On An iCloud Tax
Ian Lamont at The Digital Media Machine suggests that since iCloud only works on Lion, it’s a “tax” of sorts. Almost too easy to disagree, but I’ll shoot:
- Lion is $29.99. The cheapest upgrade of OS X in, well, forever since they’re usually several times that.
- iCloud is free. Meanwhile, MobileMe, the service replaced by iCloud, has long been $99 a year.
- MobileMe will remain active until June 30, 2012 at no extra charge. Which gives one a few months from now to scrounge up $30 to upgrade to Lion.
All in all, I don’t see having to purchase Lion as a tax in the least. Playing with the latest and the greatest comes at a price, certainly, but taking everything into account in this example: replacing the paid MobileMe with the free iCloud and then purchasing Lion is a net “refund” of $70 — hardly a tax. That’s enough for to pay for iTunes Match ($24.99 a year) when it comes out and still have enough left over for some apps.
If this is a tax, raise mine, please.
Thanks for reading my post and sharing your comments. Yes, the price of iCloud relative to MobileMe is great and I can understand how MM users really appreciate the new price structure of iCloud. But for other users, I am not sure the value is so apparent.
The “tax” I highlighted refers to the fact that people who have bought a Windows PC in the past three years or so pay nothing to use iCloud’s free version. The majority of Mac owners won’t get a free pass, unless they’ve paid or are willing to pay $30 to upgrade to Lion. Telling one group of people (loyal Mac users, no less) to pay more doesn’t seem right to me.
Hi Ian, thanks for commenting. I get what you’re saying in the post but every which way I roll it around in my head, it doesn’t sound like that bad a deal. So Windows users get iCloud for free, but just by running Windows they don’t have all the free apps that come with OS X. Or, say someone really balks at getting Lion for their Mac today — Mobile Me is free and active for another half a year — they aren’t left out in the cold. Lastly, say a Mac user just has an old Mac that can’t run Lion — well, they can purchase a new Mac today which comes with Lion.
Ultimately, I believe iCloud falls in that category of early adopter land where there’s a price to pay to be able to use it. And I don’t think it’s too high. Maybe that’s where the personal line is drawn — if Lion were $129 and basic iCloud cost $99 a year I’d definitely agree with you