If you’re going to give birth to something (overarching cloud services included), you’re going to have some labor pains…
Per AppleInsider, a number of users have vented their frustrations as they have attempted to migrate from MobileMe to iCloud. One person explained in an e-mail that they have called AppleCare, used online support, and even asked for help at a local retail store.
“I bought a MobileMe subscription when they came out,” the user wrote in their e-mail. “Until Wednesday I didn’t (realize) this created a new (Apple ID). I asked (iTunes) support to add this MobileMe address to my current (iTunes Apple ID) as this was to become my primary email address.
“On Wednesday when iCloud came out it became apparent that this MobileMe email address could not be verified on the MobileMe account as it was in use by my old (iTunes Apple ID). So (I) went to appleid.apple.com to try to change the Primary email address to something different in my iTunes AppleID but it wouldn’t let me.” Calls made to AppleCare couldn’t resolve the problem, they said.
It’s a similar story for another user, who has one Apple ID used to purchase applications and music, which is separate from the e-mail address used for their MobileMe account. The person is in a position where they must choose between the e-mail address associated with their MobileMe account, or the Apple ID that they have used to purchase applications and music.
Another person said that upon setting up their iOS device, they were asked to create a me.com e-mail address, but they were unable to do this on an iOS device or a MacBook Air.
The users stated that after speaking with a senior technical support representative at Apple, they were told that Apple is “not allowing new me.com e-mail addresses,” but only allowing MobileMe accounts to be converted to iCloud. The representative allegedly indicated that Apple has been receiving many calls about the issue, but they do not know when a fix will be available.
A similar list of headaches for MobileMe users making the move to iCloud was also detailed Monday by Chris Foresman of Ars Technica. He noted that the issues can also apply to users who have shared an Apple ID with family members, allowing purchases like software from the App Store to be installed on multiple devices — a practice allowed with Apple’s terms of service.
“Unless all devices are going to be synced to the same data store — with everyone sharing contacts, calendars, and other information — other users who were previously dependent on that account may have to re-purchase apps or music,” he said.
Apple CEO Tim Cook allegedly indicated in an e-mail in September that Apple is working to allow users to merge multiple Apple IDs. But that ability has not yet arrived.
Apple launched its free iCloud service last Wednesday, along with the release of iOS 5 for the iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch, and an update for Mac OS X 10.7 Lion adding iCloud support. iCloud will back up users’ personal data on their iOS device to Apple’s remote servers in the cloud, and also keeps data, documents, calendars and contacts synced across a number of devices with the use of an Apple ID.
If you’ve had any issues in your own MobileMe to iCloud transition, please let us know in the comments.
11 replies on “MobileMe users vent frustrations about iCloud transition issues”
My daughter and I have shared phone service. She changed her pass code. I don’t know it. iCloud is disabled in my phone. What can I do? If I delete it will I lose everything.?Everything is turned off in settings. I have a 3G she has 4
I have tried and tried, and can’t figure out how to move it over. Very frustrating!!!!!
i am among many MOBILEME clients that have lost their CONTACTs during migration to ICLOUD……no satisfaction and resolution yet….I love apple with passion but its seems litigation is a direction i might need to consider to get appropriate tech support man-hours allocated to resolve….yikes
balls! I have migrated to iCloud with (relative) ease. Now I find that the shared calendar that my girlfriend and I use (she is on MobileMe and can’t migrate as she has a iphone 3G cannot be shared between a mobile me and an icloud user. useless. that’s it, google calendar here i come. I am bored of constantly upgrading and poor backward compatibility.
Luckily my transition seems to go without a hitch…except for having to wait several hours to be able to do it, probably because Apple’s servers were maxed.
I am having similar issues with my MobileMe/iCloud transition. In my case, I have a .mac account as well as a MobileMe account, as I started using this service when it was originally called .Mac. When I try to register for iCloud using my MobileMe ID, it says the email address is associated with another Apple ID. I can’t even use the App store anymore, as I get errors saying my password is incorrect or the account has not been verified, but when I try to go through the verification process, I get the same error about the email address being associated with another Apple ID, so the verification does not go anywhere. It is pretty darn frustrating. I think I am just going to stay with MobileMe until it disappears next year and forget about iCloud all together.
I now have an Apple ID for purchases which is my primary none Apple email address & a mobilme/Apple ID email address & somehow created a new @me.com email address that was my new iCloud address but I use my original Apple ID to log into my new iCloud account. All this was done before I figured out that I was just supposed to convert my mobilme acct to the iCloud acct???? Now my iCal is all out of whack!!!! I have one calander on my iMac that looks different from my iPhone that looks different from my iPad??? I used to be the Apple master now I am Apple Sauce…..Anyone know how I can get my iCal to look the same on every device?
I think there’s a lot of FUD out there on this issue. Apple’s to blame for very poor documentation, but for me at least it’s actually worked quite well.
I managed the transition on 6 iOS devices, 3 iPods and 2 Macs sharing the same iTunes Apple ID (for app, music and video purchases) and converted two MobileMe accounts to two new iCloud accounts. (4 devices use one iCloud account and 2 devices use the other).
To its credit, Apple has pretty clearly documented that you can use one Apple ID for iTunes and a completely different one for iCloud. Just input the different version in the Setting panel for Store (in iOS) and log in under that account in iTunes (for OS X).
What Apple hasn’t documented very well is that you can continue to use iCloud just like you used MobileMe and you can sync to multiple iCloud accounts on your iOS device through the Mail, Contacts, Calendars panel (the only feature that isn’t available is iMessage since it’s only associated with the iCloud panel).
For example, if you wanted to share calendars with your spouse, you can simply add her iCloud account as an additional Mail/Contact/Calendar account and sync calendars. Ditto on contacts. You simply turn off the features you don’t want to share (e.g., Find My iPhone, iMessage)
It’s been a remarkably painless transition. Haven’t checked our iWeb site yet, but iDisk , iMessaging, Find My Friends, Find My iPhone, etc. all just work.
Heck, Apple even gives you extra free storage in iCloud (carrying over the 20 GB you had in MobileMe) and continues to give you that same free storage in MobileMe (e.g., on your iDisk).
I’m still crossing my fingers that Apple decides to keep iDisk around — even as a paid option. It’s simply a more elegant solution than third party services.
I use an MobileMe alias as my main email and wanted to change my alias to the main email and apple support says I can’t make it a main email but only as an alias pretty upset
I moved my MobleMe account to iCloud and now I cannot update my iWeb web site. Apple said it would keep working until June but my web site is now static.
Same issue here! Have you found a way yet to update your MobileMe iWeb website after transitioning to iCloud?