Some Alternatives to MobileMe

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view. MobileMe (the email, contacts, calendars and file service from Apple) is something that seemingly everyone loves to hate.  It’s too expensive, doesn’t work right, and doesn’t really offer anything that you can’t find for free.  This winning combination of traits have lead to more than a few articles detailing how to sync, share and publish without handing even more money over to Apple.

Even with the plethora of articles explaining how to save time and money, however, it is possible to find happy users of Apple products.  Users which will "vigorously" share their "carefully considered" opinions.  One user from MacWorld raises the following (somewhat legitimate) points:

Are you the pot or the kettle?  First you say don’t expect the rest of us to have the same needs/wants, and then you make a blanket statement … [which] is full of assumptions that are not necessarily correct ...

1. “It’s way to expansive.”  If you only use web hosting, then maybe.  MobileMe is $8.25/month.  how much is hosting?  Does hosting give you automatic sync of photo galleries, contacts, ect.  How much is Flickr pro on top of regular web hosting.
2. Alternatives are not that hard to find, set up or use.  Really?  It seems that not everyone knows of alternatives.  And then why did the commenter have to make suggestions and corrections?  It seems to me [that] it’s not as easy as you say.

This happy MobileMe user has essentially laid down a challenge.  He implicitly (and others explicitly) state that they are willing to pay good money for their time.  And in the same bravado common to members of the Cult of Cupertino, he almost dares someone to disagree with him.  Since this topic has become a bandwagon and I’ve decided to generally hop in its direction, I accept this challenge. You might even say that figuring out ways to avoid using Apple’s signature web service has become a bit of a hobby.

The Challenge

As with any good competition, first let’s size up Apple’s offerings.  From there, we can begin to analyze the competition and see how they stack up in comparison.  Here’s what MobileMe delivers: integrated email, calendar, contacts, picture sharing, online file storage/synchronization, and web publishing (also quaintly known as blogging).  Advertised as “Exchange for the rest of us,” the service is supposed to deliver the same ease of access that most major companies enjoy.  Put another way, MobileMe makes it convenient to keep everything up to date on all of life’s different computing devices.

The lifestyle that MobileMe promises is extremely compelling.  When it works correctly, it’s the future of computing.  Knowing that schedules, contacts, and files are where I need them to be when I want them is priceless.  Even better, any changes made to one are instantly sent to all other devices at the same time.  That’s cool!  But that’s not all, MobileMe offers a few additional strengths as well:

1. Works with iPhone/iPod Touch and Mac.  There is something tremendously cool about true, cross-platform and mobile sync.  While I’ve long had something similar available to my Windows machine and handheld through Exchange, MobileMe hits both the Mac as well.
2. Integration.  Apple has made sync goodness available through a single log-on.  Convenience makes it more likely that all of the services will actually be used.  It gets better if you use a Mac (nearly 8% of Americans do!) since the MobileMe services are deeply integrated into the operating system and iLife.
3. Websites and Blogs.  Though it is not advertised, MobileMe is tightly integrated with iWeb.  In many ways, iWeb exists exclusively as an offline client (and unofficial advertisement) for MobileMe blogs and websites.
4. Special Benefits for Mac Users.  The purpose of this article is challenge MobileMe on its home turf: Mac OS X.  For the Mac Faithful, MobileMe provides instant messaging (via iChat) and easy remote desktop connections (via Back to My Mac).  Unfortunately, Windows users are not able to use these parts of the service.

MobileMe’s strongest advantages are its simplicity, platform availability and integration.  Apple bills it as the service for people who want things to just work and any serious competition should both offer the same services and a similar degree of simplicity.

Strategy 1: Windows Live

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view. When comparing alternatives to Apple, perhaps the first place to look is Microsoft.  While Microsoft’s online services have been known under a variety of names (the current flavor of the month is Windows Live) they offer a huge number of services:

• Hotmail: Email, Calendar, Contacts and Tasks.  Hot is available from the browser, through POP3, a downloadable program called Windows Live Mail, or it can integrate with Outlook through a special connector.  And with 500 million users, most people have used it at some point in their lifetime; thus, it’s familiar.
• Photos.  Windows Live Photogallery, available through Windows Live Essentials, is the Windows equivalent of MobileMe and iPhoto.  It includes a place to both share your photos with friends and family (similar to Flickr) as well as a program that lets you organize them (Photogallery).  Luckily, Photogallery gives iPhoto ‘09 a serious run for its money in some ways and utterly devastates it in others.  My favorite feature is the ability to sync your entire photo library to every computer you use.
• Spaces.  Everyone wants to be at the center of social networking, including Microsoft.  Spaces is their current best effort.  It brings together simple social networking tools, a place for blogging, file sharing, photos, comments, emoticons, and all the many other stimulating activities which brought FaceBook to prominence.  But while many of the features appear to be aimed at social networkers, it is actually possible to build a fully-developed personal website.
• SkyDrive.  Online file storage is important.  SkyDrive offers 25 GB at a fantastic price: free!
• Mesh.  What is an online platform without file sync, backup and collaborative sharing?  And it works quite well; I would even hazard that it is the most compelling sync framework available.  (Did I mention that it also does the simplest implementation of remote desktop I’ve ever seen?)
• Messenger.  Every online platform offers an instant messenger application, so does Microsoft.
• Writer.  Back in Digital Dark Ages (circa 2003), Apple came out with iWeb and made a serious push to sale people on the “Blogging Lifestyle.”  In its day, iWeb was pretty neat with a real click and drag experience.  A few years ago, though, Microsoft released their answer to iWeb and the “blogging lifestyle:” Windows Live Writer.  Live Writer is iWeb done right. It interfaces  with essentially every blog/content management system in existence and makes updating a website simple and elegant.  But that only scratches the surface, using Live Writer you can also publish pod-casts, video feeds, and leverage social networking to its fullest.  I run VMWare Fusion on my Mac just so that I can use Writer.
• Office Live.  Ever needed access to files and documents while on the road?  Or maybe you collaborate as part of a research group or project group and need to share documents.  While you might use a solution like Subversion, you might consider Office Live as a really good alternative.  5 GB of online storage, discussions, task lists, and more make it a great way to work with others on complex school projects, research proposals, books, or presentations.  There is even a plug-in which lets you access your workspace right from Word, Excel and PowerPoint.

The Windows Live offerings simply dwarf anything that Apple offers through MobileMe.  All of the essential services are covered (email, calendar, contacts) in addition to the not-so essential (simple remote desktop, file sync, blogging, photos).  Everything is available from a single log-on and password and there is plenty of online storage.  Windows Live Hotmail, Office Live and Live Mesh all offer 5 GB of storage.  SkyDrive offers 25 GB.  In total, Microsoft offers a whopping 40 GB of free hard-drive space with no strings attached.  That’s nearly double the storage offered by Apple’s MobileMe.

If the web side is strong, the software is even better; Microsoft is primarily a software company after all.  For the first time this decade, Microsoft has even entered the arena of “lifestyle applications,” long dominated by Apple and its iLife suite.  Think about this: some of the coolest features in iPhoto ‘09 first made their debut in Windows Live Photogallery.  Face recognition?  Check.  Geo-tagging?  Check.  Integration with maps?  Check.

Through the use of add-ins, Windows Live lets you extend your existing desktop software into the cloud.  Outlook Connector gives you access to Hotmail, Live Calendars and contacts  inside of Outlook.  Office Live drops seamlessly into Microsoft Office.

But despite it’s overall strength and attraction, there is a major problem: Windows Live exists to “Light Up Windows.” Put another way: Microsoft’s services don’t play nicely with other platforms.  While there are some exceptions (Live Mesh), only web versions are available for users of alternative operating systems and support for the iPhone/iPod Touch is non-existent.  In fact, only users of Windows Mobile will find anything remotely resembling platform integration.  Which is too bad.

Advantages: Windows Live offers everything available in MobileMe and even goes deeper.  The online services are strong, especially if you use Windows as your primary OS. And the software applications are awesome.  Most important, though: it’s 100% free.

Drawbacks:   Doesn’t really play nicely with Mac, Linux or iPhone.

Strategy 2: Google

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view. If Windows Live won’t work for your email, calendar, file sync and other needs; do not despair.  There are a number of other strategies which can help you get the job done.  Google (another online giant) offers many of the same services as MobileMe and Windows Live.  Here’s the rundown:

• GMail, Google Calendar, Remember the Milk.  These cover mail, calendar, contacts and tasks with the additional benefit that they work everywhere.  GMail is standards compliant and offers both POP3 and IMAP access. This means you can access it from the mail application of your choice.  Google Calendar works in Outlook, iCal and just about anything with CalDav.  And you can connect to Remember the Milk in too ways to count.
• Google Sync.  Whereas Windows Live lacks any meaningful way to sync information to mobile devices, Google makes this extremely easy.  It works with Apple’s iPhone, Android, Blackberry and Windows Mobile; that is, just about every smart-phone in existence.  Ironically, the technology that makes this possible was licensed from Microsoft.
• Picasa.  Google has their own photo software and service, and it’s a heavy weight.  While iPhoto and Windows Live Gallery work for consumer use and light professional use, Picasa is pretty close to a professional application like Adobe’s Light Room or Apple’s Aperture.  I’ve used it to organize, edit and annotate tens of thousands of medical images and to organize albums of 5000+ pictures.  Even better, there are versions available for Windows, Linux and Mac (the only major photo application which loves all operating systems equally). But you don’t have to use Picasa on the desktop.  For Mac OS X or Windows Live Photogallery users who would rather use those programs, both plug into Picasa albums for easy photo sharing.  As do most of the aforementioned Light Room and Aperture.
• Blogger. A look at Google’s services would be incomplete without considering the Google personal publishing platform.  While not as tightly integrated as Windows Live Spaces, that can be an extremely good thing.  Blogger can be used for both personal and professional sites (complete with custom domains and sub domains), whereas Live Spaces is best suited for a personal web presence.

Google’s strategy is very interesting.  Rather than developing both the online services and corresponding desktop software (as Microsoft or Apple does), they instead focus exclusively on the online component.  This results in some of the best online experiences available anywhere that comply fully with existing standards.  This makes it easy for other companies to come along and integrate the Google into their own products.  For example, iChat will let you use a Google Talk account, Mail.app plugs into GMail, and iCal can connect to Google Calendar.

Unlike Windows Live, you can get the full iPhone experience by using Google’s Sync.  Configure iPhone Mail for Google IMAP and point your calendar and address book at Google Mobile.  The rest happens automatically.  When I tested it using my iPod Touch, updates were nearly instantaneous (maybe not push, but really close) and hassle free.

Advantages: Like Windows Live, you can get nearly everything that MobileMe has through Google with one username and password.  Even better, Google probably works with your existing software (whether that be for IM, chat, calendar, photo sharing, or email).

Drawbacks: Even though Google’s offerings Come close to a MobileMe replacement, there are still a few missing pieces; most noticeably: no online storage.

Strategy 3: A Smorgasbord of Free Services

While Microsoft may offer a complete package and Google is nearly there, why relegate yourself to a single offering.  Both are free and there’s nothing to lose.   Thus, let’s look at my favorite MobileMe replacement strategy: Mix and Match.

Use Google for email, Calendar, and tasks; then leverage Google Sync for the iPhone experience.   Live Mesh provides for cross-platform file sync and backup while SkyDrive handles online needs.  Add a pinch of Flickr for photo sharing (don’t worry, iPhoto and Windows Live Gallery have support built in); and Live Spaces, WordPress or Blogger for your website (conveniently accessed from Live Writer of course).  And these aren’t the only options, you might also consider the following:

• File Sync/Storage: Oosah (1 Terabyte of free online storage), DropBox (easy sync for Mac, Linux and Windows), and ADrive (50 GB online for free).
• Photos: Flickr, Photobucket, DropShots, Zenfolio and SmugMug.

Advantages: Pick and choose amongst the best services on the web.  Use the same services as friends and family.

Drawbacks: Multiple usernames and passwords.  Integration with specific software may not be as seamless.

Strategy 4: A Custom Web Platform

Okay, so you can get all of the same services through the various online giants (Microsoft, Google and Yahoo) or dwarves (SmugMug, DropBox, Oosah, etc.), but there are actually a few reasons you might want to opt for a paid service.  Support is one reason, but let me posit a completely different one: total and complete personal control.  While “Mix and Match” might be my favorite, Strategy 4 is the one I actually use.

For my online presence, I pay for a Professional Web Hosting account with Brinkster for $10 per month.  In return, I get email, calendar, contacts, to-do, web space and technical support.  I use the online space for this site, collaboration projects and encrypted file backup (through use of a Linux tool called Duplicity).  While online space can be found everywhere, I deliberately chose Brinkster for its email support.

You see, Brinkster’s servers run Zimbra (an OpenSource competitor to Microsoft’s Exchange).  Zimbra works with Outlook and Mac OS X via plugins and it uses ActiveSync, which means instant and perfect sync with iPhone (no futzing required).  It gets even better, $10/month doesn’t get me one account, it gets me 500.  (If that seems a bit much, there’s also a “Rookie” option, which comes with 200 GB of storage and 50 email accounts for a meager $4/month.)

Sure, hosting your own website can be like riding a tricycle on the the freeway, but it is also extremely liberating.  I control my domain name, I control my personal information.  I’m not worried about terms of service or what my employer thinks. Even better, I’m outside of the Google, Microsoft, and Apple wars.  Should any one of the big three decide to change their terms of service, storage limits, or prices; I simply don’t care.  I can still use all of the fantastic web services for free, but at the end of the day, I control my data: not a major corporation.  That feeling of freedom is priceless.

Summary

Sure … Apple’s MobileMe offers a pretty compelling vision: seamless email, contact, calendar, and data sync between everything.  And while it may be a polished service, there is really no reason to pay for it.  Microsoft, Google and many others offer similar services without for free.  So, while many of the Apple Faithful might be willing to “pay for their time;” that isn’t a very compelling argument for MobileMe’s price.  Just about everyone has a Hotmail or Google account, which means that you are already set up to live “La Vida Nublada.”  Finding alternatives is easy and can even be fun.

Similar Posts:

• Glass Houses and Stones
• The iPhone App Store and Software Quality: A User’s Perspective
• Making life easier with Windows Live Mesh
• Backup, Sync and Share – Part 4: Apple Time Machine and Samba
• Backup, Share and Sync – Part 2: Hard Drive Preparation and Server Configuration

Copywrite 2009: Rob Oakes. Apolitically Incorrect

Some Alternatives to MobileMe