iCloud was announced on Monday by Apple as the post-PC solution and replacement of existing MobileMe service. The service allows users to sync specific file types to their Apple devices or (albeit less smoothly) to their PC.
Documents are synced from iWork, photos are synced to iPhoto and music is synced to iTunes. This is a simple solution for the average person (with a Mac), but what of the power users?
iCloud does not work the same as cloud storage as we know it. It misses is the ability to access the cloud drive and input different file types - not just those from Apple's accepted channels. This is super-sync, it is not a 'hard-drive in the sky' - as Steve puts it - but isn't that closer to what we need from a service with cloud in the name?
It turns out that a hard-drive in the sky is pretty useful. If we want to dump video files, software files or anything other than the files accepted by iCloud you would have to look elsewhere for a real cloud storage solution.
iTunes is the perfect example of why this is not the cloud. A key feature of the cloud as we know it is that files stay up there, being viewed remotely. Cloud music services such as Spotify, Google Music and Amazon Cloud Player all *stream* music, or at least is only cached on your device when offline. Music on iTunes is either on your device or simply not downloaded yet. It is essentially a list of purchases in the cloud - no wonder the upload time is minimal.
The future of cloud computing needs elements of iCloud. The sync seems great and it is set to be a great tool for backup. But that is really what it is. The cloud needs to be web centric, not tied to specific devices. People need access anywhere, from any device.
So what do you think of iCloud? Continue the discussion in the comments.
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4 comments:
iCloud is certainly not everything it's cracked up to be, but it is a massive leap forward from an Apple users point of view. iCloud gives the average user a sense of freedom - "hey look I don't need iTunes anymore, and all my stuff is safe in iCloud" when in reality you're just locking yourself into Apple even more...notice how there is no way to migrate away from iCloud.
But on the other hand you'll finally be able to sync that song you forgot about to your iDevice wherever you are...Sure you won't be able to stream it, but it's a step in the right direction. To be honest with WiFi hot spots always on the up, downloading a song can sometimes be almost as quick as streaming. Cloud backup of iDevices is a nice addition, as is photo syncing. As for all the other services it's all about vendor lock in. Will I be putting my mail\contacts\calendars in iCloud, no I'll be keeping them in Google where I know I can get to them from anywhere. Will I be using iCloud for storage, no I'll be using dropbox. Will I be keeping photos in iCloud, no they will be there as a backup of my device until I put them somewhere better! iCloud ticks a lot of boxes but comes across as a jack of all trades, master of none whilst bricking you up in the Apple walled garden. For a lot of users that's fine, for power users it's not, but power users know there are better options and already use them.
iCloud does actually include 5GB of general purpose open access 'drive' storage, which is in addition to the storage used by iCloud sync applications. And iCloud sync is a public api, that third party developers are going to be able to use, so it's not just what Apple thinks you can put there.
So... Basically, your entire article is wrong.
Thanks for the comments guys.
@Jay – we’d not seen the announcements about the public API or ‘drive’ storage, they sound interesting. Do you have links for these?
Thanks! BE.
@Be
http://www.apple.com/icloud/features/documents.html
"Coming soon to third-party apps.
iCloud is already seamlessly integrated with Apple iWork apps. And we’ve given developers the tools to make their apps work with iCloud, too. So you’ll be able to paint a masterpiece, create reminders, edit stock lists, and more — and have it all stay with you on all your devices, including your Mac or PC."
The iCloud disk storage was announced during the keynote.
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