Consumer group Which? has filed a £3 billion lawsuit against Apple, accusing the tech giant of forcing iCloud usage and overcharging customers.
Consumer group Which? has filed a £3 billion lawsuit against Apple, accusing the tech giant of forcing iCloud usage and overcharging customers.
Even if you are part of the Apple ecosystem, there is zero reason to pay for iCloud. There are free alternatives.
This holds up for simple file hosting, but the entire suite of Apple apps supports collaboration, many with live editing features. Slow sync times would put a damper on that.
Do you mean office suite stuff like Keynote and Pages or are you talking more complex things like Logic Pro?
I don’t use logic, but yeah the whole iWork suite, Freeform, Reminders, Notes. I think HomeKit data is also synced, and given how much data corruption happens in HomeKit as it is, I would dread any other complication.
There’s also the transparent encryption that happens where even Apple can’t get your stuff.
I mean I’d be a fan if Apple published a requirement spec for the iCloud api and opened it up to third parties, but it will be a lot to unpack and implement.
I use all of those and I don’t need to pay for iCloud.
You must not use a lot of data on those apps then. My Logic files alone go easily over the free tier. Add to that iPhone and iPad backups for the family and there’s no way I could have anywhere near the same level of service without paying for iCloud.
Sorry, I didn’t mean to include Logic in that. I don’t use that. But like Homekit and Reminders and stuff? It’s never been an issue.
Why did you simply gloss over backups? But it’s not just that, there’s all kinds of files and documents.
Sure, if you use very little synced data and the free tier suits you, then you don’t need to pay.
That’s not the same as not needing to pay for iCloud. What you’re saying is that people don’t need to keep their data synced across devices but that should really be a user choice and not mandated by the platform.
What I’d like is for Apple to publish the iCloud API specs and allow 3rd-parties to offer alternative services that you configure somewhere in Settings.
Ideally, there would be a self-hosted option where you can simply point it to an arbitrary URL but I suspect the latter will never happen “because security”.
Of course, that last point is only really valid if their promise of E2E encryption is not more than a promise.
I glossed over backups specifically because, as I said, there are free alternatives.
For example, I back up my photos remotely to Google Photos. I also back them up locally.
The free tier is pretty good for many people. It’s mostly Photos that ever push people into actually paying for an iCloud account.
Yeah, and you can just use Google photos for free unless you have just a shit ton of photos.