[stamford]

Jeff wrote: "I meant that Apple has
replaced HomePage with Web Gallery and iWeb for Web page creation. They
retired HomePage as an active and supported feature last year or the
year before, I believe."

Pardon? HomePage is still active, and you can even create new pages there - if you log in via:

http://homepage.mac.com

But according to Apple's briefly posted statement (see my post in the other big MobileMe Macworld thread) HomePage gets squashed on October 10.

It's nonsense that HomePage was retired - what gave you that opinion? Did you have a .Mac account and were you using HomePage recently? If you were you'd have known that HomePage was working just fine.

It's Apple's unannounced future deletion of HomePage that irks, and its secretive nature in not really telling users that it's going to be scrapped. It is not mentioned as getting dumped in the MobileMe support document, and its one mention (about October 10) got removed with (again) no explanation.

As other people have noted here, it's Apple's weirdly secret nature regarding problems or solutions that is most annoying.

Apple should just be more upfront about what stays and goes. Why the secrecy?

[jeffcarlson]

stamford, I do know that HomePage is still there, and for now you can still use it. But it clearly hasn't been touched in years, and in briefings with Apple when .Mac Web Gallery was introduced last year, they told me HomePage was no longer being developed, in favor of iWeb and Web Gallery. That's why you haven't ben able to use HomePage from within the iLife apps for the last generation of iLife, and Apple sees Web creation as a function of iLife, not .Mac/MobileMe.

I'm sorry a feature you like is for all practical purposes dead, even if the code running it is still working. But there's nothing secretive about that.

Jeff

[stamford]

Apple is being secretive, Jeff, because, while it told you in press briefings, it did not inform its customers. Journalists should not assume their insider knowledge when communicating with users. Even if you wrote about it at the time, Apple's paying customers should not expect to get their information from Macworld. They expect to get it from Apple.



Also, in its .Mac-to-MobileMe Supoort document it did not mention that HomePage was one of the .Mac services being dropped. It listed all the others but not HomePage.



Finally, it stated in another Support document that HomePage would no longer be editable after October 10, and then removed that part of the statement when users started to comment on it.



In my book, that's not an open and transparent product transition.

[JayDee]

I really can't comment on the majority of features in MobileMe, because like may others I am stuck at work, where tech support will not allow us to install browsers other than the standard IE6 on our PCs. I also travel quite a bit, and the internet cafes I frequent (mostly in Africa) also mostly use older browsers. This means that for most of the time (when I am away from my Mac at home) I am unable to access my mail. This is an incredible frustration! As the article points out, mail is one of the features that perhaps doesn't require instantaneous push.
What would really be appreciated is an older interface that enables just reading and replying to mail on an older browser. While I appreciate that Apple is staking a claim to the future now, this would provide some functionality that is really needed by many people.
Oh yes, I also love, and miss iCards!
Ciao!
John

[johnn1jm]

I signed up 3 times, cancelled 3 times. I think I will wait awhile.

[lawandmed]

Lets talk about mobile me!!! The ungodly number of hours I have spent either alone or with the help of a "mobile me" support person (not including the hours of waiting time) has given me some insight. First in order to not create an absolute mess in syncing my data I elected to do iCal. iCal does sync to mobile me sync-able calendars but not in reverse or to other iCal calendars. With the ?help of the support team, I have done and redone every potential move to make iCal compatible and sync-able. It just doesn't work. Actually, when I spoke (verbally) with a customer representative, I was told that the sync between iCal and mobile me doesn't work and that the apple team is working on that. Correct me if I am wrong, but shouldn't that be told to the support team so that they don't was there time or mine. That should be the first order of business. Also thanks for the extra thirty days--thats $99.00 divided by 12 divided by the 20 or so hours I have worked on this problem leaves me with $0.41 per hour, well below the minimum wage. Dot mac worked fine for my syncing and backup but trying to throw in something that will make all mac, windows, iphone and ipod people happy has only embittered a number of the mac faithful who like myself have been around a long, long time. So, apple, get on the stick and fix this or return to dot mac until you can introduce a system without the nest of bugs that can be added to an already well working system.

[RJY1234]

I lament the loss of iCards. But mainly I hate the name. I'll continue to use my username@mac.com address (as long as I stay with "MobileMe"). Username@me.com would make me sound like a narcissistic teenager.

[jlwoods3]

MobileMe works for me and all the others on my family account. I do want them to replace Groups, though.

[Barcar]

This is probably one of the worst programs I have purchased for my Mac. I try to use it often from my company PC through Safari and it is just not worth the trouble. Very inconsistent. Frequently does not send mail or does with no indication that it has - so you end up sending two or more times.
I have been a very loyal Apple user since the Apple II but I have to admit that I am losing confidence in the Apple line. I could not believe it when I found myself telling my wife it was OK if she wanted a PC - thought I would never say that but that is how much faith I have lost in Apple.
As for Mobile Me - forget about it! Save your money. Even with the few free months they added to it, I will not continue after the time expires.

[John_Scott]

Definitely not one of Apple's greatest implementations. I myself have enjoyed dot Mac for a few years and thought the service was over priced for those like myself who used it for syncing mail and bookmarks, etc. But at least it worked!
Mobile Me is just a mess and you never know what is going to fail next. As far as I am concerned giving me a couple extra months is not what I want. What I want is a service that I can count on. Maybe Mobile Me should have went beta for free for a few months to get users to try it and report bugs. But I know Apple tries to never give any of its loyal following anything free.
If you look at what Mobile Me was designed to do it is a great ideal. I really think it was to provide a lift to iPhone users who wanted their iPhone to work in a corporate environment. Sure is a good ideal, just not implemented well.
Apple to me has strained their people to the brink of collapse it seems. Maybe they are just to small to support so many pieces of hardware that continually need fixes and updates. Because it seems that Apple is not Apple anymore.
I do not expect any company to be perfect. But Apple came pretty close to always introducing a very stable new product.
This has not been the case recently.