As more and more of our digital lives begin to move off the desktop and into the “cloud” that is the Internet, the role of computer companies is starting to drastically change. What once was stored locally on our personal computers is now being stored thousands of miles away on servers. Companies like Google are becoming guardians of our content and with that role comes a heavy responsibility – ensuring our content is accessible 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Thankfully, many companies understand the significance of this role, as was witnessed with Apple’s release of its new MobileMe service.
The new Internet service which replaced Apple’s previous .Mac service ran into more than its fair share of problems. Users couldn’t access their content, MobileMe’s web applications were nonexistent and .Mac subscribers could’t access the service at all. Apple acknowledged its mistakes and issued an apology, announcing that, to compensate its customers, it would be extending members’ subscriptions by one month. While this was a positive PR decision and will surely please Apple fans, it is also hints at something which we will surely see more of as time goes on – acknowledgment of corporate responsibility.
Companies like Google, Apple, Amazon, MySpace and Facebook all provide services that people use on a daily (sometime hourly) basis. Many people “live” on such services. As such, companies have a responsibility to ensure that their customers will be able to find their content and have the experiences they are looking for. Maintaining servers for millions of customers isn’t easy, as Apple discovered the hard way. However, as more and more personal content is being placed into the hands of companies, this is a technological problem that must continue to be addressed.
However, no matter how much technology evolves, no matter how diligent companies are, there will always be those occasional outages, not to mention the omnipresent threat of someone hacking into corporate servers and siphoning our personal data. Therefore, not only are we handing over our content to companies like Google, but also our trust and as the recent Google/Viacom story has shown, that trust can easily be broken.
While I do have a MobileMe account and use an @mac.com (or I guess now @me.com) email account, I don’t store that much information in the “cloud”, but instead use a thumb-drive for most of my needs. While part of the reason stems from security and stability, another, and perhaps more important part stems from accessibility. While the great majority of computers are now connected to the Internet in some form, there are always those times when access to the Internet is limited and it’s during those times that I’m glad I have my thumb-drive with me. Sometimes I’ll keep a backup of a file online using say MobileMe’s iDisk feature, but I always ensure that I have a “hard copy” with me as well.
What do you think about the migration to online services? Should we be worried about handing over so much information into the invisible hands of companies? Are we sacrificing privacy for convenience? Please feel free to add your own thoughts and experiences below. Do you use online services like MobileMe, Gmail or Facebook and if so, what do you find appealing about them? If not, why have you chosen to refrain from using them? I look forward to hearing what you have to say!
Filed under: Apple, Computers, Technology Tagged: | Apple, Facebook, Gmail, Google, iDisk, Mac, MobileMe, MySpace, Viacom
