On page 195 of Thomas L. Friedman's "The World Is Flat" Release 3.0, the following paragraph appears:
The "mobile me" [emphasis mine] revolution will be complete when you can move seamlessly around the town, the country, or the world with whatever device you want. The technology is getting there. When this is fully diffused the "mobile me" will have its flattening effect, by freeing people to truly be able to work and communicate from anywhere to anywhere with anything.
I am not saying that Apple's MobileMe satisfies Friedman's definition, but could this be where Apple, uh, got its inspiration for renaming .Mac?