Apple Introduces iCloud, Free Cloud Services Beyond Anything Offered to Date

[btarunr]

Apple introduced iCloud, a breakthrough set of free new cloud services that work seamlessly with applications on your iPhone, iPad, iPod touch, Mac or PC to automatically and wirelessly store your content in iCloud and automatically and wirelessly push it to all your devices. When anything changes on one of your devices, all of your devices are wirelessly updated almost instantly.

“Today it is a real hassle and very frustrating to keep all your information and content up-to-date across all your devices,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “iCloud keeps your important information and content up to date across all your devices. All of this happens automatically and wirelessly, and because it’s integrated into our apps you don’t even need to think about it—it all just works.”



The free iCloud services include:

• The former MobileMe services—Contacts, Calendar and Mail—all completely re-architected and rewritten to work seamlessly with iCloud. Users can share calendars with friends and family, and the ad-free push Mail account is hosted at me.com. Your inbox and mailboxes are kept up-to-date across all your iOS devices and computers.
• The App Store and iBookstore now download purchased iOS apps and books to all your devices, not just the device they were purchased on. In addition, the App Store and iBookstore now let you see your purchase history, and simply tapping the iCloud icon will download any apps and books to any iOS device (up to 10 devices) at no additional cost.
• iCloud Backup automatically and securely backs up your iOS devices to iCloud daily over Wi-Fi when you charge your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch. Backed up content includes purchased music, apps and books, Camera Roll (photos and videos), device settings and app data. If you replace your iOS device, just enter your Apple ID and password during setup and iCloud restores your new device.
• iCloud Storage seamlessly stores all documents created using iCloud Storage APIs, and automatically pushes them to all your devices. When you change a document on any device, iCloud automatically pushes the changes to all your devices. Apple’s Pages, Numbers and Keynote apps already take advantage of iCloud Storage. Users get up to 5GB of free storage for their mail, documents and backup—which is more amazing since the storage for music, apps and books purchased from Apple, and the storage required by Photo Stream doesn’t count towards this 5GB total. Users will be able to buy even more storage, with details announced when iCloud ships this fall.
• iCloud’s innovative Photo Stream service automatically uploads the photos you take or import on any of your devices and wirelessly pushes them to all your devices and computers. So you can use your iPhone to take a dozen photos of your friends during the afternoon baseball game, and they will be ready to share with the entire group on your iPad (or even Apple TV) when you return home. Photo Stream is built into the photo apps on all iOS devices, iPhoto on Macs, and saved to the Pictures folder on a PC. To save space, the last 1,000 photos are stored on each device so they can be viewed or moved to an album to save forever. Macs and PCs will store all photos from the Photo Stream, since they have more storage. iCloud will store each photo in the cloud for 30 days, which is plenty of time to connect your devices to iCloud and automatically download the latest photos from Photo Stream via Wi-Fi.
• iTunes in the Cloud lets you download your previously purchased iTunes music to all your iOS devices at no additional cost, and new music purchases can be downloaded automatically to all your devices. In addition, music not purchased from iTunes can gain the same benefits by using iTunes Match, a service that replaces your music with a 256 kbps AAC DRM-free version if we can match it to the over 18 million songs in the iTunes Store, it makes the matched music available in minutes (instead of weeks to upload your entire music library), and uploads only the small percentage of unmatched music. iTunes Match will be available this fall for a $24.99 annual fee. Apple today is releasing a free beta version of iTunes in the Cloud, without iTunes Match, for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch users running iOS 4.3. iTunes in the Cloud will support all iPhones that iOS 5 supports this fall.

Apple is ready to ramp iCloud in its three data centers, including the third recently completed in Maiden, NC. Apple has invested over $500 million in its Maiden data center to support the expected customer demand for the free iCloud services.

Pricing & Availability
The iCloud beta and Cloud Storage APIs are available immediately to iOS and Mac Developer Program members at developer.apple.com. iCloud will be available this fall concurrent with iOS 5. Users can sign up for iCloud for free on an iPhone, iPad or iPod touch running iOS 5 or a Mac running Mac OS X Lion with a valid Apple ID. iCloud includes 5GB of free cloud storage for Mail, Document Storage and Backup. Purchased music, apps, books and Photo Stream do not count against the storage limit. iTunes Match will be available for $24.99 per year (US only).

iTunes in the Cloud is available today in the US and requires iTunes 10.3 and iOS 4.3.3. Automatic download of apps and books is available today. Using iCloud with a PC requires Windows Vista or Windows 7; Outlook 2010 or 2007 is recommended for accessing contacts and calendars.

Apple designs Macs, the best personal computers in the world, along with OS X, iLife, iWork and professional software. Apple leads the digital music revolution with its iPods and iTunes online store. Apple has reinvented the mobile phone with its revolutionary iPhone and App Store, and has recently introduced iPad 2 which is defining the future of mobile media and computing devices.

[Wile E]

Meh, All this push to cloud based stuff is not impressing me. I'll just stick with my home server that I can access from anywhere I have internet, and has a shit-ton more storage, thank you very much.

[hanzi]

iCloud includes 5GB of free cloud storage for Mail, Document Storage and Backup. Purchased music, apps, books and Photo Stream do not count against the storage limit.

Looks like another cash cow for Apple. Can't blame them though, this is good for those people who have Apple systems that don't know anything about the latest technology, just worrying about their own business and being a part of the hype. For everyone else there is online mail system, online photo stream, online document storage and backup etc.

[Mussels]

yay, a new awesome way to make you pay more for your storage, and a way to rape unsuspecting consumers 3G data connections.

[erixx]

I have various terabytes of personal data and I don't want it to sync with my devices.

[DanTheMan]

Steve Jobs says I must buy .... Steve Jobs says I must buy....

If I don't his unicorn's horn may fall off

I know of a few Apple fanboys here at work and I bet this is all I'm going to hear about for the next few days ...

[inferKNOX]

Personally, I hate the idea of cloud based computing.
I'm not interested in the idea of my personal stuff being online and possibly at risk of unauthorised access, whether by hackers or for market research or whatever rubbish reasons they come up with for their "targeted advertising" or otherwise.
Besides that, this is only truly works well for those that have unlimited & high speed internet connectivity, not for Africa or any other region without such anyway, so these ideas of clouding everything would leave the rest of us stranded.
Syncing is one thing, but making everything cloud based is a no-no IMO!

[micropage7]

personally im not sure cloud based at this time, theres many to do before we can say its reliable and could be used daily.
i know the concept is pretty interesting where no matter where you are you can access your data thru phone, notebook, pc and so and so
but for today i prefer store it locally

[Mussels]

look at the sony hacks, and tell me how cloud would have gone down in that situation.

[Completely Bonkers]

I like "cloud" for data... so long as it isn't my private data. The idea of using cloud to store ONE copy of a CD, DVD, media file etc, and allowing millions of people to (authorised) index-link-access to it is great. Save ME my cost of installing and electricity cost of running the server holding the data, plus avoid the expensive time, money, bandwidth exercise of backing up huge media files. Great. Except for bandwidth of course. MANY countries are not like the US with high speed unlimited internet bandwidth.

But my business, my private files, things unique to me? Nope.

Well done Apple imo. I think for 99% "consumers" this is great.

I also like iOS5 where I no longer have to BACK UP my whole iPod, firmware, and iTunes bloat on my laptops precious SSD. It will save me 50GB of SSD which to me avoids having to buy a SSD capacity upgrade. iTunes on SSD laptop is really bad news economically. So iOS5 that avoids this is great.

[Wrigleyvillain]

So my music collection is 120GB. Something tells me that would be an issue.

[Frick]

Cloud storage is good for when you need certain data on several places and dont want to fiddle with USB sticks. Media and such not so much though.

[Sasqui]

They already have enough control over what you do with the i-Whatever that it doesn't really change things. Basically, an i-Person owns nothing, Apple does. Does this change the landscape?... not much they are just keeping what they already own on thier servers. It scares me.

[Completely Bonkers]

You have to see the evolution like this:

1./ iTunes lets you rip CD's to your PC and load onto iPod
2./ iTunes lets you buy music for download
3./ iTunes lets you buy music for download then back up to the cloud
4./ iTunes lets you NOT buy music for download, but buy RIGHTS to play music in the cloud
5./ iTunes doesn't let you download or own anything. Music as a service, pay per play

We are evolving slowly from 1 to 5. NO, I DONT LIKE THAT BUSINESS MODEL. But, you have to say, one step at a time, each step is being delivered in a way that 90% of customers believe is useful and adds value to them.

Just not "us".

[cheesy999]

Originally Posted by Completely Bonkers

You have to see the evolution like this:

1./ iTunes lets you rip CD's to your PC and load onto iPod
2./ iTunes lets you buy music for download
3./ iTunes lets you buy music for download then back up to the cloud
4./ iTunes lets you NOT buy music for download, but buy RIGHTS to play music in the cloud
5./ iTunes doesn't let you download or own anything. Music as a service, pay per play

We are evolving slowly from 1 to 5. NO, I DONT LIKE THAT BUSINESS MODEL. But, you have to say, one step at a time, each step is being delivered in a way that 90% of customers believe is useful and adds value to them.

Just not "us".

well you don't have to use apples terribly inefficient and overpriced business model, its not as if there aren't 100 other companies there to provide the same service itunes provides at the moment, i like spotify's business strategy, small monthly subscription to the service but i can always buy the songs for ~50-60p if i want

[a_ump]

Originally Posted by Wrigleyvillain

So my music collection is 120GB. Something tells me that would be an issue.

i'd think that the icloud would have access to a crazy music collection and through it you just access which songs you own/have owned on another device? streaming in a sense i guess....hmmm idk lol that'd be a lot of bandwidth usage.

[Wrigleyvillain]

^ Yep apparently thats what it does in a nutshell though I am trying to get more details at this point.

Edit: Hmm...sounds like the technical details are cool (for people like me with tunes from all over the place) but this will cost me $25 a year?

And the big hit among the services announced would be iTunes Match. The service which will be available for $US24.95 a year, scans through the hard drives of the user devices, including legally obtained or pirated copies, and matches them with the authorized tracks in Apple's iTunes library. It then makes a quality iTunes version of the tracks automatically accessible in the iCloud.

It appears that iTunes Match will act as a music 'launderer' of sorts, which once synced with iCloud cannot be differentiated from the music originally bought from iTunes. Meaning nobody can sue you for illegal downloading or file sharing, should your details are made available to authorities.

http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/1585...usic-strea.htm

[[H]@RD5TUFF]

I am really having a hard time understanding why in the US there is a movement outside of the corporate world to put all your stuff online, I mean form the point of, convenience of anywhere access, it makes huge sense, I mean one could do the same with an FTP, then give it all to a company like apple which is notorious for invading peoples info and privacy.

Moreover, a lot of ISP's in America are pushing hard to have a pay for what you use model with hard caps. Coupled with the fact in America we still have areas where dialup is still peoples only way on the internet. America's internet infrastructure is years behind other country's (mainly because the US is so big), I just don't see why one would want to do this, it seems only like an added cost.

[timta2]

That's cool if it's not for you, or you hate big bad Apple, or whatever reason. It's a service for a fee like any of the other million services out there.

It's not for me but I can think of a ton of people in my life that would benefit, and to most of them $25 is like taking a piss.

[Mussels]

we have an iWhatever clubhouse now, where the apple owners can huddle together for warmth, protection, shelter, and wifi based cloud storage.

[Wile E]

Originally Posted by Wrigleyvillain

^ Yep apparently thats what it does in a nutshell though I am trying to get more details at this point.

Edit: Hmm...sounds like the technical details are cool (for people like me with tunes from all over the place) but this will cost me $25 a year?



http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/1585...usic-strea.htm

Want your music anywhere? http://www.subsonic.org/pages/index.jsp

And if, like me, the majority of your collection is in flac, you do not have to convert ahead of time. Subsonic will do it on the fly.

[mdm-adph]

"iOS Storage" -- just like Dropbox, only it works on 90% less types of devices.

Why bother?

[Steevo]

I wonder how long before some fucksticks get sued for uploading tagged pirate music and other content?


Amazon offers the same but with 20GB, and I have 100GB available at Microsoft. But fat chance in hell I will upload anything of mine to them. I have a good router and high speed access. Plus I can has RDC or VNC to share at friends and family houses, and how cheap storage is I hs plenty of storage on my phone and can have more.

[Wrigleyvillain]

Hrm no streaming. Subsonic has this?

"At first blush, the thought of having your entire music collection available through iCloud sounded like an amazingly awesome deal. And for those of us who have amassed large record collections outside of the iTunes marketplace, it felt as though we were being pardoned for sins against the $.99 download -- whether we came across our mp3s through ripping, legal file sharing, or piracy," writes Audrey Watters.
"But it's important to note that Apple's new offer does not involve music streaming. True, you can have your music collection synced across devices (up to 10 of them). But you will still have to download the music you want to play onto your iPhone or iPad or iPod Touch or Mac. You won't be able to access your entire collection and randomly shuffle between all the glorious gigabytes."
Watters concludes: "Music in the cloud is still very much up for grabs."

CNN Tech

Originally Posted by mdm-adph

"iOS Storage" -- just like Dropbox, only it works on 90% less types of devices.

Why bother?

It may seem that way at a glance but not exactly...this is automatic, integrated into the OS and it's core apps and "just works" without any real user intervention or config. Ihnatko described it well:

Dropbox is intensely useful, but in the end it’s just a cloud version of a removable USB thumb drive. I copy a document from here to there, then I pick up another device, launch the Dropbox app, and copy it from there to here. Apple forcefully made the point that iCloud is meant to do no less than replace the PC in its current role as the hub of the digital experience, and relegate it to the status of Just Another Device that syncs data between itself and everything else.

Source

[mdm-adph]

Originally Posted by Wrigleyvillain

Hrm no streaming. Subsonic has this?



CNN Tech



It may seem that way at a glance but not exactly...this is automatic, integrated into the OS and it's core apps and "just works" without any real user intervention or config. Ihnatko described it well:



Source

I honestly don't know what that author is talking about "copying from here to there" with Dropbox -- the way I've used it, everything is just synced to everything else. There is no manual copying needed.

Furthermore, iCloud won't support Android or any other platform that doesn't run iTunes, and never will. Which makes it absolutely useless to a lot of people I know.