“New evidence uncovered in recent iOS 4.2 builds and the iOS 4.2.1 golden master seed is suggesting… that Apple will be offering a free MobileMe tier to users,” Slivka reports. “The evidence comes in the form of a new private framework known as AppleAccounts.framework that includes a series of device-specific error messages referring to free MobileMe accounts.”
Slivka reports, “In particular, the error messages include alerts regarding having reached ‘the maximum number of free accounts’ for a given device and certain devices not being ‘qualified for free MobileMe service.'”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: On May 07, 2010, MacDailyNews was the first to report on a tip we’d received, “Apple is planning to make MobileMe free… No timeframe was given for MobileMe to go free, other than: ‘sooner than later… depends on certain facilities going operational.'”
Hope it’s true! Would be nice.
Sweet! I’ve allways wanted an account, but they’re so expensive.
This makes sense!
If you want a complete Apple ecosystem, then you need to encouage users into Apple’s cloud. And free is a very, very good price.
This after I JUST paid for my first year…
My timing is always off.
Always wanted one but as a 14 year old with no job is way to expensive!
That would be great. Us Mac users getting such a service like that free. IT’s the ultimate treat Nobody else has.
And what extra do those that paid get?
I have been paying for this service for a few years now it has been great, especially after I lost my iPhone on a trip to Utah. But free would be great!!!
If you had paid for it be thankful that now it’s free and your saving money!
Awesomeness!
if they make mobile me free, then this new data center makes more sense. only drawback is all the crap people will add to it. Remember those websites that offered you a free site as long as they had their banners on them. Most of it was pure junk
When iOS 4.2??!!
Supported by iAd??
I still have mac.com edresses which I much prefer to the me.com variety. Perhaps a free mobileme will offer poorme.com.
i’ve been using apple’s mail service since it was called iTools. It was free then with only 5 megs of space. then they started charging yearly subscriptions and changed the name from iTools to Dot Mac. Then it became Mobile Me. And now we’re going back to FREE again? Awesome! Having a dot Mac address is so cool!
This is the first salvo across the bows of Google’s SS Titanic. If Apple makes unifying mail, contacts & calendar across all Apple devices (MacBook Air, iMac, iPad, iPhone) as easy as pie & free to boot the need for Google’s value add services will evaporate. If Apple provides by default a 2GB free hosted mail service together with Dropbox like functionality then Apple will begin to embrace you with its cloud.
If at all Apple introduces search to its online business segment, this combined with iAds placement will kick Google to the curb. Eric T Mole’s long goodbye has begun.
Free trash is still trash!
You can create a “free MobileMe” account right now … or, you could. OK, not the total package … but enough to do IM with iChat A/V. You get your name/address in the MobileMe universe, even if your features are somewhat limited.
Given how much whining has been going on regarding how much an adept can put together for “free”, making MobileMe “redundant”, I wouldn’t be surprised if Apple decided to offer a somewhat larger free sample – but still limited! – just to shut the whiners up.
Maybe supported by iAds?
The Joker commented: “Free trash is still trash!”
Now, I didn’t want to say that about all the “free” e-mail, disk storage, web site hosting and the like, but … It’s often true. Those whiners who insist they can get all the free “cloud access” you want instead of paying for MobileMe are talking about second-rate services typically supported by ads. That’s sort of like comparing a $500 Dell laptop to a MacBook and saying “they can do the same things”. And, mostly they CAN. Doesn’t mean you’ll be thrilled with the service provided.
It should be implementing fairly soon since Apple just billed my card $105.69 for renewal this week. Sumbitch.
Well, after working for Apple for 7 years and getting it for free… I’m not happy about paying for it. It’s not worth $100 a year and the only reason I still use it is because I buy it off Amazon for $55! It should be free if Google is doing everything Mobile Me is doing and more for free!
@steve32465,
What did you do there and why did you leave?
@Cubert. I’d tell you, but then I’d have to kill you.
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@ steve32465
“it should be free if Google is doing everything Mobile Me is doing and more for free!”
———————–
Everything except keeping your Macs, iPhones and iPad all in sync, and Find my iPhone. The two best Mobile Me features.
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there should still be a paid version with more perks I think… no ads, more storage etc etc OR keep it fully paid for but bring the annual fee down…
they have to fix iDisk though… it’s so buggy though… thank God for Dropbox!
Just like those who complain that “Macs are overpriced”, those whining that MobileMe is “too expensive” are comparing dissimilar things. Yes, you could cobble together some of MobileMe’s functionality with free third-party services. But, as with the Mac vs. PC decision, Mac users in particular should ask themselves, “How much are elegance, simplicity, and my time worth?” MobileMe is much simpler to manage than multiple separate services, and it keeps getting better. Recent changes to calendar sharing let me finally drop my Google calendar account. Address Book sharing is deepening. When the iPhone can subscribe to shared address books, it’ll be perfect. One-click sharing of photo albums directly from iPhoto and Aperture are great for photographers. The only weakness that still bugs me is iDisk’s speed and syncing issues. I have a DropBox account just for syncing my 1Password data across multiple Mac. DropBox is what iDisk should be.
Despite its room for improvement, MobileMe offers more than most non-subscribers realize. And, at $75 for a five-user family pack from a third-party retailer, it’s a bloody good deal. I saved about $100/year just by moving two websites from a web host to personal domains on my MM family pack accounts.
@Majikthize
Bloody hell $75 for a family pack of 5? Where in heaven’s name did you buy that from? I’d be on that in a heartbeat.
@Balmer’s
Amazon. Just bought one a few days ago to renew my existing account. There are some other retailers that often have similar deals, too. I think I paid about $100 last year.
Just to be clear, you do understand that a family pack for 5 people is not the same as five single accounts, right? With a family pack, the main account holder gets 20GB of storage, and the four “family members” get 5GB each. You can, though, host a different “personal domain” (i.e. a proper sitenameofyourchoice.com domain) on each of the five accounts.
Enjoy!
@Majikthize
All right gotcha. Thanks for the info.
Premium Services for $29.99 per year. With bonuses for long-time subscribers. That’s my wish list.
Fred — Wonder if a possibility would be a certain base level (up to 3 email accounts, low level of storage, maybe limit sync to 1 calendar) would be free — to get more storage, emails, etc. you’d need to purchase add-ons. That could actually end up making Apple even more money; as people start realizing how they can use the storage for their own Web pages and the like, they’ll want to expand their options whereas they might have never purchased MobileMe before.