Apple’s iDevices will now all be joined by the newly introduced and much anticipated iCloud. This free service will be the answer to Google and Amazon’s respective Cloud services except that, as Apple does, they’re doing it bigger and better. Whether you have an iPhone, iPad or iPod Touch, your iOS devices will all be joined together under the Apple iCloud.
In case you’re late to the party, the iCloud allows users to share emails, messages, music, calendars and whatever else you can think of between their devices. Through this FREE service, when you download something on one of your iDevices, you’ll be able to download it to the iCloud and instantly bring it into the other device. No more emailing your documents to print; just send one item from your iPhone to your iPad or vice versa or whatever’s necessary and you’ll be good to go.
Amazon’s Cloud gives users 5GB of space earmarked for music while Google’s uses Gmail, Docs and other services in addition to music. The iCloud and Apple have made deals with record labels unlike the competition which gives them the advantage. These companies obviously wanted to be in business with Apple and iTunes instead of more unproven services.
The calendar, mail and contacts functions of your devices will now all be synced after eventual upgrades including the advent of iOS 5 later this year (more on this later). Everything will be synced through, guess what, the iCloud.
However, only music bought from iTunes can be sent to the iCloud so whatever illegal music/Amazon downloaded tunes you have can’t be sent around. This is clearly in Apple and iTunes’ best interests so it’s not unexpected. Just be thankful this thing’s free.
However, for $24.99 a year, you can utilize iTunes Match and store your “entire collection” on the iCloud. It’s a steep price but it’s a premium service so we’ll see how many people pay for it.
Two of the main applications utilized for the cloud will be Photostream and Documents. Photostream will allow photos to be transferred while Documents will allow…wait for it…documents to be transferred. For Photostream, the most recent 1,000 photos will be stored on the iCloud.
This looks like a great innovation from Apple and looks to cement their place as the premium operating system among mobile devices ahead of competitor Android, even with the introduction of Honeycomb.
