Sidekick users lost data 'stored' on their devices, thanks to how the device depended on Microsoft's cloud service.
A cloud outage by a service owned by Microsoft has caused T-Mobile users to lose data stored on both devices and in the cloud. The service is run by Danger Inc., a Microsoft subsidiary that provides data services for Sidekick phones sold by T-Mobile. Contacts, calendar entries, photographs and other personal information of Sidekick users has almost certainly been lost for good thanks to a service disruption Danger said on Saturday.
By far, the best summary on the situation was a Tweet by @ThisIsTrue (Randy Cassingham) who wrote, That’s why they call it “Danger”: #Microsoft has no backup of users’ Sidekick data, loses all:
The amount of data and number of users affected wasn’t disclosed by Microsoft or T-Mobile, but the Sidekick support forums are overrun with complaints. And for while, those forums vanished … which caused its own set of outrage … but users seem to be posting their ire elsewhere.
As you might expect the loss of data has set up a firestorm of anger from Sidekick users. T-Mobile said that it would credit users’ accounts one month’s worth of the data service, and offered an FAQ with tips on rebuilding their contact lists. But users were having none of it, reports Computerworld. For what its worth, one user posted this:
“I just spoke to a lawyer and explain[ed] the entire situation,” said a user tagged as “Calsmail” last Thursday. “He informed me he would be happy to start a class-action suit against T-Mobile. He said he could not only get us out of our contracts but can more than likely get $50 per contact lost.”
No doubt a lawyer out there somewhere would love to sink his/her teeth into such a class action suit, should it be feasible to file one. The outage is causing folks to claim that trust in cloud computing has, in one fell swoop, been wiped off the map. If Danger can’t figure out a way to restore the lost data, this is absolutely true.
This phone relies on accessing Danger’s cloud service for almost all of its functions including storing contacts.
T-Mobile alerted Sidekick users of the outage on Saturday, promising an update of information today. Sidekick users are still waiting with held breath for an update on that information. The Sidekick 3G, which retailed for around $500, earned many rave reviews, such as this one posted below by Mobileburn.
Microsoft acquired Danger in February, 2008. Rumor has it that Sidekick would be a foundational service for the so-called “Pink” project which scuttlebutt says is a Microsoft-built phone and/or a tablet PC. With this disaster, I’m more doubtful than ever that Project Pink will ever materialize.
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