November 27, 2010
This morning I was sitting at the breakfast table with my wife’s family. We were chatting about Black Friday and each surfing the internet to find the best deals. I picked up my father-in-law’s iPad. This would be my first authentic stab at the iPad. By “authentic” I mean that I’ve played around with an iPad in the past but haven’t ever really used it to accomplish a real task for myself.
As I was browsing the web I began noticing a few sites that didn’t seem to be compatible with the IPad. As often is the case, I began thinking that investigating and reporting on these would make an interesting blog post. The obvious and most glaring issue is, of course, websites built in Flash. By now we all know how Mr. Jobs feels about Flash. I snapped a few screenshots and went to email them to myself. As I logged into my MobileMe account I was met with a somewhat stunning reality. MobileMe would not allow me to send an email from the iPad. Instead it wanted me to “Set up Mail, Contacts, Calendar” on the iPad itself. All I could think was …. but it’s not my iPad!
There are several issues at play
MobileMe is prohibiting me from sending email from the iPad. I can’t login through the web to send an email and I’m certainly not setting up my MobileMe account on an iPad I don’t own.
An iPad, at least when using MobileMe, is apparently seen by Apple as a personal devise and not a device that would be shared.
I investigated the site to see if there is a way to get past this issue and simply login. Surprisingly, it doesn’t appear possible. This just seems odd. I wanted to see if I would have the same experience on my iPhone, I did. Although, I can more fully understand this restriction on the iPhone as a cell phone is generally a more personal device.
So what does this mean? I’d suggest Apple is unnecessarily causing a segment of their users undue pain. Maybe not a large segment but a segment nonetheless. The good news is, the solution is simple. Allow users to access MobileMe from their iPads, and from their iPhones for that matter, should they want to do so.
The larger question – is the IPad a personal devise or can it be shared?
