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Another Death in the Cloud As Apple Kills Off iWork
Google is retiring the iGoogle page, but on a much shorter time scale, Apple is shutting down an iService of its own: the cloud-storage site iWork.com (linked to Apple's office apps suite iWork) is slated to go offline at the end of this month. Says the article, over at SlashCloud: "As of that date, 'you will no longer be able to access your documents on the iWork.com site or view them on the Web,' reads Apple’s note on the matter, followed by a recommendation that anyone with documents on iWork download them to the desktop." Both of these announcements remind me why I covet local storage for documents and the ability to set my own GUI prefs.
Makes sense as they are a consumer brand and not targeting the workplace.
Seems like they're just moving their online document storage service from iWork.com to iCloud. It's not like iDrive, where they killed it and offered no replacement.
There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
iWork.com was always in Beta. Documents sharing services were incorporated into iCloud thus making iWorks.com redundant.
Says the article, over at SlashBI
And that's when I stopped reading.
...where your important business data is as misty amd vaporous as its namesake. very eponymous if you ask me, and just as likely to evaporate.
Silence is a state of mime.
Just as it's not a good idea to have a single copy of your files on a single disk it's not a good idea to have a single copy of your data in "the cloud" either. Cloud storage is useful, especially when using multiple computers but it's not a substitute for local storage and backups (but does make a good off-site backup). But you have to be prepared to switch storage providers and go through all the hassle of uploading your data again if you rely on someone else to store it. If it comes to that at least having a local copy of your files means you don't have to download them first before you can upload them again.
SlashBI still exists, apparently.
So using online storage negates the use of local storage? What?
Glad to see this stupid product die. The name alone would make me suicidal if I ever had to use it.
Nothing like a blatant reminder, first thing in the morning, that you have no choice but to slave over your daily toil, when you've got a subliminal reminder found in a name like "iWork".
Why is the chrome icon used for this story? Editors can't differentiate between Google and Apple anymore?
Oh wait, that's a Microsoft Product.
I for one am not surprised about this. Personally, if you are fucking stupid enough to use the 'Cloud', you deserve what you get. Someone will either steal it, or it will be deleted without authorization. Yeah, like I am going to let someone else manage my private data and documents.
Why is it that most of the people that I encounter seem to have been shat from the Sphincter of Mediocrity?
But Apple actually announced this back in early March, and as others have pointed out at least have a path to iCloud in place.
I believe the next wave of successful internet startups will be based on ... local storage.
The new service from AppleGoogleMicrosoft. Put your files there. Store them. Depend on them. PAY for their storage. And we'll just say bye to the whole thing when some MBA-asshole (but I repeat myself) wants to make his bonus by "saving" money this quarter.
Please do not read this sig. Thank you.
I got in an argument with essentially my whole class by saying that we never going to fully get rid of system in the home and probably at work. Everyone was "Keep the data in the cloud, we can stream anything all the time, all I need is my smartphone." They brushed off my security arguments, the fact that communications can go down, and you're really going to compose spreadsheets and reports on your smartphone? It was an MBA class, by the way.
Vote monkeys into Congress. They are cheaper and more trustworthy.
Except that this was announced 4 months ago and documents can be migrated to iCloud. But, yeah, besides that, your post is totally on the mark.
Feels great being one of the few who actually used igoogle. occasionally.
now uCan slack
Great then I'll have more time for my iHobby.
Don't sign up for iCloud. They'll probably drop that, too.
"Cloud" services have short lifespans. About two to four years from startup to shutdown seems typical. Google and Microsoft have both dumped many of their online services already. Telco "cloud" services, like Sprint's PictureMail, have been dumped. Many online music services from PlaysForSure to WalMart Music collapsed. Cloud APIs don't last too long, either; Yahoo Search, Yahoo Boss, Google SOAP search, and Hoover's business search are all gone or on the way out.
The shutdowns are getting faster, too. Now, 30 days from announcement to "all your data is gone" is apparently acceptable. Don't put something in the "cloud" and go on a long trip.
...where if you accidentally forgot to move some piece of paper from one drawer to another within some arbitrarily-announced amount of time, a guy would come into your home/office and shred it.
The success of cloud services is testament to one thing: just how unimportant most data is. The first world is a circle-jerk of pointless "service economy".
Seriously, Apple abandoning iWork is the fundamental equivalent of dropping floppy drives.
If new computers are not going to use floppy drives then you will have to transfer them to a different storage medium if you want to access the content after the fact.
Dropping an iService is equivalent to moving your content to another form of storage, whether its physical or virtual.
What would be "nice" is for Apple to provide some kind of utility or tool to make conversion easier. iWork.com should now have a button on it to zip up and download one large file of all your content rather then having to manually move individual files to your desktop. Of, zip it up and move it to Apple's new cloud storage, or convert to new Numbers/Pages/Keynote files stored in the cloud, etc. There are about a dozen ways Apple could make this easier for people rather then just cutting the power a month from now.
Its good for old services that are not used to die and allow companies to focus on providing better services people actually use. The opposite is Windows which supports every freaking hardware and software standard on the planet even if only .1% of the people use any of it. I am sure there is still code buried deep in the Windows kernel to support 8" floppy drives.
In the long run, everybody hates change, but they always seem to love the results.
I haven't thought of anything clever to put here, but then again most of you haven't either.
but what the heck are they going to replace it with?
You go into an app, and see the list of documents that go with that app.
Or you receive a type of document in email (or by a dropbox app) and select an application that can open a document of that type.
The file system is horribly, horribly confusing to non-technical people. If you really want to bring computing to the masses, the file system must go. I'm not sure if what Apple is doing is the best approach but the computer industry HAS to try something else.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Oh wait, that's a Microsoft Product.
Actually, NT sounds just like "en tee" = "I don't work" or "I won't do it" in Finnish.
BTW, this is not a joke, either.
Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. - Voltaire
The new service from AppleGoogleMicrosoft. Put your files there. Store them. Depend on them. PAY for their storage.
The reason they keep shutting down is that in fact you DON'T pay for them.
Something that exists as a loss leader is way more likely to vanish than something that makes it's own way.
That even includes something like dropbox...
It doesn't mean you shouldn't store things there though, just that you shouldn't rely on it always being there...
iCloud is a little more stable than most contenders though if only because it is the easiest way by far for people to backup iOS devices.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
this is not a joke, either.
well it sure wasn't funny.
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
It was purely a 'document sharing' service. It is BECOMING a cloud storage service via iCloud.
So apple give notice the iWork is going away, moving actually, but they mention igoogle service which wasn't even the same type of thing?
Another examples of Timothy's shining idiocy.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Company drops support for old product rarely used anymore. A few people are upset. News at 11! In Google's case it seemed more that they are just still trying out different user interfaces more than dropping a product.
http://interserver.net/
Unfortunately, iCloud is simply keeping your devices in sync. All the data is stored locally on your devices and not streamed on demand. Thus you must pay the Apple tax for flash storage on all your devices.
I have taken to cloud storage in a big way and mostly quite like the convenience of it. But increasingly I am now forced to react whenever someone sneezes in Mountain View and decides to shut down something. I was affected by Google Pages to which I had links from all over the internet. I had some software downloads on that and the new Google sites is terrible. It is not so much having to move your files. The problem is that other things depend on your process and those all are affected. In the case of my free software, I could not be bothered to move the web-pages over to my server so I just deleted the whole lot.
So, I you needed normal map correction software, Lightning fast image sharing through IM you are now missing out on my free software.
I used Buzz a little, got shutdown too. Not too much of an issue but I was considering to put effort in creating a decent following on it. Glad I didn't. Also gral I never jumped on the Google Wave bandwagon either.
However, I have used iGoogle from the moment is became available and right until today that is my control center. The default home page on all my computers.
In one view I can see my appointments, emails, slashdot, bookmarks and recent google documents. Where else can I have that?
So, now the shut that down, I am forced to change the way I do things. And this is really the tip of the iceberg. On Google+ I have a personal and business page. Growing a following takes effort and time but what if they shut that down? In a smaller sense the cloud is also starting to prove downsides.
They are forever "improving" the user interface experience. This means that from one month to the next I am never quite sure how to access my Adsense control panel or other account details. Stuff changes constantly, layouts and styles change and it affects my productivity.
There are real benefits to local software. Although unused, my old Office XP will still run on my windows 7 machine without me having to re-learn how to use the software all the time and forever hunting through menus to find back a feature that I am sure is there somewhere.
I used to blame Microsoft for never sticking to anything (Enter Silverlight) but in all honesty, their OS is remarkable. It will still run very old windows code and I think they do deserve to be recognized for that. In contrast, my new Galaxy S3 android phone will no longer run a $6 racing game I purchased for my Google Nexus One two years ago.
In short: The big providers are their own worst cloud enemy because they keep changing the platform and rules of engagement. And don't give me the "But it is free what do you expect" argument. It is not free at all. I pay for it with information about me and exposure to adverts.
Apple did NOT "kill off iWork". (The title's only 100% wrong; hey, that's not so bad, right?)
iWork is a software suite that's cruising along just fine. iWork.com – hey, a different name! – is closing down. What the post forgets (?) to add is that its functions are not going away; they're simply moving to Apple's new shared home for cloudy things, iCloud.com.
In a separate news item, Apple's MobileMe service is also closing down – but again, that's because much of it is moving to iCloud.com. (Not all of it; as others note, components like iDisk are just disappearing. They could theoretically re-emerge on iCloud, though, if Apple can finally figure out how to do all of its online services well.)
Where am I going to store all of my bank statements and customer data? I can't store it locally on my own database that wouldn't be as secure as turning it over to Big Corp.
Both of these announcements remind me why I covet local storage for documents and the ability to set my own GUI prefs.
great, enjoy your 1993 desktop computer experience. basically, since there are a few examples of cloud services not lasting until the end of the universe, you won't use them. you did read where YOU wrote that the files can be downloaded to your desktop, right?
i'd get it if they went offline without warning, but that's not what's happening.
The file system is horribly, horribly confusing to non-technical people
Moving away from the file system is horribly confusing to me. When folks build up a collection of hundreds of documents and want to keep them well-organized, they drag them into folders. What's so confusing about that, especially when done using a pretty GUI? It's a great metaphor for how non-technical people keep real-world paper documents organized. If anyone has implemented a superior organizational concept, I haven't noticed.
You go into an app, and see the list of documents that go with that app.
Terrible! I want to see my collection of folders and documents in the glory of its full entirety, not filtered by whatever app I may in at the time. At the very least, I need to know what volume the documents are stored on, so I know whether they've been backed up. (And so I know which cloud service to blame when they disappear, get corrupted, get compromised, etc.)
How about we educate the masses about the power of the file system, instead of dumbing down the interface and snatching that power away from techies and non-techies alike. That's a huge step backwards.
That that is is that that that that is not is not.
Actually, NT sounds just like "en tee" = "I don't work" or "I won't do it" in Finnish.
Believe it or not, Finnish sounds just like the English word for, "I'm done with this." And Nokia is starting to sound like the English word for, "I'm SO done with this." Those crazy Finns...
*sigh* Do you understand that the "actual implementation into files, folders, and hierarchy" need not be an ACTUAL HIERARCHY OF ACTUAL DIRECTORY ENTRIES on disk, but could instead be stored in a more secure, more easily indexed, and more flexible fashion (such as a db filesystem), but present to the user as a sequence of folders, or other similar "organizational" metaphor?
This allows for things like multiple paths to the same file, based on metadata about the file, instead of a situation where you end up with about 70 copies of the same file strewn all over your "nice neat" metaphor like filesystem bukkake.
It's like you've never heard of the motherfucking MVC pattern. Jesus christ.
In the UK, 75% of households have a computer. By any definition, the masses do have computers with warts, filesystems and all.
Just because they have them does not mean they use them with great regularity, or without difficulty.
Also I beg to differ on these computers "having filesystems". What MOST of them have is a Desktop, and that is it - because that's where people put EVERY file.
Which means they lose tons of stuff...
This is not giving people access to the powers computers promise. It is tricking them into placing valuable memories where they can be easily destroy and then you laughing at them for being "stupid".
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
People have no problem intuitively understanding that concept.
Yes, they really really really REALLY really really do.
REALLY.
I've done support for family. I used to do computer support at a college. People DO NOT understand folders, nested or otherwise, and there is no amount of lipstick you can put on that pig to make it so.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
As daunting as the idea of moving away from a file system may be, something like the old BeOS file system could be interesting. You could use it like a traditional file system or you could use it like a database. Every file had the potential for lots of user defined meta data beyond the usual date/ownership etc. so if you wanted to you could just dump all of your documents in one big heap then select e.g. all wordprocessing documents about a certain subject or maybe all music files with a certain genre.
Having used it for a while it did become quite compelling, even to a luddite like me and I missed it when BeOS died. Despite being a luddite I'll acknowledge that there are good alternatives
Everyone was touting the "cloud". It's the next big thing, they'd say. You can get at your stuff from anywhere, they'd say.
But you're screwed if the service gets shut down, I'd reply.
That won't happen, was their reply.
Yeah, riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight.
(I'm expecting Google Docs to go next.)
Well, I can't speak to your experience, but I also have done support for family, college faculty, students, and corporate users and found the exact opposite. When explained and demonstrated clearly, people had no problem understanding the concept.
Of course, the concept of folders is different from actually using them in practice. A lot of people found them a pain to navigate, but once they were shown tricks such as pop-up paths, shortcuts, sidebar aliases, favorites, etc. they were able to navigate much more easily.
I did support one Ph.D. professor, a well-known researcher, who kept everything he created on his desktop - and I mean EVERYTHING! :)
"Slow down, Cowboy! It has been 3 years, 7 months and 26 days since you last successfully posted a comment."
I'm not a big RMS fan, but he's been warning people about proprietary services like this for years and we've all been bitten by them. I just had to move the contents of my mobile me iDisk to Amazon Cloud Drive. That took some time to download everything and upload it again. (7GB of data) I'll have to deal with it again when Amazon kills their service someday.
We need an open source, p2p like network for our data so there's redundant copies everywhere.
MidnightBSD: The BSD for Everyone
Makes sense as they are a consumer brand and not targeting the workplace.
I guess the -1 means apple fanboys thought you were trying to slander the company.
I'm sure it must be something else, probably why mine will be modded down too. I wonder if you can spot it now.