Apple iCloud beta goes live, pricing for US market revealed

Apple’s new and hotly debated data storage service, the iCloud, is now accessible to any developer heading over to iCloud.com.

The beta version of the Apple iCloud service, rumoured to launch fully to coincide with the iPhone 5 in September, is now live. It lets users remotely manage iWork data, such as documents and spreadsheets, email contacts and calendar dates.

US users have also been given a pricing guide. The 5Gb storage option is free, while the 10Gb option will cost $20 (around £12) a year. $40 (£25) will buy US users 20Gb, and 50Gb will cost $100 (£61) per annum.

As reported previously, users will be able to access data remotely by syncing it across different Apple devices. Additionally, you can buy music from the iTunes store and then, without having to copy it to your devices’ hard drives, listen to it wherever you are. The same thing will apply to apps.

Apple says: “iCloud Storage APIs enable your apps to store documents and key value data in iCloud. iCloud will wirelessly push documents to a user’s device automatically and update the documents when changed on any device — automatically.”

We say: cloud computing is not something individual (i.e. non-business) users seem too excited by – yet. The fact that Apple are taking it seriously means that this form of data storage will pick up steam, and until September, there is still ample time for the hype to build more. We’ll keep an eye open.