Apple, The output of the iCloud

The output of the iCloud mean that Apple has finally understood the Web?

Apple never really went to the Internet. The company manages the largest digital platform in the world, and it sells more music and applications than anyone else.

But if you feel that the "cloud" is becoming the link which will allow to unite all our computers - if you think that we are entering a new era, which will see us store the majority of our music, our films, our photos, and our documents online, all available wherever we are, on the Web-then so long that the Apple products seem you archaic.

Take the iPhone and the iPad: we have always had connect them to our PC to synchronize data - a ubiquitous and irritating practice, which is pale figure with the Android operating system, Google, which allows to the economy of the cables.

It cannot be said that Apple had nothing included in the "cloud". It is rather the philosophy of all-free clean Internet which did not correspond to the model of business of the Corporation. Apple conducts large margins on its equipment and its software. The idea to offer products - and launch an advertising campaign to popularize this project - was horror to Steve Jobs and company. MobileMe - system email, calendaring, sharing and synchronization of Apple - was billed $ 99 per year. Google provides - as of course - all of these programs to its users.

The cloud of Apple against the Google cloud

But all this comes from change - at least, according to Steve Jobs. The pattern of Apple Worldwide Developer Conference, announced the disappearance of MobileMe, replaced with iCloud - a new system, sensible adapt all Apple gadgets to the Internet.

The demonstration was impressive - and free of almost all of these new services was for many. If the company is able to ensure the proper functioning of the iCloud (which is not certain when we recall the chaotic launch of MobileMe), it could well become one of the main competitors of the hegemonic Google cloud.

This is a few months of Apple executives argue that the iPad marked entry into a new era of computing - the "world post-PC", in their words. All of the new features announced by Steve Jobs confirms partly this assertion. With iCloud, more need of cables: you can use your iPhone and your iPad, even if you don't have a laptop (or desktop).

This could become one of the main arguments for the sale of the iPad: Apple ensures that outside the United States, and especially in Asia, hundreds of thousands of people are in this situation: people who want to use their phones and their shelves such as computers, and not only as a gadget in addition to the machine that occupies their Office. "If you want to cut the cord, it is possible," explains Scott Forstall, responsible for the development of the iOS at Apple.

Late response

That said, the iCloud is, in many respects, most lagging as innovative - a late reaction to the debauchery of free tools offered by Google. Now, your iPhone, your iPad, and iPod Touch synchronize your email and your agenda on all your devices, instantly, via the Internet. Youpi! But so many years that I am well on Android phones (or even on my iPhone) using the services of Google. This in part explains the motivation of Apple: phones and Android tablets sell well, and Apple and ready to all to give a step ahead to the iPhone and the iPad.

But I bet that Apple reversal has other reasons. By adapting its equipment to the Internet, Apple improves their ergonomics - ergonomics improvement is always the primary purpose of Apple (and, campaigns of pubs of society are always fantastic). For evidence, the incredible photographs synchronization system: any photo taken by a device will instantly appear on all your machines (including your Windows PC). And when you import these photos from your digital camera to your computer, it will appear on your iPhone and your iPad.

Perfect synchronization

This service is free: Apple servers will keep these data for thirty days, regardless of the size of the photos, and synchronize your thousand recent photos with all your devices. (Same thing for the documents.) (When you will bring changes to a text file on your iPad, changes will be passed to your Mac and your PC.)

Similarly, with respect to online music storage, Apple does not want to cede an inch of land to Amazon and Google. These last months, Amazon and Google have launched their own online storage service. They allow you to submit your music files on their servers. No need to synchronize: it is enough to have access to the Internet to listen to your music.

But these storage spaces (the "lockers"), however, have a default size: downloading your music on these sites can sometimes... take several weeks. (It is the pure truth: I began to store my music on the new Google service at the beginning of may, and my 30 GB library has completed his transfer on Google servers at the beginning of June...).

The iCloud of Apple save us these technical problems. A, the company obtained the agreement of the labels for the synchronization of the securities purchased on iTunes is; You can transfer them a device to another in accordance with the law. What pieces you have not purchased on iTunes (in other words, your CD - and music obtained in a manner... less legal), Apple has provided a system: the iTunes game.

iTunes will analyze your music library, then it will compare it to the iTunes directory to find equivalent titles, and will allow you to access these pieces on iTunes from all your devices. Otherwise said, more need to transfer your music - you can access all your pieces, wherever you are, and this will take you a few minutes (and not a few weeks...).

Soon free

With iTunes game, Apple provides an excellent solution to the problem of online storage. Excellent - but expensive. Apple has the pass agreements with labels to create this service - and if you want to use it, you need to participate in the repayment of the abovementioned agreements; It will cost 25 doll.