An Introduction to Apple's MobileMe Service Part I

By James Alan Miller on August 12, 2008 11:10 AM

Author: Philip L. Graitcer

MobileMe might have been an all time hit, if Apple hadn't also launched the iPhone 3G and iPhone software 2.0 at the same time, and if there hadn't been technical problems with MobileMe that made it completely unusable for a group of users. Instead, the only news that MobileMe generated through much of July was bad news.

There were technical glitches with MobileMe—some people couldn't use e-mail, others couldn't even set up their accounts—and Apple was mum for a few weeks about the problems. That just made life more confusing for users. I spent at least eight hours, two of them with Apple technical support, trying to figure out accounts.

Thankfully, as of late July, the technical issues with MobileMe had been fixed. And after a few weeks of using MobileMe, I'm happy to report that MobileMe is a great product.

What makes it so great?

MobileMe keeps email, contacts, appointments up-to-date between a Mac, and iPhone, iPod touch, and even a PC. That means if you make a change to an appointment or an address on your home computer, it will automatically appear on your iPhone and on any other computer you've set up.

There service does this by setting up what Apple calls a "MobileMe cloud." The cloud holds all your e-mail, contact, and appointment information. When you make a change to a contact on your iPhone, it automatically gets sent to the cloud and in a few minutes sent to your other computers. It also works with pictures and large files. What is on one device automatically gets sent to the others through the cloud.

MobileMe works with Microsoft Outlook and Mac Address Book so you don't even have to have a Mac—you can synch with the PC office computer too. All you need is an internet connection and be running Safari, Firefox, or Internet Explorer 7.0

But wait, there's more. With MobileMe you get a virtual desktop. That means on almost any computer attached to the internet, you can access your appointments, contacts, and your e-mail.

Next: How to set up iPhone/iPod touch for MobileMe.