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In an email to Apple employees, the company's chief executive conceded that it was a mistake to release MobileMe at the same time as the new iPhone, the App Store, and the iPhone

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and iPod touch software upgrade.

"We all had more than enough to do, and MobileMe could have been delayed without consequence," he wrote.

At its worst point, the botched launch left thousands upon thousands of MobileMe subscribers without email and in some cases messages were lost forever. Such was the PR disaster, that the normally thicker-skinned-than-a-rhino Apple took the unprecedented step of blogging on the ongoing problems.

Internal changes were bound to follow and Jobs revealed that Eddy Cue, the head of iTunes, will also assume responsibility for Mobile Me, reporting directly to the chief exec.

"The MobileMe launch clearly demonstrates that we have more to learn about Internet services," Jobs wrote. "And learn we will. The vision of MobileMe is both exciting and ambitious, and we will press on to make it a service we are all proud of by the end of this year."