Mobile first, cloud 'second'....

[Great deal]

I think they really need to get an internal handle on the marketing side. The development teams never shared information which led to many issues under Balmers watch. I know it takes time for large companies to shift, the marketing teams and bean counters need restructuring. Have to tip my hat to Apple as they seem to get it right most of the time.

Then MS was horrible in their marketing, because to a lay person, and apparently to Thurrot initially, the message appeared to be for backup and access.

Especially for media.

 

[a5cent]

Some seem to be arguing that it is all our own fault (the consumer) because we didn't read between the lines and carefully parse Microsoft's advertising and marketing.

No. Nobody is arguing that. In hindsight, I do think we were naive (including myself). That doesn't mean consumers are at fault, because MS could/should have maintained the 15GB camera role perk. It's just that there were signs we could have seen if we wanted to. The point is to learn from it and move on.

Unlimited storage is a separate issue, but here it's obvious that the sales pitch is a lie. It's impossible to offer unlimited storage. The laws of nature forbid it. And yet here we are, with many people again believing they can get unlimited storage for a set price (this time believing amazon).

Falling for it once was naive. Falling for the same thing again is stupid.

Ultimately, there are but two choices. We either pay for what we use ($ per GB) or we get a set price with a capped quota. The unlimited offer for a set price is just to reel people in. As soon as a service becomes popular, companies have no choice but to change it.

 

[Great deal]

Exactly, Amazon will change the offer as well, not if more when.

 

[Reflexx]

No. Nobody is arguing that. In hindsight, I do think we were naive (including myself). That doesn't mean consumers are at fault, because MS could/should have maintained the 15GB camera role perk. It's just that there were signs we could have seen if we wanted to. The point is to learn from it and move on.

Unlimited storage is a separate issue, but here it's obvious that the sales pitch is a lie. It's impossible to offer unlimited storage. The laws of nature forbid it. And yet here we are, with many people again believing they can get unlimited storage for a set price (this time believing amazon).

Falling for it once was naive. Falling for the same thing again is stupid.

Ultimately, there are but two choices. We either pay for what we use ($ per GB) or we get a set price with a capped quota. The unlimited offer for a set price is just to reel people in. As soon as a service becomes popular, companies have no choice but to change it.

Even phone carriers were willing to allows the customers to be grandfathered in with their current unlimited plans when there carriers decided to stop offering then.
You know things are bad when AT&T has you beat in customer service.

 

[a5cent]

Even phone carriers were willing to allows the customers to be grandfathered in with their current unlimited plans when there carriers decided to stop offering then.

You know things are bad when AT&T has you beat in customer service.

Apples and oranges.

For carriers, grandfathering in a person with an "unlimited" data plan costs them almost nothing. When the customer isn't using the service no cost is incurred at all.

For OneDrive, a single user can bind hundreds of dollars worth of storage assets, for as long as the offer is provided, even if that user does nothing at all.

Beyond both using the term "unlimited", the two services have absolutely nothing in common. If you want to call MS stupid for offering unlimited in the first place, be my guest. That is reasonable criticism. Expecting them to grandfather in the physically impossible is not reasonable however.

Expecting MS to grandfather in the 15GB online camera roll perk for Lumia users is a different issue entirely. At least that would not be promising the physically impossible.

 

[fiveaces01]

How is it that so many have missed where all signs pointed about the direction MS would be headed when they named Satya Nadella as the new man in charge of MS. He was running the Cloud division prior to his promotion. We have seen this type of "loss leader" promotion throughout our lives as consumers. I told everyone that I knew to be careful about how much they relied on this promotional One Drive storage since it became available. The new head of MS used to run the cloud division...does it not stand to reason that he would concentrate first on that which he knew the most about. They have been pushing for music and all Office stuff to be stored in the cloud free...for a while. Most of the people that I know who use smartphones have no concept of what the Cloud is and want no part of storing anything there. It may be great for business, but Mr. Nadella has made a huge error if he believes that storage will drive revenue the way his shareholders expect

 

[elindalyne]

They announced OneDrive would be losing unlimited storage last year... No one paid any attention to it.

 

[Reflexx]

Apples and oranges.

For carriers, grandfathering in a person with an "unlimited" data plan costs them almost nothing. When the customer isn't using the service no cost is incurred at all.

For OneDrive, a single user can bind hundreds of dollars worth of storage assets, for as long as the offer is provided, even if that user does nothing at all.

Beyond both using the term "unlimited", the two services have absolutely nothing in common. If you want to call MS stupid for offering unlimited in the first place, be my guest. That is reasonable criticism. Expecting them to grandfather in the physically impossible is not reasonable however.

Expecting MS to grandfather in the 15GB online camera roll perk for Lumia users is a different issue entirely. At least that would not be promising the physically impossible.

That's pretty much what I was referring to.

 

[a5cent]

That's pretty much what I was referring to.

Ah okay, in the post I replied to you seemed to be talking about the unlimited offer.

Okay then. Looks like we're on the same page.

 

[Reflexx]

Ah okay, in the post I replied to you seemed to be talking about the unlimited offer.

Okay then. Looks like we're on the same page.

YYeah. I can understand why "unlimited" can't continue. Though I do think it was pretty bad of them to blame it on abuse.

 

[TechFreak1]

Where on that screenshot does it say anything about being intended as a backup mechanism?

Everything I've heard from MS suggests OneDrive really isn't supposed to be used as a backup system. It's meant to synchrone small files across devices. That's definitely not what a backup system does.

I think, what really is key here is the perception so when you tell someone they have unlimited storage and can have all their files in one place.

What do you anticipate will happen?

Invariably it will become used as a mass back up solution lol.

Personally the removal of the 100, 200 Gig tiers (and to replace these with just a 50 Gig tier) along with the camera bonuses is what irks me the most as it impacts every single Windows Phone user.

I can understand why they did what they did however the way they went about it is just beyond any sort of rationale.

The abusers could have easily reprimanded since the TOS is there reprimand users for questionable content not penalize their entire user base.

They could have gone through a thoughtful approach:

1) They could have easily grandfathered the accounts using 1TB+ (as after all they have paid for an unlimited service).

2) locked down the offending accounts if the TOS was breached.

3) made new accounts going forward have only 5 Gigs (change coming into affect on dd/mm/yyyy etc).

4) offered the 50 Gig plans alongside other tiers.

5) kept the camera roll bonus, are they and their partners going to reword all adverts that showcase this bonus?

As otherwise it is going to be classed as miss selling and false advertising which is a criminal offence for which they will be heavily penalised for.

6) add 1TB increment add-ons so people have the option of adding more storage.

7) reduce new 365 accounts to 1TB after a cut off date.

The whole unlimited business was just fool hardy to begin with as it was an impossible task, us techies know there is no such thing as unlimited storage space when it comes to data. If they didn't roll out this "unlimited" service, no one would have batted an eye lid.

Perhaps some people envision the cloud in the literal sense :grincry:, that it's just there floating above absorbing all the data like a sponge - even then a sponge needs a good rinse out now and then lol.