Google GDrive - unlimited space for photo backup

[bee1000]

when you can just get more money from investors?

Google is publicly traded now, so they do need profits to keep their share price high. (Around $330 today)

From Reuters:

For the fiscal year ended 31 December 2005, Google Inc.'s revenues increased 92% to $6.14B. Net income totaled $1.47B, up from $399.1M. Revenues reflect the continued expansion of the Company's global advertiser base & partner network & the benefits of product improvements. Net income also reflects growth in higher margin Google site revenue & the absence of a charge related to the non-recurring portion of the settlement of disputes with Yahoo.

--
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ckeach

 

[Allen Greenky]

...Google will know more about us than the KGB ever did about their
own people. Google = Brave New World.

I used to try to 'opt-out' of banner ad tracking cookies (that didn't work according to my cookie manager, either my software was wrong or the trackers lied)

but on Double-click's opt out page was a sidebar that proclaimed that they would never use collected data about specific users to target advertising based on the user's religious nor sexual lifestyle.

This of course suggests that they would know.

--

moderator of the z-prophoto, photohistory, and kodakpro mailing lists at yahoogroups.com

 

[rander3127]

--Lets hope they don't censor it, as they've done with the Chinese version
of Google.
-Rich

 

[Bluesky123510]

The day will come when personal computing will be just a commodity like electricity, water, or phone service. As long as it works, who cares if it runs from your own desk, or someplace else.

You have no problem storing your voice mail in Bell co server ? Do you have a black berry ? You also have no problem keeping your money in the bank, because everybody does it, and you are safe being just one fish among the billions doing the same thing. The computing service will be the same, for CPU power or drive space...

 

[Meryl Arbing]

Well, since I know just how flimsy security can be and I don't have the attitude that if it APPEARS to work 'who cares?' I DO care!

In that vein, I DON'T have my voice mail stored on the phone company's server. I have a dedicated phone answering machine that I can turn on or off at my own whim and doesn't cost me a penny more than what it cost to buy it in the first place.

I don't have a Blackberry (our company tried them and found them inadequate AND a security problem).

My money is in the bank because it is safer than keeping it in a sock under my bed. If the bank is robbed, my deposits are protected (I am not even close to the limit!).

I have several layers of hardware and software firewalls on my home PC as well as anti-virus, anti-spyware software which are always updated to the current versions. I cast as small a profile on the web as possible.

The whole thing is about 'risk assessment' and how much 'exposure' you want. Storing my files on an external drive (uncontrolled by me and subject to scans and analysis by the host) is simply not a good idea.

Microsoft is soon to announce their Microsoft Live intitiative (you can see the betas now) where not only data but applications will be external to the user. So what you type on your 'word processor' will not be limited to your machine but will be also visible on a remote machine (and subject to keyword scans and analysis...Hi Homeland Security!!). I can see where corporations would find this attractive since they wouldn't have to buy 1,000 MS Office licences but, for the individual, we should keep our applications 'personal' and our data within our own computer.

The day will come when personal computing will be just a commodity
like electricity, water, or phone service. As long as it works, who
cares if it runs from your own desk, or someplace else.

You have no problem storing your voice mail in Bell co server ? Do
you have a black berry ? You also have no problem keeping your
money in the bank, because everybody does it, and you are safe
being just one fish among the billions doing the same thing. The
computing service will be the same, for CPU power or drive space...

 

[BorisK1]

Well, since I know just how flimsy security can be and I don't have
the attitude that if it APPEARS to work 'who cares?' I DO care!

Hard to argue against hard facts

In that vein, I DON'T have my voice mail stored on the phone
company's server. I have a dedicated phone answering machine that I
can turn on or off at my own whim and doesn't cost me a penny more
than what it cost to buy it in the first place.
I don't have a Blackberry (our company tried them and found them
inadequate AND a security problem).
My money is in the bank because it is safer than keeping it in a
sock under my bed. If the bank is robbed, my deposits are protected
(I am not even close to the limit!).
I have several layers of hardware and software firewalls on my home
PC as well as anti-virus, anti-spyware software which are always
updated to the current versions. I cast as small a profile on the
web as possible.
The whole thing is about 'risk assessment' and how much 'exposure'
you want. Storing my files on an external drive (uncontrolled by me
and subject to scans and analysis by the host) is simply not a good
idea.

Here's what I can do: split my files into "high security risk" and "low security risk" category, and keep the "low risk" ones on a google drive. For me, picture files are "low risk", because they don't contain much personal details about me, and wouldn't be worth much to a thief. I guess, if somebody was trying to trace my movements, they could look at the dates...

To me, this whole GDisk thing seems very similar to regular website hosting, just with a better interface and somewhat less public.

Microsoft is soon to announce their Microsoft Live intitiative (you
can see the betas now) where not only data but applications will be
external to the user. So what you type on your 'word processor'
will not be limited to your machine but will be also visible on a
remote machine (and subject to keyword scans and analysis...Hi
Homeland Security!!). I can see where corporations would find this
attractive since they wouldn't have to buy 1,000 MS Office licences
but, for the individual, we should keep our applications 'personal'
and our data within our own computer.

Replacing applications with services is different, because now you don't have a choice which data goes through the network, and (among other things) your firewall is basically rendered useless, because you don't know if it's MS Word Service requesting access to the outside world or a new MS Word macro worm.

Boris

 

[Wick Smith]

If Gdrive were available now, I would put on it documents and pictures that were not critical to my identity, but that I would like to have backed up and available from wherever I happen to be.

PaperPort used to have a service called PaperPort Online, where you could store your scanned documents. Apparently they couldn't keep it going. They now offer it essentially for companies (who presumably already have a backup strategy) and charge way too much for it.

--
-wick

 

[bee1000]

You bring up a good point. People are using Gmail accounts as portable hard drives more than as additional storage space.

--
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ckeach

 

[Bluesky123510]

Microsoft is soon to announce their Microsoft Live intitiative (you
can see the betas now) where not only data but applications will be
external to the user. So what you type on your 'word processor'
will not be limited to your machine but will be also visible on a
remote machine (and subject to keyword scans and analysis...Hi
Homeland Security!!). I can see where corporations would find this
attractive since they wouldn't have to buy 1,000 MS Office licences
but, for the individual, we should keep our applications 'personal'
and our data within our own computer.

-----------------------------

Some good points from both of you. Concerning licenses, users still pay, only the cost will be hidden (included) in the service fee user pay each month, just like the phone bill now covers hardwares, services for voice mail, call waiting etc..

Personally, I think it will come sooner or later, wether we like it or not. If you are afraid of using municipal water source now out of fear of terrorist attack with virus, can you still dig your own well for water, LOL ? We have no choice for water now (well you can pay dearly for bottled water), and no choice for PC later. Of course, it's still possible for you to opt to keep your important personal data on private equipments, but as Boris mentioned, normal data will be commonly stored offsite...

 

[RogerMerit]

I recently heard about this.

I don't see how they can profit from it. Anyway, it's impracticle without fast broadband.

Well, google hasn't confirmed it yet. But considering what they've
done with GMail, I don't think GDrive is too far off.

http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=1113

Any comments on how feasible this is? And how Google can profit
from this service?

I don't think this is an anternative to services such as pbase, but
it's a cheap way to back up my RAW photos off-site. Of course,
I'll still have another copy on my DVD's though, just in case.

 

[rjbc]

well, my mistake then. i was under the impression that you had to somehow confirm your number via a text message or something as opposed to just giving a phony one.

anyway, this whole unlimited storage thing is worthy of Oh God Part II or something. talk about making a deal with the devil. sure, you get unlmited storage, as long as they get unlimited access to your stuff.

oh, also nice timing is a judge's decision today to force google to hand over that surfing info to the governement. point is, the more google has the dime on everybody, the more they will be hit up by the feds and darn near everyone else for it too. 10 years from now there will probably be some sort of Google CSI, lol. I cant think of any better way to keep tabs on what people are thinking than to know what they are looking for. already now you have websites that automatically detect your IP address and from that deduce your town's name, then they actually insert that town name in the web page's code so u get a phony "find a date in "your" town!" kind of ad. and this is only the begining. I can already see the episode of Law and Order about some case where Jack McCoy tries to use Google evidence against a defendant.

 

[wilfredmrand]

Google has power unlike any spy agency, government or cartel has ever dreamed about. The've been invited onto Windows hard drives, they record all our searches, they have more dots than anyone can connect. And as a public corporation, they are (or soon will be) pathological. If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. How much will advertisers (and the NSA) know about us because of all these "free" Google "goodies."
--
Wilfred M Rand
http://www.pbase.com/wilfredmrand/