What features do you get if you use MobileMe?

• online storage
• calendar push / synchronization
• mail push / synchronization
• contacts push / synchronization
• online picture gallery
• tracking your iPhone / remote wipe
• back to my Mac

That’s a good set of features. You get everything that is necessary to keep your iPhone and your home and office computers synchronized. Plus some other stuff that can be handy.

But since we live in 2010 you can get nearly everything and much more as a free service.

I talked to some friends and they asked for alternatives to MobileMe. They own a iPhone but it is not critical that they always have up to date, live synchronized data that works reliable with a 99% uptime. They just want it as “handy addon”.

Since we live in 2010 you get nearly enterprise grade services for free. Let’s take a look.

Free services today

Back in 2000 when Internet spread there were many free services that sucked. They were unreliable and didn’t work as expected. You could only use them as a student that didn’t depend on it.

I think I don’t have to tell you that most of the popular free services today are great. They are used by many people because they are stable, fast and get the job done.

Trust

Switching from MobileMe to other solutions is a big step. You have one account provided by one company you trust.

Replacing it means that you’ll have many accounts provided by many companies. But can you trust them not to sell your data? Can you enter a phone number of a client or a appointment with the address attached without fearing that the data will be spread across various marketing services?

We live in 2010. You can. If a company would start selling your private data they’d be dead in a matter of hours after it is published.

Look at Navigons move to remove the paid application and replace it with the free one. So much bad press.  Even if they didn’t deserve it, they are on the ground, bleeding and people kick them in the ridges hoping they’ll die. Of course they won’t but hey – who cares.

Take down a company that did something you don’t appreciate was never so easy. And for some people it is a holy crusade.

So let’s close this and say: You can trust companies like Google. You know, they tell you their slogan “don’t do something evil”. Do you really believe they would lie to you? Sorry, could not resist,… Let’s be honest. Every company can sell you. They won’t if they think for two cent.

Replacements

Looking for some replacements is easy and challenging. There are many alternatives and providers offering a service or a part of it for free. Picking the right one is the trick.

You have to consider some points and make sure you are okay with them.

• You will have to create multiple accounts
• You have more configuration to do
• You won’t get “remote wipe” and “locate my iPhone”

If you have no problem with those three points go for it. If you really think locate my iPhone will help you one day stay with MobileMe.

If contact informations on your iPhone are so sensitive that deleting them on your calendar and waiting two minutes for your iPhone to synchronize is not fast enough you should get your own OSX server and never ever write something in a ordinary calendar because there is also no remote wipe.

Calendar, Contacts and Mail

That’s pretty easy. Go for Google. You’ll get everything and can connect your iPhone using the exchange protocol. You won’t notice the difference. Just make sure you keep your calendars private and don’t publish them. This would truly suck.

Google provides tools to synchronize everything with Google Calendar. No matter if you use iCal, Outloook, iPhone or Android. You can synchronize it. You can even get a application written by them if you believe it will be better. Hint: don’t go for it. It is not necessary.

Trust

Google is a big company that knows nearly everything about you. But they showed that they are reliable. If you trust Apple you can also trust Google. The chance that they sell you are the same.

And remember: They sell you premium services for your company. You can go enterprise without anyone noticing that you use Google.

Mails

I think we all have an existing email account or two. You can either let Google collect them or you can go the geeky way.

Setup z-push to push all your mail accounts to your iPhone. Without any server and storage between. Your account, your server, your push solution. It looks funny, even if I haven’t tried it myself. I know that it works since a friend is using it and I’ll try it myself the next few days.

Contacts

It looks like you cannot directly synchronize your contacts with Outlook. There are several 3rd party applications but I have no experience with them and I won’t recommend one since I cannot promise that they won’t trash your Outlook database.

Online storage

I love the fact that I can just upload a file, click “give me a link” and send it to someone. There are many ways to share files online.

Upload sites

Just use rapidshare, uploaded.to or on of those free file hosts you all know. Your data will be available for some days and people downloading it will be bugged with advertisements, waiting times and no available download slots. It isn’t fun at all but it works.

Get a server

If you have too much money just get a vserver by a hosting company. You have to configure it, you have to manage it, you have to reinstall it after it is hacked and used for warez distribution,… but hey: get your own server. It is cool and all the kids are doing it

Okay no more joking. If you share large files, if you need a lot of storage and if you need them to be available all the time either get a server hosted by someone else or if your Internet connection is potent enough host it at your basement.

Just keep three things in mind

1. you should be qualified to setup and run a server
2. you won’t have 100% uptime
3. you should really be qualified to setup and run a server

Running a server isn’t a joke and it requires a lot of work compared to other solutions.

Dropbox

Get Dropbox. You get online storage and synchronization across your computers and even get a application for your iPhone. It is limited to 2GB until you start paying but it should be enough for most users.

You can share files, collaborate and even have a undelete function if you accidentally delete something you need.

Dropbox is a great service and I love it.

Online picture gallery

Get flickr. You know it. It works. I don’t have to say much about it, don’t I?

Back to my Mac

This is a tricky one that you won’t get if you have no clue about computers.

The easiest way to get back to my mac is a VPN. I use IPsec since it is supported by all devices I use. Some people will prefer OpenVPN and that’s just fine.

Now if you have no idea what I’m talking about just go for something proprietary like Hamashi. It is used by gamers all over the world and it looks like it works.

What we get?

Everything. Except remote wipe and locate my iPhone. But I think it is fine. You’ll save 80€ a year.

Migrate your data

If you are using MobileMe and want to switch over to Google you don’t have to copy and paste your data. Migrating your iDisk to Dropbox is easy. Just drag your files.

This is not possible for a calendar and contacts. But there is a easy trick. Setup a computer to synchronize your MobileMe contacts and calendar with Outlook or iCal. If everything is stored on your system just synchronize it with Google. Migrating your stuff doesn’t require black magic. It is a matter of clicks.

So don’t give me this “it is so much work” shit.

You’ll have to create 3 (or four) accounts. You have to invest 30 minutes in configuration. And you save 80€ / year.

I just drove 2 hours on a freeway. I had to change directions 5 times. In those 2 hours I was talking nearly 80 minutes with 3 people using my iPhone.

If I would use my iPhone for navigation tasks I would still be driving and likely in the wrong direction,…

Repeat after me: “no navigation while using your phone is bad”

If this works I’ll add a mobile post section in my blog. This will result in more updates and maybe some interesting stuff – there are many strange things happening out there :>