DropBox

• Apple’s mobileme service suffered from numerous setbacks ever since its much-hyped launch alongside the iPhone 3G.   To give you an idea of how much Apple screwed up, I signed up for the 60 day mobileme trial close to the launch of the iPhone 3G and Apple’s consolation prize “free trial extensions” pushed my trial period until the beginning of December.
• If you purchased your iPhone 3G around launch time as I did you can expect an email from Apple in the next few days alerting you to the end of the trial period and an upcoming charge to your credit card on file!
• A few reasons why I can live without mobileme:
  • I dont use the @me.com email. As much as I woud like push email, it’s not worth filtering my other addresses. I’ll wait for that push update (any day now…)
  • iDisk was unreliable and annoying.
  • I’ll sync my contacts and calendars with iTunes instead of over-the-air
• A few options that I’m using to replace mobileme functionality
  • Foxmarks – Store and sync bookmarks and passwords across multiple Firefox browsers (home, office, etc.)
  • Dropbox – 2GB of free storage, works great on pcs and macs, slick web interface (I use it on 3 computers and my iPhone. love it.)
• Take care of your base. My interest in paying for mobileme, a completely underwhelming experience at this point, is none.  However, I will say that I own over $10k of Apple hardware between my mac pro, cinema display, iphone and powerbook and it’d be nice to have a working, in-house software solution to keep them connected.  It’s dangerous letting users out of the Apple ecosystem…the kool-aid wears off.
• Apple’s failure to execute on a strong cloud connectivity option further solidifies the concerns that they lack the capability to deploy a large-scale software solution.
• Lastly, as a stockholder I’m sure these upcoming mobileme charges to the negligent throngs will do nice things for the balance sheet but could spell trouble in the PR department.

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