Apple's MobileMe on the road to recovery

MobileMe is getting better, but it's still causing problems for some users of the service.

(Credit: Susan Dove/CNET News)

Apple has started to provide regular updates on the status of its MobileMe service, which is still causing problems for some users.

Some poor soul at Apple known only as David G. was drafted by CEO Steve Jobs to write every-other-day posts on the status of MobileMe, the successor to Apple's .Mac service that has caused no small level of frustration in the two weeks since it launched. In the initial post on Friday, Apple acknowledged that those affected by the outage lost 10 percent of their e-mail between July 16 and July 18, the height of the outage.

Apple is still saying that only 1 percent of MobileMe users were affected by the e-mail problems, which were apparently caused by a "serious problem with one of our mail servers," David wrote. However, broader problems with accessing calendars and contacts information were the result of a misjudgment in demand, he said, and Apple has since added new servers and tweaked older ones to handle the load.

On Sunday, David updated the page with the news that Apple had turned on e-mail access for 40 percent of those affected by the e-mail outage, who can also now see their e-mail history during the affected period. More updates will come later this week, he promised.

[JoeF2]

FailMe... This parody site says it best: http://failmeismorelikeit.com/

[Vegaman_Dan]

14 days after the service launches they have restored up to almost 40% of those people affected. Not exactly very reassuring news, nor the sort of thing that makes you want to trust your data to such a system. This is very, very disappointing.

[tekwiz4u]

It's about time they updated us on these things.

[ralfthedog]

No one should store critical data on any server they do not own. Any data stored on off site servers should be backed up locally. I use my iDisk for moving files to and from computers not on my network.

I don't use my Apple email address. If you don't own and maintain the server, don't trust it. I might use it when I need to give out an email address that will get spammed.

[Travis Ernst]

Vegaman, if you read the numbers, they are down to 0.6% (or LESS) that are having some sort of problem, it could even be on the user end. Less than 1% is pretty darn good. Most ISP's have problems somewhere on the consumer access point on a regular basis and can't claim 99%. GIVE APPLE CREDIT for ironing it out fast and running a smooth ship.

Your contacts, calendar and meetings are stored on your computer and synced through Mobile. So you don't lose this data. You can sync your data with your handheld, or log on from remote and look at your desktop to retrieve it.

If you are yelling from the sidelines to make noise, be quiet. I have it, use it, and I am not complaining at all. Sure I lost use of the mail briefly, But it was in chaos on Day 0, what would you expect with 1m phones/accounts being activated and apps being DL'd. They had it up and running again a lot faster then I expected it to be. If you have an ISP you have a email through them as well, so Mobile is not your only email to use; don't gripe.

[Vegaman_Dan]

You may be right that Apple is "running a smooth ship" in regards to the MobileMe service, but let's not take their word for it- let's see what their actual customers have to say about it. Going to the Apple forums, here's a sampling of some of the concerns customers have about this service:

"My contact information just VANISHED in my iphone! "

"Contact Data on MobileMe ("cloud" version) Not Right "

"Disappointed (Personal Domains) "

"There is no available customer service for mobile me. "

"Iphone not getting the info that I put on my ibook. What gives? "

"MobileMe Mail account sync insists on adding @me.com "

"Calendars could not be synced due to inconsistent data "

"No Contact Detail "

"idisk Last sync failed "

"Disappearing mail? "

"Down since the 18th "

"Personal domain does not work "

"Mobile Me Contacts Disappearing for Ages on iPhone - NOT ACCEPTABLE! "

"Up, Down, Up Down "

"Mail Application Unstable after Mobile Me Update "

"Mobileme Not Reliable "

"Nothing in Mobile Me working... "

"There is a problem with your credit card." ARRRGGHHHH!!! "

"Calendar on MobielMe Hanging "

"Mobile Me CANNOT Sync to XP Outlook w/Exchange Server "

"It was back for several hours, and now it's gone "

"MoblieMe 'customer service' - any alternatives? "

"They did not fix the ALIAS !!!! "

That's a lot of concerned people, I would say. And this is just a small sampling too. There are 1,797 pages of these comments, each 15 topics full for a total of 26,955 separate topics from MobileMe users since the product release that are having some issues.

Not exactly 'running a smooth ship' as you put it, hmm? Those are the people that Apple has to convince that the service is running normally, not you or I. It's those paying customers who have the issues to be addressed.

[QuetzalcoatlUSA]

Actually you can lose data. Read the WSJ's Mossberg Report today. Unless maybe one of the leading Apple proponents is just "yelling from the sidelines," too.

[QuetzalcoatlUSA]

Actually you can lose data. Read the WSJ's Mossberg Report today. Unless maybe one of the leading Apple proponents is just "yelling from the sidelines," too.

http://online.wsj.com/article/personal_technology.html

[eyepoker]

Finaly Apple owns up to something... amazing.... but, how are we to believe what they say about the "%1 affected" when they so clearly have a history of not telling us anything at all. Who knows what the true scope of the issues are? We'll never know, thats for sure.

[troyallen]

Yes, you can. Mine works. So I don't fall in the 1%

[stupid_user]

So let me get this straight...you give out your credit card to pay $99 a year for a service you dont use because you dont trust the company and the servers? Where do you think your credit card data with your billing address is stored??????

If you were so smart about these things you wouldn't subscribe in the first place...

[troyrig]

it never ceases to amaze me how apple junkies pounce on anything that has issues in the PC world but the second their "It just works" mac products fail they get ticked off at any slight criticism, no matter how justified it is.

[ikramerica--2008]

Many of us who pay for .Mac were very, critical of Apple and feel as if Apple only cares about iPhone customers at this point, ignoring the fact they sell computers at all.

[Vegaman_Dan]

Now they can add 'sometimes' to the phrase. :)

[jimoase]

I am a 1%er yet. Web email service came back in a limited form, July 24th to current, on Saturday. Mail from my desk top remain send only.

The reliability issue has me puzzled. Apple is marketing the Me Generation products as not reliable enough for business. Who is the target market for the Me Generation products? Who has information they casually care about? I am retired so I am beyond syncing calendars, syncing files etc. Those are activities of people who are still in the everyday for pay workforce. I suspect these Me Generation tools are looked at as productivity tools. Who wants a tool they can not count on to perform? How can a unreliable tool be useful? If a tool is not useful, is it valuable?

I originally got dot Mac for the integration of iChat and ease of use for email. I recently found out Google's gMail works just fine and costs nothing. ComCast prevents me from using iChat to see my grands and the other 10 accounts use email occasionally and iChat even less. So I need to find a cost effective replacement for iChat. Then guess what my next cost saving move is?

Poor day when you can't learn something.

Jim

[rcrusoe]

I dodged the bullet. With the exception of a very slow calendar the first couple days of operation MobileMe has worked as advertised for me. Google hosts my personal domain for me, so I use my .Mac mail address only for online purchases, etc. when I don't want to give out my primary address.

But I rely on MobileMe to sync my work and personal calendars, bookmarks, and address book between my home and work computers and my iPhone. And, with the addition of busysync, my Google calendar is also kept in sync.

They fixed enough problems for me to renew my subscription when it expires next month.

[arkangel_3]

After weeks of trying to resolve a situation with my Family Account (which I've had since 2006), I reached the end of my rope this morning. I had posted about the topic on threads I started and on threads started by others about the same issue in hope that I would get some sort of an answer. For some reason, anything to do with this issue as been *massively* covered up by Apple. Posts and threads were DELETED from the Mobile Me Support Forums, on more than one occasion.

I posted an "Open Letter" to Apple on the .Mac to Mobile Me Transition forum and the thread (which at last count had 87 views and 4 replies) was DELETED, ostensibly for their "Unsolicited Idea Submission Policy". All I was doing was suggest Apple come clean with the issues, and try and address them with the subscribers in a timely fashion. Gee, I guess they don't like my idea.

So, I wrote Steve Jobs; whether or not he reads it or it has any effect, I don't know. At least I got a chance to vent to the top dog...and yes, it was a nice constructive letter. Hopefully his Inbox doesn't have a filter for "Unsolicited Ideas".

[minimalist]

Now there is a new drama: Mobile Me erases all the contacts on your iPhone.

6 hours and counting since this happened to me and there are several threads with very angry people on the Apple support site.

And if Apple thinks they have solved the problem of pokey web apps by adding more servers they need think again.... try tripling that number. Because the web version of MM calendar is painfully slow where as Google Calendar is lightning fast. For a pay service to be slower and less feature rich than a free one is really embarassing.

[jef5623]

So Apple is entering into the 7th age of computing with MobileMe?

[AppleSuxLeo]

MobileMe...the CORE of Apple jokes for years to come !

[cyclelogicpress.com]

Working great for me. First time I've renewed since iTools.

[andres286]

MobileMe is the stupidest thing Apple has ever created. I am sorry this might pissed a lot of ppl off even though i am an apple fan... This MobileMe service is a failure.

Steve Jobs wants to take your money no matter what it takes..

PS: Apple let me give you a FREE advice MAKE a new MacBook for less than $800 and keep make new DEVICES!!!!!!!

thats it!

:)

[bowlie1]

Not too happy - but not too disappointed either. I did have an iPod that would sync with Outlook in the office (plugged in and via iTunes) and with Address Book and my Music Library at home (plugged in and via iTunes). Mobile Me stopped all that. Can't synchronise one iPod to two PCs.

So I now synchronise my Outlook Calendar to my (old) Palm T, my Palm T to Calendar which pushes (eventually) to my iPod. I thought it was supposed to 'just work'.