What's going to happen to MobileMe?

Gone are the days of backing up your files to CDs, DVDs, or other physical media. The big buzzword today is cloud computing. Everyone is doing it these days, from storage companies such as Dropbox to multi-service providers such as Google and Amazon.

Apple has always had a foot in the cloud, first with iTools (which became .Mac), then MobileMe. Now, Apple is taking the plunge and moving forward with its biggest cloud endeavor to date, iCloud. So what does this mean for you, the end user? Let's find out.

Don't panic
If you're currently a MobileMe subscriber, you're not going to get cut off... yet. You'll be able to access your MobileMe account until June 30, 2012. After that, the service will no longer be available.

If you've tried to sign up for a MobileMe account recently, you probably already realize that the service is no longer taking new customers. That's because the debut of iCloud is right around the corner with the release of iOS 5 this fall.

Moving on up... to the cloud side
Transitioning from MobileMe to iCloud will be easy, according to Apple. Once iCloud debuts, you'll be able to sign up for it and sync your current MobileMe content and features with iCloud automatically.

The new syncing capabilities of iCloud are quite impressive, but keep in mind that they are only available on Apple's iDevices. Each device linked to your account on the service will be able to share contacts, email, photos, video, music, and more, which is something MobileMe wasn't able to offer.

Now for the catch...
You knew there had to be a catch, right? Well, there is. First, while the service is free, you're limited to only 5GB of storage space. Now, if we were just talking about contacts, calendars, and email, that's a lot of space; however, when you throw photos, music, and videos into the mix, 5GB fills up very quickly.

Of course, Apple has a solution ready for those of you who will need more storage. It comes at a price, and the exact details are still to be announced this fall. But that's not the only catch.

If you have a big music collection that you've purchased from iTunes, you'll be able to sync it to all of your devices for free. However, what can you do about music that you did not purchase from Apple? This is where iMatch comes in.

iMatch will scan your system for all of your music files and match them to high-quality versions in the iTunes database, allowing you to stream them anytime, anywhere, no matter where or how you got them. This service comes at a price ($24.99 a year), providing streaming at 256kbps (which is very good quality for streaming music).

The bottom line
If you're an Apple user, this should be a no-brainer for you. The syncing capabilities alone will be worth transitioning over from MobileMe, especially for the free portion of the service. If you're a music lover, picking up the iMatch program is another easy decision to make. While Amazon and Google have competing services offering music sync, they don't support all of your Apple devices (at least, not without some kind of technical hassle, if they do).

While free cloud computing services are cropping up everywhere, all of them put limits on the amount of free storage you can get. After that, each one uses a tiered pricing structure. We don't know what the cost will be for additional iCloud storage, but based on the pricing of the iMatch program, we're pretty sure it will be worth it.

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