Dear Steve and Co. I've never written to you before.
The keynote is just over and I am very happy with most of the announcements....
Except for the new charges for .mac. I've just read the online FAQ about .mac.
When you introduced iTools, you encouraged its use and promoted it as a free, value-added service to Mac users. Many loyal (some also very long-time) Mac users happily accepted your invitation to use this service, assuming that it would be around a long time and remain free for at least the basic services as introduced.
Many have created web sites that have been in place for a while, indexed by various search engines and referenced by many other sites.
Many have made mac.com their main email address and have subscribed to numerous mailing lists.
Now you say it's costing too much money to run. Well I can understand that things in life are often not free but wasn't the running cost to be included in the cost of a Mac?
This US$100=A$200 per year is WAY over the top for the average user who just mostly wants a basic email service and maybe a few MB of web space.
By all means charge for the extra services and storage capacity for those that need them but please leave the existing basic services alone.
If I knew you would be charging anywhere near this amount I never would have signed up.
I've also encouraged someone else to get a mac.com address for himself and his wife which went part way to convincing a long-time PC user to by a new iMac G4 recently. I strongly doubt they'll be subscribing to .mac.
But I guess it appears that's exactly what you want - to get rid of the trouble-makers "costing you money".
Anyone in Apple's management should have been able to see this would be an extremely unpopular decision and would get loyal mac users off side.
Yours in astonishment warren -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Warren Jones http://homepage.mac.com/warrenj/ Parkwood, Western Australia
