MobileMe rumored to get alternative payment methods
A recently-published report from Germany suggests Apple will soon add brand new functionality to MobileMe: the ability to subscribe to the suite of online services with a form of payment other than a credit card. The rumor discourages hope for MobileMe becoming a free offering.
According to macnews.de, one of its readers ran into trouble while trying to renew his subscription to MobileMe. Currently, it's practically impossible for Apple's customers to activate a subscription to the US$99 per year online service without a credit card. When the macnews.de reader, who doesn't have a credit card, explained his situation to Apple's support hotline, a support agent for the company told him, "We're currently working on offering customers alternate payment options." The support staffer could not provide any further details or a release date.
Once upon a time, customers like this macnews.de reader could walk into a store, purchase a boxed "copy" of MobileMe using their preferred payment method, bring the box home and use the included activation instructions to enable or renew their MobileMe subscriptions online. But in February, Apple discontinued shipments of boxed MobileMe activation kits, leaving customers with only one option for buying the service: online with a valid credit card. This limitation could dramatically reduce MobileMe subscriptions in countries like Germany where about 80 percent of consumers use bank transfers to complete online transactions, according to research by The Nielsen Company. If Apple wishes to continue charging customers for all or part of its online services, it would be necessary for the company to offer more payment options.
Prompted by an email from Steve Jobs promising MobileMe would "get a lot better in 2011," many speculate the service is due for a major overhaul this year. Today, Apple's suite of online services allows subscribers to publish websites and photo galleries, access ad-free IMAP email, synchronize data between Macs and devices over the internet, backup and share files online and locate lost iPhones. Rumors suggest any or all of these services will be revamped and expanded to include a "media locker" to give subscribers online access to certain content purchased from the iTunes Store. Speculators hoped Apple planned to offer MobileMe free of charge, especially after the company discontinued the service's boxed activation kits. But if Apple is exploring alternative payment options, an entirely free MobileMe seems unlikely.
[via MacNN]
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A recently-published report from Germany suggests Apple will soon add brand new functionality to MobileMe: the ability to subscribe to...
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I purchased mobileme in a apple store and activated it without ever having to use a credit card.
Now I know they stopped selling mobileme in stores so I guess I am out of luck when it comes time to renew next year, assuming it still cost money.
To add to my comment (number 19) - after May 5th I will not be able to sync my iPod calendar with my Mac's iCal and the me.com calendar. Not only - I will not even be able to access my calendars on me.com!!!
Can they actually do this? I mean, this is a "breach of contract" - I paid for a service they are not providing me anymore (this was not communicated to me when I paid back in July 2010...)?
From the FAQ (http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4037?viewlocale=en_US):
What happens if I don't upgrade by May 5, 2011?
After May 5, 2011, if you have not upgraded to the new Calendar service, your calendars will no longer automatically sync between your devices and you will be unable to access your calendars at me.com.
PV, that's one of my major issues - I rely on a local iCal calendar, not a MobileMe hosted one that nothing but iOS 4 Apple devices will sync with. I understand moving forward and a standard like CalDAV is important, but it takes out the Sync Services and adds layers of multiple steps (and 3rd party tools) to get things to all sync up correctly.
March 30 2011 at 10:58 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down ReplyMaybe that is just the line that they feed consumers on the phone at the call center... seems to me that telling consumers that an "alternative" is on the way is a good way of telling people that they should "hold on a little longer because we're going to make it free" without actually revealing anything
March 30 2011 at 12:16 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down ReplyThe discounted price available from outlets such as Amazon.com is what's kept me a subscriber for years. If that option disappears, my Mobile Me account probably will too. Call it nitpicky, but somehow I can mentally justify 60 bucks a year for the current state of Mobile Me, but I can't justify 100 bucks for it. If iDisk were as good as Dropbox, that might be a different story, but it is a sadly inferior product. The syncing is nice (when it works) but it's not worth 100 bucks.
Then again, I'd by happy to pay full price if they just switched the name away from Mobile Me and me.com -- the two dumbest product names in the history of Apple.
I think the *@me.com address is cool, so much so that after years, I actually paid for a MobileMe subscription this year, and also registered my own domain *.me.uk
I think we'll see the whole MobileMe service split-up and each bit will cost $4.99 each -- Calendar? $4.99; iDisk? $4.99 and so on.
I echo your sentiments, DJR. I used to purchase the boxes from Amazon every year, saving $30-40 off my MobileMe annual cost. Now with the new calendar format changing (I sync with a couple of non-Apple products, as well as a 1st gen iPhone), I will lose that functionality here in the next month.
For a product that was reasonable to subscribe to, provided some great functionality and has worked for me very well, it's starting to look like I may need to decide what to do come October 2011 when my annual sub is up for renewal.
I never thought MobileMe would go free. However I do think that eventually you will get some email service and possibly calendar syncing for free. Maybe even 5 gigabytes of storage. However in Cloud Services, charging for storage is where the money is at. Apple is not going to allow people to store all of their stuff in the Cloud without a fee. Neither does Google, Amazon or Microsoft.
People also need to stop thinking that because a company makes a tidy profit that they somehow owe the consumer something for free. They don't. Their entire goal is to continue making profit and to increasing the amount of profit year over year. They do this through new services. To think otherwise is simply naive. The world is not socialistic or open source. People are only entitled to the basic necessities and none of Apple's products fall into that category.
Apparently no one involved in writing these things has worked in customer service. This is typical customer service speak. If someone calls and complains about having to pay with a credit card, the standard response would be:
"We're currently working on offering customers alternate payment options."
This DOESN'T mean they are really working on anything, it just keeps the customer from complaining further.
This guy is dead on. This is typical customer service. Why make a story about it? This is just like all of those "network upgrades" I promised people years ago. You do what you have to so they get off your line.
March 29 2011 at 6:57 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply"We're currently working on offering customers alternate payment options."
It's possible the support agent used a talking point simply to get the customer off the phone. In my experience as a customer service rep, I would try not to lie to customers about future plans for the company or its products. While it would save me from a customer's torment in the short term, it risked the customer's incredibly valuable long term trust and loyalty. Apple isn't known for taking this sort of shortcut with its customers. (Not to say it could never happen, of course.)
To the broader point, the support agent's statement may be proven true by one or both of the following:
a) MobileMe becomes a free service (the absence of payment is an "alternative" to credit card payments)
b) Apple adds new payment methods to support customers who wish to subscribe to MobileMe without using a credit card
If promised upgrades to the service arrive in 2011, we won't have to wait long to find out!
The only thing *I* know is that I cannot use the new Calendar application with my 3 years old iPod Touch 1st gen (Apr. 2008) since I cannot update it to OS4 - so I am paying 70€/year to not run a calendar service on a device I paid 359€. Nice.
March 29 2011 at 4:10 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down ReplyThis doesn't make sense. Why would Apple disable purchasing of MobileMe?
I purposely did not renew my subscription in January because I just don't see how $99 (or even the Amazon discount) is worth it. iDisk sucks. I gave up on it the first month of use for Dropbox. And mail, calendar & contact syncing are free with google. I'd check it out again if mail, calendar & contact syncing were offered for free. Lord knows Apple makes enough money to give something back.
They didn't disable purchasing it, you just need a credit card to purchase it.
March 29 2011 at 4:01 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down ReplyOh. I must have misunderstood what I heard. Either way, I'm not paying for it.
March 29 2011 at 4:09 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply"This limitation could dramatically reduce MobileMe subscriptions in countries like Germany where about 80% of consumers use bank transfers to complete online transactions"
Do they not have PayPal or debit cards in Germany?
Doesn't iTunes allow PayPal? Which, by default, indicates the Mac App Store does? There should be a way through one of the App Stores
March 29 2011 at 3:33 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down ReplyiTunes doesn't support PayPal.
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