Apple’s “David G.” reported via Apple’s MobielMe Status Webpage on Friday:
Steve Jobs has asked me to write a posting every other day or so to let everyone know what’s happening with MobileMe, and I’m working directly with the MobileMe group to ensure that we keep you really up to date. In the 14 days since we launched, it’s been a rocky road and we know the pain some people have been suffering. Be assured people here are working 24-7 to improve matters, and we’re going to favor getting you new info hot off the presses even if we have to post corrections or further updates later.
One issue we encountered was a mail outage affecting 1% of our members. Last Friday a serious problem with one of our mail servers blocked those members’ access to their MobileMe mail accounts. As of today a team was able to restore limited web access to those accounts so the affected members can use their browsers to read mail that has arrived since last Friday (though not before) as well as send and receive new mail. The team has already begun rolling out restoration of full access for all the accounts and expect to finish by the end of next week. We particularly regret to report the loss in the affected accounts of approximately 10% of the messages received between July 16 and July 18.
The day we launched MobileMe, we had a lot more traffic to our servers than we anticipated, with the result that access to the web versions of the MobileMe applications — Mail, Contacts, Calendar, Gallery, iDisk — was temporarily unavailable. We’ve since added server capacity and tuned our software to scale better — i.e. behave more gracefully when traffic spikes. The team has also fixed over 70 bugs including one that was preventing MobileMe IMAP mail folders from syncing correctly between the web app and Mac OS X Mail or Outlook, plus others correcting display issues in Calendar and in general enhancing the performance of our web apps.
On Sunday, 8:15pm PDT, David G. reported:
As you know, restoring full email access to the remaining 1% of MobileMe users is our first priority. We turned on web access to their current email yesterday and the feedback has been cautiously positive. Since then, we’ve restored full email history (minus the approximately 10% of mail received between July 18 and July 22 which may have been lost) and the ability to access email from a Mac, PC and iPhone, to over 40% of these users, and expect the remainder to be restored in the next few days.
A note of clarification to these 1% of MobileMe users — all of the email you received between July 18 and July 22 was placed on our new server on July 23 and was stamped with that date as a result. If you need the actual date for particular messages you can take advantage of the ability to view long headers in MobileMe Mail (via Preferences) to peer into the log and find the actual mailing time and date.
We’ll report again on our progress in another post early this week.
Follow the status of MobileMe here: www.apple.com/mobileme/status/
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Readers “Sir Gill Bates” and “JadisOne” for the heads up.]
1% of users. Sure. Sounds like MobileMess has a common bug.
I hope it doesn’t need major surgery.
Fix iCal desktop calendars, Apple. I’ve added events on me.com and in over a week of syncing and resetting sync and manually syncing, etc. I still don’t see these events on my Macs’ desktop iCals. Mysteriously, after syncing my iPod touch, the me.com-created events show up there, but not on the desktop. WTF?
Even in adversity Apple still out-performs the competition.
Still a mess. My contacts (address book) never come up. I just get the wheel of death…..sure I have over 700 contacts….but that’s not that much and it use to come up quickly in .Mac.com.
The only reason my email now shows up….I switched from IMAP to POP and downloaded the 7000 messages….so now there’s nothing online. And it still takes a few seconds to come up.
It seems i am lucky because i never had problems with .mac or mobileme. Everything works fine.
Looks like MM team leader was served up an ultimatum – “Keep the customers informed or lose your job and while your at it, FIX MOBILEME. The press is killing our reputation (and possible future sales).”
Losing email messages is not acceptable. But I hope that’s 10% of the email for the 1% that had this problem. Since my service was (mostly) uninterrupted, I hope 10% of my email didn’t get lost.
I have problems with address changes in me.com entries disappearing. When my Mac syncs it loses the changes I made on me.com.
My push calendars and contacts have stopped “pushing.”
I too doubt that “1%” number, unless, of course, everyone I know are 1 percenter’s.
Then again….
(and yes, LOSING mail is UNACCEPTABLE)
Getting their act together.
It was a rough start, but I have a good feeling about MobileMe. I just hope they open it up to more web-based applications, and bring back bookmarks and iCards.
Only minor issues here, nothing lost.
Yup, same deal as coolfactor for me too, couple of days offline, all back up and running now, working well too I might add.
I really feel for the members having these problems, but hang in there – when it works, it’s awesome.
I’ve had my mac address since it was iTools (and free!)
My still not syncing. It’s not pushing it back to my MacBook Pro. It’s a pain.
On a different note, I really thought that AT&T;changed its stripes concerning customer service. When I bought the first iPhone on the day it came out, I had no problems. Reps were very courteous, friendly, and eager to help. I went to my local AT&T;store yesterday in VA Beach. Boy, was there a big difference in service. There was no major line. Just three of us. I was third in line. When I finally was at the head of the line, I waited an additional 30 minutes. Another rep helped out another individual even though I indicated to him that I was in line first. He never came back to me even though he said he was coming back. So, I left the store. I don’t think I will be going to that one anymore.
On the other hand, this is the Apple from the old days – Great ideas, great products, but on initial roll out, inadequate supply versus demand. In those days I could forgive it because Apple was working on a very tight budget (I guess), and probably couldn’t afford even the possibility of having surplus product laying around. Today however, I’d like to think that Apple could be much better prepared to provide this type of service. … it really should have been nothing less than flawless on roll out.
I’m a Macintosh fanboy from way back (not always an Apple or SJ fan boy – but usually), and everybody I know and work with knows it – and when Apple pulls stuff like this it hurts all of us. My admonition to Apple this morning is STFD (Slow The F@!k Down). Things are going better for Apple and the entire desktop using community now than they have been since the general availability of personal computers began, and MS became the megalopoly that it is today.
I live in Cupertino ( next to apple campus) and pass by apple campus almost everyday. On Sunday seen lot of cars in campus.. may be they are working extra time to fix mobileme problems.
“Even in adversity Apple still out-performs the competition.”
Name any other email service which has performed this badly.
When I reply to an email, I still get a draft that is saved in the “drafts” folder. This is fine but when I hit send or close the email and click “don’t save” the draft stays in the folder and I have to delete it manually. This happens in webmail and in mail.app on my mac.
Anyone else have this issue?
News alert, News alert. News alert.
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365 days after Vista launched, Microsoft announces there were a few problems and some of the users complained. Well they now announce that Vista is really great…….. and patches have been recently made………. so shut up and enjoy Vista.
14 days after MobileMe launches, Apple announces there were a few problems and some users complained. Apple is providing fixes and free service to affected users. (see below).
Hmmm. 365 days and users are forced to buy Vista with their computer vs 14 days and you can use the program or not, what ever you like. …. Interesting difference.
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” I’m working directly with the MobileMe group to ensure that we keep you really up to date. In the 14 days since we launched, it’s been a rocky road and we know the pain some people have been suffering. Be assured people here are working 24-7 to improve matters, and we’re going to favor getting you new info hot off the presses even if we have to post corrections or further updates later.”
1% of MobileMe customers is quite a few users. But, that was not the number who experienced difficulties, that was the number who “encountered an e-mail outage” “last friday”. So, they weren’t counting me, who effectively lost the ability to access my e-mail for a couple of days earlier – due mainly to my own ineptitude in dealing with the changes they instituted. It also may not include those who have, or are, experienced syncing problems. I can relate to that as I just spent two days getting my three computers synced together – making changes here and there, deleting entries, editing entries … and that’s just a couple of calendars and my Address Book! I STILL have two entries for my mother’s birthday on my calendar – same day, one in her name and the other as “Mom”.
In it’s current state it’s unusable for me. When I sync the iphone to mobile me, everything erases on the iphone. The contacts sync on the computer, and on mobile me fine, but do not “push” down to the phone. It’s been properly set up by an apple genius…. two geniuses in fact. Just doesn’t work. All of this started with the last mobile me update. It was patchy before, but now it just doesn’t work No contacts, no updates, no email (push of fetch). Nada.
Eldernorm: 365 days and users are forced to buy Vista with their computer vs 14 days and you can use the program or not, what ever you like. …. Interesting difference.
In fact, if you purchased a .Mac, you’re now forced to use (or, more accurately, NOT use) MobileMe. Even Microsoft never FORCED an existing XP customer to install Vista.
Apple: Oops.. our product is crap. Here’s a coupon for more of it!
At least they’re trying to fix it, and not kill it, like PlaysForCrap.
It’s getting more and more personal!
Friday, July 25, 2008 post gave a nice comfy and in-control feeling, since it was written in 1st person singular. Like he/she/it was talking directly to me. The only logical thing missing was a signature.
Thankfully Apple PR noticed the discrepancy, and now we have a David G. Having a former interim president of the Republic of Texas to report on MobileMe status means Apple is serious about this cloud computing thing. Mr David G. Burnet has been in the cloud since 1870.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_G._Burnet
I take full responsibility and I will personally see that all your problems are fixed in no time! Anonymous.
“Even Microsoft never FORCED an existing XP customer to install Vista.”
And nobody but freaking idiots buy an install a new OS on the first day of availability.
And nobody should expect a high level of reliability out of an Apple product.
MobileMess is just Apple operating at it’s usual level of quality, made more obvious by the higher expectations of a new group of Apple customers.