Apple Welcomes Customers to iCloud Before Official Launch

Although iCloud was not to be publicly launched for another few days, some Apple customers received emails from Cupertino welcoming them to the new service.

Customers this weekend were seemingly sent a premature email regarding iCloud, welcoming them to the service with a notification that the user’s email address is now the Apple ID one uses to get an iPhone, iPad, iPod touch, Mac, or PC set up.

According to a screenshot provided by a customer called Sam, Apple’s email reads:

“Dear Sam,

Welcome to iCloud. The Apple ID for your iCloud account is … and it’s what you’ll use to get your iPhone, iPad, iPod touch, Mac, and PC set up. Just follow these instructions and you’ll be up and running in no time.”

The provided link (naturally) doesn't work yet. Apple adds that, “Once iCloud is set up, it stores your content and wirelessly pushes it to all your devices. For example, buy a song with iTunes on your computer, and it will appear on your iPod touch and iPad. When you snap a photo on your iPhone it will automatically be sent to your iPad. You can start creating a Pages document on your iPhone, and put the finishing touches on it from your iPad. There’s no need to dock or sync to your computer. With iCloud, it just works.”

The message ends with the Mac maker saying: “We home you enjoy using iCloud. Sincerely, Apple”.

Announced in June, this year, iCloud has been described by Apple as a breakthrough set of Internet services that builds on MobileMe with the addition of several new offerings, including iCloud Backup, iCloud Storage, Photo Stream, iTunes in the Cloud, and others.

iCloud will be released this fall (likely tomorrow) alongside iOS 5 as a free service with 5GB of storage, with the option to get additional storage through paid plans. Purchased music, apps, books and Photo Stream do not count against the storage limit, while iTunes Match will be available for $24.99 (around 18 EUR) per year (US only).