Google

2005-06-01

Online File Storage

I was talking to a friend the other day who had just purchased a digital camera. He asked me what I was doing to back up my photos / files. I told him that I has written a script to copy important files to my wife's pc over the LAN and time to time I burn them onto DVDs.

He said he was afraid to keep them on his pc because he was afraid to lose them so he was looking for an online file storage solution. It made perfect sense! The challenge is to find a 'saf' location. You do not want to put your files on to a server and find out that company went out of business the other day.

I know a few guys who are using fotki for storing their fotos (I never liked the name). They charge a flat fee of $50/year for unlimited access, not that bad actually.

If you just would like to carry around a few files, Yahoo hass its Yahoo briefcase which can hold about 30MB only. Some people are using their gmail accounts to store files but that is not really convenient.

There is a company called streamload, offering 10 GB storage area. The catch is that you can only download 100MB/month, yet it is free.

I checked some other site like flipdrive, xdrive etc. For the convenience they are offering, they are not that pricey either. The question remains: are they secure enough and are they going to be around.

In fact, I keep on asking myself, why would not Google (or Yahoo) go into online storage business. They have a good reputation and are trusted. As they are already offering GB e-mails they seem to have no issue with space.

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