My memory prostheses got a nice upgrade when I integrated my Outlook and Palm/Toodledo "notes" into a
single Cloud based repository with powerful OS X (Notational Velocity), Win (ResophNotes), and iOS (Simplenote.app) Clients.
I'm loving this ecosystem. There's speed, simplicity, data freedom, multi-platform and integration with Spotlight and Windows search (both ResophNotes and Notational Velocity can create local stores with each note a simple text file available for indexing and editing).
Did I mention Speed and Data Freedom? Just wanted to check. I'm copying a pasting notes from various scattered sources, building a single searchable repository of my memory extensions. It's a good complement to the memory stores distributed in my
blogs and
google reader shares and integrated via my
Google Custom Search Page.
It's all good fun - until someone gets hurt. Tonight Simperium, the creators of
Simplenote, had a
single ominous blog post:
Simplenote will be unavailable on the App Store for (hopefully) a short period of time. We apologize to our potential new users. You're welcome to create an account in the meantime and we'll let you know when we're back.
Right. Simplenote, you see, owns that Cloud repository I mentioned.
They've evidently been booted from the App Store. Their too-brief posting lends itself to grim interpretations.
I do so love the Cloud.
We must hope that Simperium "simply" violated an API rule with a new release, and that they'll be back soon -- hopefully with a longer news post. For now, however, a
comment on my tech blog is especially relevant ...
Blogger:Migrating Notes comment: Martin: "... how can I trust the 'Simperium' entity without any further information available?"
Cough. Good question. How do we know, for example, that Simperium isn't a KGB front mining data to be used by Russian crime syndicates paying for Putin's personal submarine? Maybe "sImperium" is a clue.
The short answer is I don't trust them. I don't trust Google or Apple either Simperium, so it's nothing personal. Or, more correctly, I trust these companies to do what's best for the people who control them within the limits of what they think they can get away with.
So I don't put anything in my Simplenotes that I wouldn't put in my blog. I keep my passwords in 1Password, not in my Simplenotes. I also don't put anything in Simplenotes that I can't afford to lose. All my notes are synchronized by
Notational Velocity (open source, the superb
ResophNotes does the same thing for Windows) to a local store on my personal hard drive, where the UTF-8 plain text files are also backed up hourly.
I also know that Simplenote is used by some serious geeks,
including the notorious John Gruber and the authors of ResophNotes and Notational Velocity. It it should vanish something like it would be recreated.
So I don't trust Simperium, but I'm not worried about them either.
Or at least, not panicky.
PS. All of this stuff is basically free. Simplenote.app is very cheap, and ResophNotes and Notational Velocity are free (donations accepted and encouraged - I gave!). The Simplenotes cloud service is normally free, I paid for premium service. This, by the way, is a bit worrisome. I'd rather Simperium had a clearer revenue stream.
Update 8/13/10: Simplenote responds in comments. They took themselves offline to fix an error in how they configured their update. I expect next time something like this happens their blog post will be more informative.
Update 8/23/10: Simplenote update just appeared in the App Store. So they're back at last.
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