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It's Not You, It's MobileMe
With the humble, flawed beginnings of eWorld firmly in the past, Apple confidently took its on-
line services to the next level in 2008, launching MobileMe (see Figure I-3) as a replacement to .Mac
alongside the new iPhone 3G. Not only were several .Mac features dropped (including iCards, .Mac
slides, and .Mac Groups) but the MobileMe service simply didn't perform as advertised, leading to
terrible reviews and moaning users. Syncing was a mess, the online platforms buggy, and some users
couldn't even access e-mail. The curse of eWorld had returned.
With so many issues plaguing users of MobileMe, Apple offered refunds and even an extension
on the original extension of the free MobileMe trial, providing some users with more than three free
months of MobileMe use.
Figure I-3
The colorful form of Apple's unmitigated online disaster, MobileMe
And Then There Was iCloud
After the surprising failure that was MobileMe, Apple needed new direction and focus for its on-
line service. So it introduced iCloud in June 2011 with the most important new feature versus the be-
leaguered MobileMe: It was available for free. New users and existing subscribers of the soon-to-be-
discontinued MobileMe were welcomed to the new service, which was more geared to syncing and
backup for Macs and iOS devices as well as offering the @me.com e-mail address. Which leaves us at
a convenient point to begin this topic. You might have an iCloud account already, or you may have
been scared away by MobileMe and are now tentatively peering at iCloud and its offerings before
making the jump. Trust me, things are better. Let's get you up and running with iCloud.
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