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Save more with Google Drive

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Re: Save more with Google Drive

#41
post #24

I think at this point I'm a little more comfortable paying more for a company that I know won't abandon this market. I know Dropbox will be Dropbox in 5 years. How can we be sure Google Drive won't be shuttered in less time? Google is very haphazard with their web properties. Sometimes they shutter them, sometimes they stuff them in the closet. Google Reader, Wave, etc, you know. the stories. What scares me more are…

It's possible I'm mistaken, but all the examples of 'abandonment' you've listed are free. Here, you're paying. It's a business. You've got the same guarantee as you've got with Dropbox.

Google Checkout was abandoned and wasn't free

Re: Save more with Google Drive

#42
post #12

I wouldn't be surprised if this was some attempt to get more of your data for ad analysis. I'd rather stick with Dropbox or AeroFS, at least security/privacy is a priority there.

DINGDINGDING We have a winner. This is most likely why they don't support WebDav (where you could easily employ encryption layers over a standard protocol)

They should just give up the pretense they're providing a service and make it free.

We're the product.

Re: Save more with Google Drive

#43
post #16

I think at this point I'm a little more comfortable paying more for a company that I know won't abandon this market. I know Dropbox will be Dropbox in 5 years. How can we be sure Google Drive won't be shuttered in less time? Google is very haphazard with their web properties. Sometimes they shutter them, sometimes they stuff them in the closet. Google Reader, Wave, etc, you know. the stories. What scares me more are…

Is FUD really necessary?

I don't think it's FUD, adn I don't agree with the approach of 'it's free, so you have no say in it.' I wish that if a service was not working for a publisher (and therefore not getting any more development $) there were a protocol to either open-source it or offer it on a subscription basis with a public minimum target that needed to be reached to justify ongoing operation in its current form (eg Reader, which worked fine for many people).

Re: Save more with Google Drive

#44

I think at this point I'm a little more comfortable paying more for a company that I know won't abandon this market. I know Dropbox will be Dropbox in 5 years. How can we be sure Google Drive won't be shuttered in less time? Google is very haphazard with their web properties. Sometimes they shutter them, sometimes they stuff them in the closet. Google Reader, Wave, etc, you know. the stories. What scares me more are…

All of those were experiments and not paid products. I don't see Google shutting down stuff that people are actually paying for.

Re: Save more with Google Drive

#46
I use Google Drive and the new price seems quite nice to me.

That being said, I find the web interface for Drive to be awful.

What I want is for the web-interface to be more "desktop-like". For example,

* It's difficult to select multiple disparate files

* you have limited options on how to sort your files

* If you search for a file, it's difficult to open up the enclosing directory (at least I can't figure it out)

* previewing large files is slow/clunky/error prone

* the whole web-interface has an inelegant feel that I don't get with gmail and other Google products.

There's room for improvement there. JMHO

Re: Save more with Google Drive

#47

I don't know about Americans, but I hope Europeans are staying as far away from American clouds as possible. At least for government use, using non-open source American software should be considered a "national security risk" at this point, with no exaggeration.

Ha, as if European hosted providers were safe from US snooping.

Re: Save more with Google Drive

#48

I think at this point I'm a little more comfortable paying more for a company that I know won't abandon this market. I know Dropbox will be Dropbox in 5 years. How can we be sure Google Drive won't be shuttered in less time? Google is very haphazard with their web properties. Sometimes they shutter them, sometimes they stuff them in the closet. Google Reader, Wave, etc, you know. the stories. What scares me more are…

Who cares? If they close it, you signup for a competitor and re-upload the data. Even if they do close it, you'll have months to copy everything. And besides, if you're relying on a single system for all your backups, you're doing it wrong.

That's a terrible retort. Downloading and then uploading a terabyte of data can be very expensive depending on where you live, and it can also take a very long time.

Re: Save more with Google Drive

#49

I think at this point I'm a little more comfortable paying more for a company that I know won't abandon this market. I know Dropbox will be Dropbox in 5 years. How can we be sure Google Drive won't be shuttered in less time? Google is very haphazard with their web properties. Sometimes they shutter them, sometimes they stuff them in the closet. Google Reader, Wave, etc, you know. the stories. What scares me more are…

Fair point, Google does abandon projects. Although I think that Google is very focused on the cloud, it's a key market for them now and likely in the future. I think nothing is future proof but Google Drive is likely just as good of a bet as the others. Worst case, you know Google will give you plenty of options and time to select a new provider if they did indeed shut down Google Drive.

Or they might bump up the price 3X+ with short notice, like they did for the App Engine.
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