Though not a complete surprise, Apple’s email to MobileMe subscribers Thursday announcing that HomePage -- the old .Mac Web page creation utility -- would be shut down for good as of July 7 nevertheless has caused some consternation.

Anyone who made extensive use of HomePage faces a fair amount of work to transfer their files to MobileMe pages. For most people, that will mean photos and videos, although you could use HomePage to create any kind of personal Web site.

Subscribers can continue to edit pages made with HomePage until the July 7 cutoff. After that existing Web pages will exist in perpetuity, but users won’t be able to change or even delete them.

Thankfully, files won’t disappear because they’re stored on the user’s iDisk. Users who stored their media on their iDisk only (and did not have copies on their Mac’s hard drive) will need to download each file and reconstruct new pages on MobileMe from scratch.

Apple has posted instructions on its Web site on how to do this, but how about automating the conversion process somehow? Perhaps that posed to many technical hurdles, but Apple could have made an effort.

After all, people shell out $99 a year for MobileMe. Many have subscribed since it converted from the free iTools to a paid service in 2002. Is it too much to ask for a bit more consideration of your most loyal customers?

Then again, this is business as usual for Apple. Whenever it leaves a technology behind for something new and better, veteran users clinging to older technology feel the pain.

For instance, another feature that goes away July 7 -- .Mac Groups – has no equivalent in MobileMe whatsoever. If you relied on .Mac groups for anything, tough luck.

This doesn’t mean MobileMe stinks. Overall, it’s a significant improvement over .Mac.

But Apple’s transitions often seem to inconvenience the most steadfast Mac users – those who have stuck by Apple for many years but don’t necessarily have the means to keep up with the company’s latest and greatest.

Anyway, enough grousing. What does the end of HomePage mean to you?

In the case of converting HomePage pages to MobileMe pages, folks who own iLife ‘08 or iLife ’09 should have the least trouble. The newest versions of iPhoto and iMovie automatically integrate with MobileMe.

People using iLife ’06 – and I’m sure there are still quite a few, as iLife ’06 was preinstalled on Macs through mid-2007 – will need to use iWeb to re-create their pages. Fortunately, both iMovie ’06 and iPhoto ’06 include an option to send files to iWeb, which can publish to MobileMe.

Anyone using iLife ’05 or earlier, however, will need to upgrade if they wish to continue creating and editing Web pages on their MobileMe space. That would include anyone who’s still using a Mac purchased in 2005 or earlier and never bothered to upgrade iLife.

Although I’m not a fan of “forced upgrades,” clearly anyone still using iLife ’05 is missing out on some terrific improvements in the suite. You do what you gotta do, I guess.

Here are the links to the relevant Apple KnowledgeBase pages, for convenience:

MobileMe/.Mac HomePage FAQ

Migrating photos from HomePage to MobileMe

Migrating movies from HomePage to MobileMe

MobileMe .Mac Groups FAQ

Posted by David Zeiler at 7:06 PM in MobileMe | Permalink | Comments (3)
                       

Yesterday I received a suspicious e-mail informing me that I had a “billing problem” with my iTunes Store account, a sign that Internet-based scammers again are targeting Apple customers.

The goal, of course, is to trick the recipient into clicking on a fake Web address contained in the e-mail. Those that take the bait land at a fraudulent Web site where they unwittingly surrender their credit card or account password information to the criminals.

A similar wave of e-mails aimed at iTunes Store customers went out last May. I received a phishing e-mail regarding my (then) .Mac account last June. And less than two weeks ago Gizmodo reported on a phishing e-mail directed at people due to renew their MobileMe accounts.

Most people recognize these scam messages for what they are and delete them immediately. But a few click impulsively, driven by false concern over their account. Don’t be one of those people.

The e-mail I got yesterday was not as sophisticated as others I’ve seen. Though I admit seeing the words “iTunes Store” and “billing problem” in my e-mail caught my attention.

But the message within clearly was a phishing scam, riddled with red flags: the “undisclosed recipients” in the address line, the blank space next to “Dear,” the numerous spelling errors, the awkward English.

It’s been said many times before, but it always bears repeating: Never click on links in e-mails that propose to take you to a page where you must “verify” any account or password information. Not for Apple, not for a financial institution, not for eBay. Never do it.

If you’re concerned about a personal account, go directly to that company’s Web site and log in as you would normally. You can then safely check your account.

Posted by David Zeiler at 4:17 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)
                       

After the botched MobileMe/iPhone 3G launch, as well as more recent problems users have reported with iPhone 3G reception, you’d assume customers would punish Apple.

Add to that an assortment of other issues over the past year or so, from the bricking of unlocked iPhones last fall to a plethora of Mac OS X Leopard bugs to last week’s iPhone “kill switch” dustup, and you have a lot of reasons consumers might want to avoid Apple products.

But whatever the disappointments, you won’t see it reflected in the company’s third quarter sales numbers.

Apple is expected to report another record quarter in September, according to a note to clients by Royal Bank of Canada analyst Mike Abramsky. AppleInsider reported this morning that Abramsky said Apple should see year-over year growth of 44 percent, with Mac sales topping 3 million for the first time.

That would beat the previous record – 2.496 million Macs sold, just set in the July quarter – by an amazing 20 percent. Abramsky also predicts iPhone 3G sales for the quarter to reach 5.1 million, which would nearly double the previous record for iPhone sales (2.315 million in the December 2007 quarter).

Earlier this week Apple made news by scoring 10 points higher than its closest competitor (Dell) on the University of Michigan’s American Customer Satisfaction Index. Apple received its highest score ever, 85 on the ASCI’s 100-point scale. Last year it scored a 79.

"Apple is not without its quality problems," ACSI project head Claes Fornell told Computerworld. "People know there have been some service and product quality problems, but Apple has an almost Teflon-like quality. Its problems don't really seem to matter to consumers."

The ASCI survey was taken before the MobileMe launch and recent iPhone 3G problems, but it seems someone is always complaining about an Apple product or service, if not taking them to court.

How can Apple commit so many wrongs and yet continue to enjoy record customer satisfaction numbers and booming sales growth?

Apple’s hold on customers can’t be completely explained by the “fanboy effect”; that is, people so devoted to the company they forgive it for any transgression. Apple has added many new customers in the past few years that do not fall into that category, from casual iPod owners to disgruntled PC users switching from Windows.

Such customers have bought Apple products with high expectations they would “just work.” I can’t imagine they’d tolerate consistently poor quality and bad service when those factors most likely drove them into the Apple camp.

Here’s what I think Apple’s “Teflon” is made of:

Cool factor: Apple’s marketing machine has successfully sold the idea of Apple as the coolest consumer technology company, a notion reinforced by its acclaimed product designs. People who buy Apple products feel that the company’s hip image will reflect on them. It doesn’t fix the problems, but it makes it harder to turn away from Apple.

Worse alternatives: Even if you have had a bad experience with Apple, many know first-hand that living with a Dell or Hewlett-Packard PC running Windows could be worse. Apple’s seamless control of the entire user experience has no substitute in the consumer technology world.

Apple trying harder: Though historically poor at fixing problems, Apple has gotten better recently. Not only did it work hard to address MobileMe’s problems, it just this week gave MobileMe account holders 60 more free days in addition to the 30 days it awarded a month ago. The company apologized. Customers will forgive a company that makes an effort to make things right.

Apple also has made an effort to get software fixes out to customers more rapidly, although it could do a better job of explaining to affected customers what the heck is going on (e.g., this week’s iPhone 3G reception fix).

Not as bad as it looks: Apple benefits from the media’s obsession with it when it rolls out new products – no tech company gets comparable attention – but that backfires when Apple has trouble. Many of Apple’s problems that draw extensive coverage would be largely ignored if they befell another company.

Squeaky wheels: With the exception of some large-scale blunders, like the MobileMe/iPhone 3G launch, most of Apple’s problems affect a relatively small number of customers, many of whom are very vocal. Most Apple customers have minor, easily rectified problems, and have no serious beef with the company.

For Apple to lose massive numbers of customers, it’s going to have to commit sins far worse than any it has thus far and be utterly non-repentant.

Posted by David Zeiler at 4:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (9)
                       

In a rare admission of culpability, Apple CEO Steve Jobs sent out a memo to employees last night admitting that launching MobileMe at the same time as the iPhone 3G was a bad idea.

The memo, obtained by Web site Ars Technica, was sent to Apple employees Monday evening.

“It was a mistake to launch MobileMe at the same time as iPhone 3G, iPhone 2.0 software and the App Store. We all had more than enough to do, and MobileMe could have been delayed without consequence," Jobs wrote.

Since I came down pretty hard on Apple and Mr. Jobs in the aftermath of the chaotic MobileMe launch, during which customers had trouble accessing the service (particularly their e-mail) and activating their new 3G iPhones, I’d like to be among the first to applaud this admission Apple could have executed better.

Jobs goes on: “The MobileMe launch clearly demonstrates that we have more to learn about Internet services. And learn we will. The vision of MobileMe is both exciting and ambitious, and we will press on to make it a service we are all proud of by the end of this year."

Good for you, Steve. In the past Apple has struggled to admit mistakes, which inevitably has delayed correcting them. Perhaps Jobs has had an epiphany. (We can hope.)

I suspect the unusually negative publicity that accompanied the iPhone 3G/MobileMe launch and the ensuing MobileMe service glitches caught Jobs’ attention.

And not just Apple bloggers like yours truly, but major tech journalists such as David Pogue of The New York Times and Walt Mossberg of the Wall Street Journal. Those two nearly always swoon over everything Apple does, but both had harsh words for MobileMe. That must have bruised Jobs’ ego.

But hey, whatever works, right? Apple is committed to making MobileMe work as intended, and that’s all that matters now.

Posted by David Zeiler at 12:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)
                       

As if Apple didn’t have enough trouble on its hands with the ongoing MobileMe e-mail nightmare, the company faces an even thornier problem with its revamped, renamed online service.

Though better than .Mac, it’s not massively better.

I’ve been using MobileMe/.Mac since it was a free service known as iTools (according to my account status, that would be Jan. 17, 2000). I have continued to pay the $99 annual membership fee because I liked the mac.com e-mail address, the online iDisk storage and its integration with Mac OS X and Apple apps such as iCal, iPhoto, iWeb and Address Book.

I love how easy it is to push a button in iPhoto and have the images appear in my gallery minutes later. And how easy it is to create a Web site or blog with iWeb and with a push of a button post it to the Internet – no HTML or FTP required.

And iDisk is great for sending large files back and forth to work (I don’t need to remember to put a flash drive in my pocket) or to friends and family.

Given what I do with the service, however, many of MobileMe improvements don’t do much for me.

True, the browser-based online versions of iCal, Mail and the Address Book look great, feel as responsive as any desktop app and work almost exactly like their Mac counterparts.

But I have little need for Web-based versions of those programs. It’s not that often I want to access my contacts and calendar from a computer I don’t own. Generally I’d rather use the versions on the hard drives of my Mac Pro and MacBook.

For some reason I expected more from Apple here. Maybe I’m the exception, but the few browser-based apps MobileMe offers aren’t ones that I would use with any regularity.

So the flashiest aspect of MobileMe gives me marginally more functionality than .Mac did, since .Mac kept all my iCal, Address Book data and Safari bookmarks synchronized on all my Macs (and my iPod Classic, for that matter).

How about the “push” technology that is supposed to keep all the data on my Macs synced automatically?

Well, it turns out that MobileMe is better than .Mac was at propagating changes, but Apple’s early promises of data instantly updated on all Web-connected devices wasn’t quite accurate.

Tech-savvy users quickly figured out that while data saved directly to the MobileMe servers would push out to any Web-connected Macs, PCs or iPhones, changes made to an app on your Mac’s hard drive would not transmit to other devices until the Mac synced with MobileMe at its next scheduled interval – which could be up to 15 minutes.

That’s not much different than how .Mac synced data.

All this is not to say that MobileMe is a total disappointment. Apple improved several aspects of the service significantly.

One of the more intriguing features of MobileMe is the improved accessibility for those using Windows PCs. Not only will MobileMe sync with a PC running Internet Explorer, Outlook and Windows Contacts, but it also allows PC users to run those Web-based Mac-like apps – yet another carrot to lure the unenlightened away from the Dark Side.

Since I use the iDisk more than any other feature, I’m pleased with the doubling of storage space to 20 gigabytes. I’m very pleased with its much faster speed (under .Mac just opening the iDisk to see your files could result in enough face time with the spinning beach ball to hypnotize you).

Yet MobileMe’s Web-based version of the iDisk still lacks key features when compared to mounting the iDisk on your Desktop the old-fashioned way via the Finder menu command.

When you open your iDisk in the Finder, you can see previews of photos, text files and movies; when you use the Web-based interface, you can’t. And you can’t drag-and-drop files from the browser window to your Desktop as you can from an iDisk Finder window.

Apple could easily make MobileMe much more compelling, however.

The secret lies in its browser-based apps – MobileMe needs more of them. And Apple has several excellent candidates among the existing iLife and iWork programs.

Imagine enhancing the photos in your Gallery with a browser-based iPhoto, or managing your own music collection in the “cloud” via a browser-based iTunes, or using a browser-based iWeb to maintain your MobileMe-based blog. Imagine a browser-based version of the Pages word processor.

Think about it: most people don’t buy iLife, as it is included with every Mac. Including lite versions of a select few of these apps in MobileMe would give more Mac users a reason to buy it while ratcheting up the temptation for Windows users to switch. Meanwhile, Pages lite would serve as an online demo to promote sales of the full iWork suite.

Because despite the new features and enhancements, at $99 per year MobileMe remains more expensive than it’s worth to many users. Adding a few more apps, a la Google Apps (which is free, for Pete’s sake), would go a long way toward fulfilling the promise of a fee-based Apple-run online service.

And installing servers that don’t drop users e-mail service for a week while wiping 10 percent of their messages wouldn’t hurt, either.

Posted by David Zeiler at 1:37 PM in MobileMe, Software by Apple | Permalink | Comments (6)
                       

I personally haven’t noticed any problems with my MobileMe e-mail account, which switched over from .Mac July 11, but many others have. Apple’s MobileMe Mail discussion forum is loaded with threads started by angry customers who can’t use their me.com e-mail accounts.

This morning a reader posted a transcript of a tech support chat to my blog entry last week on Apple’s inexcusably poor preparation for the combined iPhone 3G/MobileMe launch. Although unusual for this blog I thought the conversation revealing enough that it deserved its own entry.

While others who commented on that entry thought I was too harsh in my criticism, the lingering problems with MobileMe services suggest otherwise.

Apple even sent out an e-mail last Wednesday apologizing for a launch that was “a lot rockier than we had hoped.” To smooth all the ruffled feathers Apple has given all MobileMe customers a free 30-day extension.

Apple gets points for acknowledging the issues and trying to make it right, but that will do little to placate people who just want the service to work as promised.

Here is that reader’s comment post, unedited:

NO EMAIL ACCESS THROUGH MOBILE ME SINCE FRIDAY JULY 18th AT 10:00am. Here 
is the "chat" I had this morning at 9:00 with mobileme support. NO END IN
 SIGHT!

 Here is my chat at 9:00am





Hi, my name is Craig. Welcome to Apple!




Craig: Good Morning, Elizabeth.




Elizabeth Forrester: I have had no email access for 4 days




Craig: I'm very sorry to hear that, Elizabeth. Give me just a moment to
look up your account.




Elizabeth Forrester: no mail though mail app, iphone, or me.com. when I log
in i see a blank gray page




Craig: Unfortunately, after reviewing your account, it looks like your
 account is part of a small group of customers experiencing a temporary 
outage in mail service with MobileMe. I know it's been a few days and it is
 frustrating. I'm in the same boat as you, my mail hasn't been up for four 
days either.




Craig: Apple is working hard and has made this issue their number one
priority. We expect the issue to be resolved soon.




Elizabeth Forrester: when is this going to corrected?? 4 DAYS is
 RIDICULOUS! This is my only email acct. I depend on this for work. I just
 got a gmail acct this morning and after checking the discussion pages it's
unlikely a "small amount" of customers




Elizabeth Forrester: what is the issue?




Craig: We are experiencing a temporary issue with one of our mail servers.
I'm sorry that is affecting you as well. I know how frustrating it is to be 
without mail.




Elizabeth Forrester: what's frustrating is the lack of response. Since 
Friday I've been told that it will be resolved soon. I'm very disappointed 
and beyond frustrated at the lack of communication and acceptable time
frame for it to be resolved. so we just need to it and wait- possibly for
 days?




Elizabeth Forrester: thanks craig. i'll make sure everyone of the other
 "small amount" of customers knows that there is no end in sight.




Craig: Unfortunately, I don't have any thing else to tell you besides
 asking you to wait. I don't know any more about the issue and a resolution
 time than I've told you. I'm very sorry for the inconvenience this has 
caused.




Elizabeth Forrester: Me too. One loyal apple customer is now gone.


Posted by David Zeiler at 12:23 PM in MobileMe | Permalink | Comments (26)
                       

“What were you thinking?” a legendary editor at the Baltimore Sun, Tony Barbieri, would ask his underperforming underlings. Before they could respond (they knew better), he would answer the question for them: “You weren’t thinking.”

After Apple made a perfect mess of the twin MobileMe/ iPhone 3G launch Friday, I couldn’t help but picture Tony in his office dressing down a contrite Steve Jobs. (Hey, I have a wild imagination, OK?)

As always, Apple had set the table for massive media coverage of the iPhone 3G launch. But the plan backfired when Apple’s servers, strained to the breaking point by excessive traffic, all but stopped functioning. Instead of the usual accolades and interviews with enthralled customers, the stories focused on the anger and frustration of disgruntled customers.

People buying the new iPhone in Apple Stores and AT&T stores could not get their new toy activated in the store, as required by Apple’s new purchasing rules. Many were sent home and told to activate it via iTunes from their home computer.

In most cases that didn’t work, either.

Meanwhile, Mac users trying to access the new MobileMe services experienced similar vexations. The service was up and down – mostly down – for the better part of the day.

But it was the iPhone debacle that drew the bulk of the bad publicity. A sampling of headlines: “For Apple, a taste of humble pie,” (Boston Globe); “Apple bungles its iPhone 3G launch” (Time); “iFiasco: Apple's iPhone launch flawed, faithful told to go home” (Chicago Sun-Times); “iPhone Users Plagued by Software Problems” (New York Times). There are many more. Many, many more.

Despite being an Apple advocate, I have to give the company a collective slap upside the head for this one.

The date was set months ago; Apple knew from its experience with the launch of the original iPhone last year that its stores (and AT&T’s) would be packed with early adopters. The change in policy to have customers activate their phones in the store instead of when they got home meant a lot of high, steady traffic on its servers.

And Apple knew that owners of the original iPhone, trying to upgrade to the iPhone 2.0 software to enjoy many of the goodies available on the iPhone 3G, would also be hitting those same servers.

And Apple scheduled the switchover of its .Mac service to the beefier MobileMe the night before, creating more chaos. I realize Apple did this because the MobileMe service syncs with iPhones as well as Macs, but doing it so close to the iPhone 3G launch meant Apple had to take a giant gamble – a gamble it lost big time.

The more prudent but less dramatic strategy would have been to set up the MobileMe service several days in advance of the iPhone launch. That would have taken some of the pressure off Apple’s servers from thousands of .Mac users like myself eager to test out MobileMe’s new features as soon as they were available.

And while it would have slightly spoiled the drama of the iPhone 3G’s introduction, Apple could have allowed the current iPhone owners to download the whopping 225 megabyte iPhone 2.0 software update a few days earlier.

Less orchestrated, less dramatic yes, but minus the meltdown.

This would be a humiliation for any large company, but it’s worse for Apple, which has built its public image on a foundation of superior design and customer service. Long-time Apple critics are feasting on this blunder as proof Apple isn’t the premium company it claims to be.

Apple’s best hope for minimizing the damage from this fiasco is that customers are so wowed by the iPhone 3G (and the iPhone 2.0 software, and the new MobileMe features) they’ll begrudgingly forgive it – as they have with previous transgressions.

But it never should have happened.

Posted by David Zeiler at 8:09 AM | Permalink | Comments (28)
                       

Apple CEO Steve Jobs fulfilled the world’s expectations today by introducing the iPhone 3G, which will use AT&T’s much faster next-generation network to access the Internet. The new iPhone will go on sale July 11 starting at $199 for the 8-gigabyte model and $299 for the 16 GB model (which also comes in a white model).

Jobs also introduced a new $99-a-year “cloud computing” service, MobileMe that replaces the .Mac service that has long been dinged for costing more than it was worth.

Jobs presented a checklist of improvements to the iPhone that included the 3G network support, increased affordability, better enterprise support and wider international availability.

In addition to a faster network connection, the iPhone 3G features built-in GPS, better battery life and a plethora of new apps written by a growing legion of developers.

The new models did not get a bump in memory, no doubt helping Apple afford the big price cut -- from $399 and $499 – to make the device more affordable. Jobs said 56 percent of those who wanted an iPhone but did not buy one said the reason was cost.

Apple has taken care of increasing the iPhone’s global availability by signing contracts with cellular carriers in nearly 70 countries over the past month or so.

As for enterprise support, Jobs crowed about how the iPhone 3G includes many of the features business customers said they wanted: push e-mail, VPN, support for Microsoft Exchange, and so forth. He said 35 percent of companies in the Fortune 500 have participated in the program.

Perhaps to build suspense for the expected iPhone announcement, Jobs devoted about half of the keynote to iPhone software created by the first wave of iPhone developers.

Though hard to argue with given the audience – Mac and iPhone application developers – all that tech talk and the endless string of demos began to wear thin. As Engadget’s Ryan Block put I in his live blog commentary, “Man, these demos are crazy boring. Throw us a bone here Apple!”

Still, the overall impact of those demos was to show off the amazing potential of the iPhone as a platform. In addition to the many games, the keynote included demos of a music creation app, several medical apps and “At Bat,” an app that allows users to follow Major League Baseball games in real time and even catch video highlights from mlb.com.

As the stable of wide-ranging iPhone apps continues to swell, it will make the iPhone itself more and more compelling, particularly in relation to its competition.

The other major announcement Jobs made at the keynote was the arrival of MobileMe, which Apple senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing described as “Exchange for the rest of us.” Microsoft Exchange allows businesses to centrally manage e-mail, calendar and contact information.

MobileMe enables individuals to use the Internet to manage their e-mail, contacts and calendars among multiple devices, including Macs, PCs running Windows and an iPhone.

For example, if you add a contact to your Address Book on your Mac, it shows up seconds later in the contact list on your iPhone. According to Schiller, MobileMe uses wireless networking to maintain up-to-date data on all a user’s devices.

MobileMe integrates with iCal, Address and Mail on a Mac and Microsoft Outlook on a PC. No mention was made of whether MobileMe would work with Microsoft’s Office for Mac Entourage mail program.

Even more dramatic is MobileMe’s Web 2.0 applications. When a user logs in to MobileMe, he can access not just online iDisk storage (which has doubled from 10 GB to 20 GB), but also a group of common applications – a calendar, mail, photos and more over the Internet, much like Google Apps.

The MobileMe Apps look very much like their Mac counterparts, and even support Mac-like features like drag-and-drop.

Those with existing .Mac accounts will be upgraded to MobileMe automatically, while those new to the service can get a 60-day free trial to see if they like it. The service will cost $99 a year, just like .Mac did.

Conspicuous by its absence in the Jobs keynote was any mention of the next version of Mac OS X or a new multi-touch device, both of which were the subject of much rumor chatter in recent days.

Posted by David Zeiler at 3:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (9)