Does .Mac Need to Go '2.0?'

GigaOm is recommending updates to .Mac to make it Web 2.0-compliant, so to speak, including some interactivity for iCal calendars, a better Webmail interface and faster iDisk service.

I agree...I use iDisk only for occasional backups at this point, where at one time I thought it would be useful for file sharing in my office. Too slow...we got a dedicated FTP service. I use my .Mac e-mail account almost exclusively by POP downloading it to Apple Mail -- not only is the Webmail interface clunky, but Apple doesn't give me enough storage space (and I pay for *extra*) to use Apple Mail as my main account. And I use Apple Mail all the time to reply from different e-mail accounts from which I receive e-mail, etc -- something that Gmail, for one, can handle online. I'm a little wary of Gmail (I still bristle at the idea of storing my whole e-mail existence on Google servers), but I'm leaning more and more toward it, if only because Google offers the most elegant solution I've seen so far for Webmail via my Blackberry.

Apple might take a page from Google and Yahoo! and notice that people seem to be spending more time in their browser, accessing e-mail, reminders, calendars, address books -- even office apps. (To see Google's strategy in action, just stop by Google Spreadsheets and Writely, which Google recently bought...warning: not Safari-friendly.)

I noticed the other day when I was stopped by the Apple section at CompUSA that it seems MacBooks and Mac minis no longer ship with AppleWorks...maybe it's time for Apple to put an AppleWorks Web edition online?