Ask HN: Is cloud storage a solved problem?

3 points by boduh 9 years ago | 6 comments

What do you find lacking when using Box/Dropbox/Google Drive/iCloud/OneDrive?

Are there things that could be done better or are you happy with the way things are now?

eaguyhn 9 years ago |

I had a DropBox account that had been idle for awhile, when I received a notice that the email had been changed without my knowledge. I think the account was empty or with little value but I thought I should go recover the account to make sure.

DropBox support was horrendous, first robo-sending the same "check our FAQ" response for a week, then sending multiple "we'll have someone look into this" for another few days.

Bottom line is that I never was able to get back into the account and was never able to communicate with anyone.

I finally gave up because I'm pretty sure the account had nothing of value in it and after two weeks it was probably moot anyway.

boduh 9 years ago |

Based on the replies here it looks like most people are fine with the way things are now. Maybe this is the reason why we haven't seen any big innovations in this space in the last years?

PaulHoule 9 years ago |

Dropbox works. OneDrive might work now, it certainly did not work at the beginning. Office would try as hard as it could to make you try OneDrive, then you would try to save and it would fail.

byoung2 9 years ago |

I use Dropbox...I find search to be lacking. I would also prefer a system of tags instead of a folder structure.

slideboxx 9 years ago | |

Hi,

Wondering what you feel is lacking about search. I have a product that sits on top of Dropbox (and other cloud services) and provides slide-level (as opposed to file-level) search for PowerPoint files; I'm thinking this could be expanded to other types of files and would love to hear your thoughts.

Email in my profile if you want to go off line.

Thanks!

dagw 9 years ago |

Transparent selective syncing. Basically what Dropbox project infinity claims that they will solve.