down for maintenance. When I went to bed at 3:30 a.m. EDT, MobileMe wasn't available—no surprise there. But it wasn't available at 9:05 a.m., either, which was the next time I checked. I didn't finally get on until 2:46 p.m. EDT. Limited access raises concerns about how smoothly the launch will go.

If Apple can meet the heavy sync load and keep it going smoothly, MobileMe will be established as a premier Web service. Microsoft, which is testing rival sync service Live Mesh, better watch out if MobileMe launches smoothly. If MobileMe crashes, or even just slows down in heavy Web traffic, there can be cheering at Microsoft. The company has moved slowly in launching its own sync service so as to build out data center scale. And Microsoft probably needs the scale more than Apple. The number of Live IDs is approaching 500 million, thanks to free services.

That said, if iPhone 3G sales are as big as some analysts forecast, Apple is going to need all the data center scale that it can get to handle new MobileMe accounts.

I'm surprised how little analysis there has been about what the services revenue would mean to Apple. Hypothetically, if Apple sells 5 million iPhone 3Gs through the end of 2008 and 20 percent of customers sign up for MobileMe, that's $99 million. Many analysts' sales estimates for the iPhone 3G are higher, and MobileMe adoption could be much, much greater. What if one in three iPhone 3G buyers added the service? I'll be interested to see on Friday, when the iPhone 3G is launched here in the United States, how Apple sales staff offers MobileMe. Surely the service will be pitched to every iPhone buyer at Apple Stores; if not, Apple would miss a huge cross-sales opportunity.

Apple plans to keep active existing @mac e-mail address, while IDs, or handles, automatically move to @me.com. I checked on Tuesday, and the @me.com equivalent of my @mac.com handle could receive e-mail. I successfully signed into MobileMe using the @me.com address.

Microsoft started a land grab with the move from @hotmail.com to @live.com. People could snatch up new handles at @live.com. So that sore-looking brandybicket48216 might become brandyb, bbicket or even brandybicket. Apple is taking the more conservative approach of automatically transferring e-mail handles and keeping both active.

My question: For how long? As I said, I've seen little spam on .Mac compared with Gmail or Hotmail. But abandoned @mac.com or unadopted @me.com addresses could become residences for spammers, unless Apple is very prepared.

The transition to MobileMe requires more than just Apple's opening the new Web site and service. Existing .Mac subscribers will need to download a MobileMe preferences update (Mac users, anyway) and iTunes 7.7. As I blogged this post, the MobileMe preferences update was not available via Software Update in Mac OS X 10.5.

[Editor's Note: Number corrected.]

Related Posts:

• While You're Waiting for the iPhone 2.0 Update, Apple Watch, July 10, 2008
• iTunes App Store Open for Business, Apple Watch, July 10, 2008
• iTunes Turns 7.7, Apple Watch, July 10, 2008
• iPhone in Sync, Apple Watch, June 27, 2008
• Microsoft-Apple: Friendly Exchange, Microsoft Watch, June 10, 2008
• Will MobileMe Mesh?, Microsoft Watch, June 10, 2008
• It's Time for a .Mac Makeover, Apple Watch, May 30, 2008
• Content, Context and Compromise, Apple Watch, April 28, 2008
• Live Mesh: Windows Becomes the Web, Microsoft Watch, April 23, 2008
• Do IT Simply with Sync, Microsoft Watch, March 11, 2008

Posted by Joe Wilcox on July 10, 2008 2:47 PM