Apple Gets Its Wings

Well, it finally happened. Apple is joining the cloud. This week the site launched the iCloud for developers. The company also unveiled its iCloud pricing, which includes 5 GB of free cloud storage, and additional storage at about $2 per GB per year. Developers and the media all seem to be ecstatic over the iCloud. My question is: isn't this so obvious? People are obviously always on the go, using many different devices and want to be able to access their things wherever they are. The cloud itself has been in existence for quite a while and used by companies such as Amazon. Why did it take such a long time for Apple to get on the bandwagon and why is it causing such a hoopla when this has clearly been done before?

This reminds me of a similar situation with Amazon and Barnes & Noble. Amazon was the first to launch an eBook reader- the Kindle. Barnes & Noble waited and iterated until it was able to release something to the market that it thought was perfect and could beat Amazon- the nook. Yet Barnes & Noble hasn't been able to catch up to Amazon's head start. The retailer hasn't been able to make up the ground it lost. Yet when Apple waits and perfects something, the company's seen as smartly waiting for just the right moment. This seems to be exactly the case with the iCloud. Apple will probably bring the cloud to the masses and become that much more popular when it launches. When launching a new product, timing is critical. And this of course, in additional to its flawless execution, is the key to Apple's success. Once again, it seems like Apple can just do no wrong.