Now that Apple has revealed its new iCloud online service, a surprising amount of iGoodies have been revealed. As with any Apple service, it's a closed, iOS-centric, deceptively simple (as in, keep waiting for the fine print) system, but compared to the service it supplants, MobileMe, iCloud is a bargain. Not only is the basic service free, but you can augment it with iTunes Match to back up and upgrade your entire music library for $25/year: That's one-quarter the cost of Mobile Me.
Stacked against our admittedly wide-eyed wish list, iCloud performs reasonably well. Among our ten requested features, iCloud delivers two entirely, three mostly, with five wishes—as yet—unfulfilled. Read on for the full story on how our original 10 dream features stack up against what actually emerged from WWDC. You may be surprised by the results. Interested in how iCloud stacks up against the competition? Read our feature on Apple iCloud vs. Amazon Cloud Player vs. Google Music Beta.
#1 DRM Amnesty: Wish Mostly Granted (at a Cost)
The Wish
If DRM is dead, it has quite a spirited afterlife. Yes, iTunes music has shed its DRM, and yes you can upgrade your library for 30 cents per track, but questions remain: what will iCloud do with old-fashioned, DRM-laden songs? And what of those iTunes DRM-tagged TV shows and movies? You shouldn't have to worry about this if you've copied a file to five computers. You shouldn't even have to differentiate between "computers" and "devices;" those distinctions are temporary at best. The fact is, consumers have spoken: RIP DRM. Apple and the record (and movie) execs would do well to listen and let files run freely.The Reality
Apple and the music execs are prepared to offer your DRM-laden iTunes library amnesty, at a cost. In fact, they'll do you one better: For $25 year, iTunes Match will pair all of your songs—no matter how they got into iTunes—with their DRM-free, 256kbps twins in Apple's 18 million-song vault in the sky. If you manage to stump iTunes, Match will even upload your outliers, so that you're entire library is wirelessly accessible. That is, if you're willing to commit to $25/year for the foreseeable future.#2 Yesterday's $100 is Today's Free: Wish Granted
The Wish
This $99/year thing, which Apple charges for MobileMe, has got to go. With Google Docs and Picasa customers can essentially replace Apple's syncing service—it's no wonder MobileMe is on BorrowedTime. The price tag needs to drop (a lot) or disappear: Perhaps iCloud comes along for the ride with Lion or maybe some services find the chopping block. For a lower cost of admission, I would venture that most MobileMe users would trade MobileMe Gallery for Flickr and relinquish their ".me" e-mail addresses for Gmail accounts, if they haven't already.The Reality
Let's be clear: iCloud is free. You get Photo Stream, a rolling collection of your last 1,000 photos (and new photos for 30 days). iTunes in the Cloud vaporizes every song you've purchased through iTunes—also unlimited, and always accessible are your iTunes Apps and iBooks. Finally, you get a combined 5 gigabytes for all your mail, calendars, documents, and iOS device backup. All nine of these "apps" are free. Now, if you happen to have music that you didn't buy from the iTunes Music Store, you can add an additional service—iTunes Match—for $25 a year in order to vaporize your entire library. You don't have to do this. You can still manually sync (and wirelessly with iOS 5), but if you want everything up the cloud, irrespective of source, you'll have to add $25 to the tally. Still, compared with MobileMe, which retailed for $99, iCloud + iTunes Match is a steal.#3 Beyond the Walled Garden: Wish Unfulfilled
The Wish
Much as customers love the refined UI—for all its issues, MobileMe looks great—Apple needs to understand that people outside their commercials (sometimes) leave the walled garden. If they were to embrace this, even enable it, iCloud could become all the more useful. Help customers push files to DropBox or Google Docs, post images to Flickr and Picasa, or stay organized with Evernote. It shouldn't be a one-way street, either: If customers already built libraries in outside services, it's iCloud's, not the customer's, job to interoperate.The Reality
Despite iOS's embrace of third-party tech (Twitter), iCloud remains a closed system. Those waiting for interoperability with DropBox, Picasa, Flickr, or Evernote, will have to manage those services independently of Apple's cloud.
#4 More Than Music: Wish Mostly Granted
The Wish
iTunes is already the central repository for music, music videos, television shows, movies, rentals, podcasts, audio books, iBooks, and apps (and I'm sure I missed something). Any complementary service to iTunes shouldn't just "cloudify" tunes; ideally it'll put the full kit and caboodle in the cloud. If iCloud is the new MobileMe, it should take iDisk along for the ride. Then there's iWork. You can already iWork from every iOS device or even access docs from the web-based beta version of iWork. If Apple's serious about its own productivity suite, it makes sense for iWork to roll into the cloud. What you then have is one inexpensive—ideally free—cloud-based service that absorbs iDisk, iWork.com, and all iTunes-based content. It's a big jump from MobileMe, but compared to competing services, it makes sense. Amazon delivers cloud-based music and storage with Amazon Cloud Player and Cloud Drive. Google does the same with Google Music Beta and Google Docs. It's time for Apple to up the ante and produce a service caters specifically to its iOS devices.
The Reality
iCloud does a lot more than music. In fact, in terms of composition, iCloud is just one-ninth music. Beyond music, you can sync calendars, contacts, mail, documents, apps (and app data), and iBooks across your computers and mobile devices. iCloud is still, for the most part, blind. During the WWDC keynote there was virtually no talk of video—in fact one new technology for iOS 5, iMessage, looked a lot like FaceTime sans video. We also don't know what's happening with the iWork.com beta. While you can take your documents, presentations, and spreadsheets to go, whether or not you'll be able to do any work from your web browser remains to be seen.#5 Unlimited Storage: Wish Unfulfilled
The Wish
Absorbing iEverything is going to take an awfully large iCloud. While Apple will probably let customers put iTunes purchases in the cloud for free, iCloud could really find its pitch if it allows customers to send their full libraries—complete with apps and more—up to the cloud. Windows Live SkyDrive gives customers 25 gigabytes of online storage for free; imagine if Apple, flush with cash from iPods, iPhones, and iPads, took it a step further. Yes, it's decidedly un-Apple to give away what can be monetized, but consider the long game. Apple already has the software (MobileMe) and a significant server farm. Imagine the competitive advantage of an iDevice with unlimited, always-on storage. It's enough to stare down the onslaught of Androids. It's probably a pipe dream, I know. Perhaps a more feasible solution is free cloud storage for purchases and discounted storage for everything else.The Reality
As previously outlined, iCloud comes with unlimited storage for iTunes-purchased music, apps, and iBooks. You also get unlimited storage of new photos for one month—after that they conceivably disappear, leaving you with your 1,000 most recent pics. The barrier appears when it comes to your iOS backup data, documents, calendars, and mail: There, iCloud tops out at 5 gigabytes—considerably less than you get with Windows Live SkyDrive, for example. While iTunes Match will, at a cost, let you put your iTunes library online irrespective of size, there is no analog service when it comes to the rest of your data. We still haven't heard anything about pricing should you go beyond that 5GB. And we won't know if there will be an equivalent of iDisk, which lets you store whatever you want, as opposed to just data from iWork and iOS apps.
Click here to read how we did on smart sharing, Ping integration, and subscription services.
#6 Bringing the Cloud Down to Earth: Wish Mostly Granted
The Wish
Sometimes cloud services can get rained out by lost connectivity. For example, if I'm listening to an album and I walk down to the subway, if that album is stored solely in the cloud, my iPhone tunes out once it loses wireless connectivity. Video raises another issue: Watching a movie over Wi-Fi is quite different than watching over 3G. A successful iCloud could model Google Music, which automatically caches songs to your device as you listen and allows you to specify particular files for offline consumption. Considering every Apple iOS device already has 8+ gigabytes of storage, there's more than enough buffer.
The Reality
Throughout the keynote Apple kept repeating the phrase "it just works." The idea behind iCloud is that your data is always there, automatically pushed to your device. This auto-downloading sounds great, and ought to minimize headaches when it comes to disconnecting from Wi-Fi or 3G. The only catch is that not everything lives in the cloud. We still don't know what happens to video that you purchased through iTunes—never mind all the video from other sources. The opposite of our original premise is actually more of a concern now—since everything is downloaded to your device rather than streamed from the cloud, you don't save any local storage space.#7 Lala Gets Real: Wish Granted (And Then Some)
The Wish
To get a good sense of what's in store for iCloud, you'd do well to look at former streaming service and Apple acquisition Lala. Lala had a catalog of music from which to draw, so no transfer was needed. The added bonus was that you got the ideal versions of music: high quality, DRM-free tracks. I see no reason why Apple couldn't use this technology for any songs or albums customers already purchased through iTunes. In a perfect world, they would corral your musical mutts—songs from ripped CDs, Amazon, and others—and locate them in a heavenly iCloud. At the very least, however, I would love to see hybrid model, wherein iCloud automatically Lala's iTunes purchases and allows customers to manually upload miscellaneous media.The Reality
iCloud does for your iTunes-purchased tracks what Lala did for you library for a fee. With iTunes Match, however, iCloud exceeds Lala. If you opt into the $25/year service, iTunes Match scans your library and draws from a larger cloud-based inventory. As with Lala, you'll get DRM-free, high-quality (256 Kbps) versions of whatever you have in your iTunes library. Because the iTunes cloud is massive (18 million songs), most songs ought to be available in prime form, though, even if they aren't, iTunes Match automatically uploads outliers to the cloud so that your entire library is available. As for my wish, forget manually uploads; the entire process is automated.#8 Smart Sharing: Wish Unfulfilled
The Wish
When it comes to video, there is no one magic file. I certainly don't need 1080p on my iPhone, retina screen or not. And, if I'm on an AT&T network, low-res is best-res. Hopefully, iCloud will be a smart streamer. It will be able to see on what device and from what connection you're watching. Similar to Netflix, iCloud will optimize media for your means: 1080p for AppleTV, YouTube-quality web video for the iPhone on the go.The Reality
Apple didn't touch video in the keynote. It could be that they're still ironing out licensing deals with studios, but as it stands, don't count on any magic bullets.#9 Ping Opens Up: Wish Unfulfilled
The Wish
The Reality
Like another "hobby" product, AppleTV, Ping didn't get much love at the keynote. So far there isn't any word of new functionality. Hopefully it will follow the model of another beleaguered Apple service, MobileMe, and limp along long enough to grow into itself.#10 The Long-Lost Subscription Service: Wish Unfulfilled
The Wish
We already know that Apple has inked deals with Warner Music Group and at least one of the remaining three largest music labels. With all four in the fold, iCloud could allow customers to buy music from any device anywhere, or, more importantly, access music that they've already purchased, from any device, anywhere. With all the stakeholders at the table, I want to see Apple fulfill one of the longest running iTunes rumors: a subscription service. One of the key rationalizations for the pay-per-song model was that customers wanted to own their music. However, now that customers are comfortable with cloud-based storage, why wouldn't they be comfortable with a full-featured subscription service? Take Netflix. Or Hulu. When it comes to media, compatibility, and convenience trumps ownership. I'm not saying iTunes has to do away with the per-per-song model, but why not, if you're already building a cloud-based service and negotiating with the big four, give customers one more way to play?
The Reality
Color me flabbergasted. For WWDC, Apple renegotiated contracts with the record labels and made every song in their catalog available to the cloud-based iTunes Match subscription service. And yet, they still haven't bothered to offer a basic subscription service. The music is already there. The devices are ready to connect to the cloud. But unless you have the song in your library, you can't pay to stream it. Strikes me as a missed opportunity—and a big one at that.