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BitTorrent Sync Is A Dropbox Killer, Or Maybe Much More Than That

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Re: BitTorrent Sync Is A Dropbox Killer, Or Maybe Much More Than That

#71

Post by petsos »

bigiain wrote: post #68
acabal wrote: post #33

I looked at BTSync the other day when researching self-hosted Dropbox alternatives. It looks like a great product and so far beats the pants off the closest competitor, Seafile, for ease of install and use. I was really impressed. But unfortunately it's not open source, so it comes down to an issue of trust--which, in the end, is the same issue with Dropbox and really the entire point of moving to self-hosted for me.…

"Do you trust BitTorrent to properly encrypt your data as they promise? To not send it to someone else on the sly?" I've currently got BTSync dealing with a bunch of "non-private" data, and EncFS (and BoxCryptor on OS X) encrypting the more private data I'm syncing with BTSync. I'm still "trusting" the BTSync app not to mess with my machine(s) in unexpected ways - but I have to trust every application I run to do tha…

If you are going to trust BoxCryptor you can as well trust BTSync directly.

Re: BitTorrent Sync Is A Dropbox Killer, Or Maybe Much More Than That

#72

Post by monkeynotes »

AndrewDucker wrote: post #36

It has a massive problem which Dropbox solves: the need for both computers to be on at the same time. I have a laptop. I have a desktop. They are almost never on at the same time. With Dropbox this is _fine_ - the files go from one to the cloud, and then to the other when it's turned on. With BTSync, this would mean that my files would never sync.

Also Dropbox offers offsite secure backup. If I loose all my machines I can at least rely on Dropbox retaining my data.

Re: BitTorrent Sync Is A Dropbox Killer, Or Maybe Much More Than That

#73

Post by westicle »

keiferski wrote: post #12
ronnier wrote: post #5

I'd say it could be troubling for dropbox. It's probably game over for https://aerofs.com though unless AeroFS drastically changes/pivots. For dropbox, they do have some advantages. Bittorrent brings up thoughts of piracy. Dropbox doesn't have that reputation and would be much more acceptable in corporate environments. Additionally, Dropbox has integration with a lot of apps and I don't see that happening with BT Syn…

1. A service with the word "torrent" in it will never be adopted by a corporate entity. (edit: "typical" corporation. Technology companies don't count) 2. You may be overestimating how much the average person cares about file storage size, 3rd party servers, or transferring large files.

A corporate entity is simply a registered company. I have several corporate entities, which I would describe as "typical" corporations. I would have no strong feelings one way or another about using such a service.

You might be thinking about a publicly listed company, which is far from a typical company.

Re: BitTorrent Sync Is A Dropbox Killer, Or Maybe Much More Than That

#74

Post by StavrosK »

adambard wrote: post #22
induscreep wrote: post #13

1. BT Sync needs to be open sourced and their security practices need to be peer reivewed 2. No version control in BT Sync like Dropbox has - killer feature in Dropbox IMHO

Why does Sync deserve a security audit and Dropbox not? If anything I'd say Dropbox is the more risky, what with storing all your files on their own servers.

Because Dropbox is clearly untrustworthy, there's no need to audit it. BTSync is potentially trustworthy.

Re: BitTorrent Sync Is A Dropbox Killer, Or Maybe Much More Than That

#75

Post by hayksaakian »

nl wrote: post #61
keiferski wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. A service with the word "torrent" in it will never be adopted by a corporate entity. (edit: "typical" corporation. Technology companies don't count) 2. You may be overestimating how much the average person cares about file storage size, 3rd party servers, or transferring large files.

A service with the word "torrent" in it will never be adopted by a corporate entity Absolutely not true. Eg: I know film theaters use private Bittorrent networks to distribute the multi-GB master copies of their films to cinemas (yes, they have hardware DRM etc where you need a unique code to be able to play, but they have no problem using the best tool for the job).

I'd read a blog post about this.

Re: BitTorrent Sync Is A Dropbox Killer, Or Maybe Much More Than That

#76

Post by tlrobinson »

petsos wrote: post #71
bigiain wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Do you trust BitTorrent to properly encrypt your data as they promise? To not send it to someone else on the sly?" I've currently got BTSync dealing with a bunch of "non-private" data, and EncFS (and BoxCryptor on OS X) encrypting the more private data I'm syncing with BTSync. I'm still "trusting" the BTSync app not to mess with my machine(s) in unexpected ways - but I have to trust every application I run to do tha…

If you are going to trust BoxCryptor you can as well trust BTSync directly.

You could argue that trusting two different entities for encryption and storage is safer than trusting a single entity for both. Two unrelated parties are "unlikely to collude" against you.

Of course I'd rather not have to trust either, especially with encryption. Is there an open source equivalent to BoxCryptor?

Re: BitTorrent Sync Is A Dropbox Killer, Or Maybe Much More Than That

#77

Post by zachlatta »

zzzmarcus wrote: post #51
EricDeb wrote: post #21

One thing I've wanted to do is access files remotely without downloading them (streaming/virtual drives, etc). Do any of these services allow that (BTsync, dropbox, aeroFS), or am I forced to download files before accessing them?

Checkout Bitcasa [ https://www.bitcasa.com/ ]. If I understand you correctly it does what you want. Their website is frustratingly scarce on technical details but I've tried it and it works as they describe it.

I've had nothing but frustrations with Bitcasa. They have good ideas, but I found their execution to be exceedingly buggy and unreliable.

Re: BitTorrent Sync Is A Dropbox Killer, Or Maybe Much More Than That

#78

Post by kmasters »

Although this may be a little blunt, I don't see how a company that caters to media theft is going to compete with Dropbox. Although Dropbox intentionally lets people register many accounts to they can do more or less the same thing. (Ever know someone with 20 dropbox accounts?)

This is the 800 lb gorilla in the cloud storage room. Providers like Dropbox, Box, SkyDrive, GDrive dont want to be cast in the light of Megaupload or BitTorrent, lest their business come under scrutiny. Hence they keep their data caps fairly low so you can't store a DVD on their service.

I dont use torrent software because Im not interesting in illegal content. I dont think regardless of their traffic stats BTSync is going to matter much to mainstream users.

Re: BitTorrent Sync Is A Dropbox Killer, Or Maybe Much More Than That

#79

Post by nobodysbusiness »

ronnier wrote: post #5

I'd say it could be troubling for dropbox. It's probably game over for https://aerofs.com though unless AeroFS drastically changes/pivots. For dropbox, they do have some advantages. Bittorrent brings up thoughts of piracy. Dropbox doesn't have that reputation and would be much more acceptable in corporate environments. Additionally, Dropbox has integration with a lot of apps and I don't see that happening with BT Syn…

It seems to me that Dropbox is becoming complacent. They still only offer 2 GB of storage for their free plan.

Someone else here commented about using Bittorrent to sync their music library, since the 2 GB that Dropbox offers would probably be too little space. But now there are new Dropbox-like services offering MUCH more space. The largest that I've seen so far is Copy.com, which offers 15 GB for free or 20 GB free if you sign up through a referral link (in case you want to try it out: https://copy.com?r=odoDlI).

Dropbox has name recognition, but how long can they get by on that when competitors offer 10x more space?

Re: BitTorrent Sync Is A Dropbox Killer, Or Maybe Much More Than That

#80

Post by usefulcat »

pivo wrote: post #69
AndrewDucker wrote: post #36

It has a massive problem which Dropbox solves: the need for both computers to be on at the same time. I have a laptop. I have a desktop. They are almost never on at the same time. With Dropbox this is _fine_ - the files go from one to the cloud, and then to the other when it's turned on. With BTSync, this would mean that my files would never sync.

I solved this problem with a $35 raspberrypi and a 2TB external USB disk that I tucked away in a closet at home. It takes very little power so I can leave it on all the time. The btsync command line version for ARM has worked well for me so far.

That's nice. But how many people are willing and able to do that compared to willing and able to install and use Dropbox?
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