SkyDrive is a threat to Dropbox(pcworld.com) |
SkyDrive is a threat to Dropbox(pcworld.com) |
It's a seriously impressive, well integrated platform that costs nothing and doesn't tie you into keeping the data in the cloud. There's a copy always on your machines.
no-one is doing it as well as Microsoft if you ask me. Outside the mainstream tech press trendy Microsoft bashing I know a lot of people who are switching back to Live and Office 365. They're sneaking in the back door while everyone is bitching about them.
In general, the 360 is a pretty powerful freight train. "Add in 360 support" to almost anything Microsoft does and the picture changes pretty drastically.
I've noticed an uptick of the "poor maligned Microsoft" angle lately. It is a boorish tactic to neuter counterpoints (essentially the yang of the "fanboy!" rallying cry). I would argue that many Microsoft products get a pass they would not get from any other company.
I tried Skydrive with OneNote, imagining a world of integration and usability. It was a horrible failure, not least because Skydrive has a comical latency for changes to propagate, rendering it useless for many purposes. Add the terrible, terrible UI. Further the "bundled" angle is a tactic that most consumers and businesses are rightly wary of now, and it gives Microsoft little advantage.
Dropbox has nothing to be afraid of from Microsoft. And eventually Microsoft will simply abandon SkyDrive (after various rebrandings) and leave adopters in the lurch.
I know a lot of people who are switching back to Live and Office 365
Sure....
OneNote works fine for me. Latency is usually in the seconds range which is fine. I don't think you'll be switching devices every 5 seconds. Even on a shitty O2 GPRS connection it's fine for me.
There are a bunch of MS haters around, even on HN.
For example, Microsoft watcher and insider Paul Thurrott's site http://winsupersite.com is hellbanned on HN(banned from even appearing on the new page), most probably due to excessive flagging from haters and fanboys of other platforms, while Gruber's posts get top billing.
> I would argue that many Microsoft products get a pass they would not get from any other company.
Really?
Will SkyDrive manage to become a good competitor? I would expect so, especially given how Microsoft can push into the field by piggybacking it on Office, etc.
However, should Microsoft? No.
For Microsoft, SkyDrive will not sell more copies of Windows or Office. Instead, it will simply be another waste of money and resources on a feature that will not sway people to their products. If you're going to get Office, you're going to get Office - a cloud drive won't convince you over some other offering.
It won't really sell large numbers of Office, and the fact that less than 1% of people use more than 7gb (the free tier) means that it will make very little money overall.
Office will certainly sell subscriptions of SkyDrive, but they'll be free subscriptions mostly and the people won't really care about it. It doesn't make the core product offering more compelling, which seems to be their core strategy based on the yearly price.
Dropbox has done so well because they aren't just the first mover - they are the standard by which others are judged. With this in mind, Microsoft is making a mistake trying to make an offering to compete with it. They should have just made a deal with Dropbox in the first place.
Dropbox integration would be a fantastic selling point for Office; SkyDrive integration is not.
That sounds like an argument in favor of keeping the 25GB cap. Does Microsoft not trust their own data? Are they really allocating 25GB/user currently, do they need the revenue from the 1% that will now have to pay or what is going on?
Dropbox gives 2gb for free, so 7gb from Microsoft is more than enough to be a competitive advantage.
Also, by not starting out at 25gb, Microsoft can slowly increase the free rate, as and when necessary, and generate lots of free press and happy users along the way as well.
Lastly, since Google's service hasn't launched yet, perhaps it's not prudent to get into an arms-race right off the bat.
>If you have an Android device, we also encourage you to try other apps from partners built using SkyDrive APIs. For example with Browser for SkyDrive or Cloud Explorer for SkyDrive, you can view, access and upload documents or photos on your Android phone. Portfolio for SkyDrive lets you organize and upload photos from your Android phone in batches to SkyDrive. If you want to add SkyDrive support to your app, site or device, please visit our developer center.
Looks like there's OneNote and third party apps, but official support would be nice.
It's open source, and uses git to backup files. Not sure how close to your needs it is, but I'm sure there's other stuff a google search away.
Cubby - LogMeIn product .. 5Gb Free Cloud
+ "Unlimited peer-to-peer (P2P) syncing means no storage limits when you're syncing between your own computers. Storage limits only apply to cubbies that are synced to the cloud."
http://techcrunch.com/2012/04/12/logmein-prepares-to-take-on...
In my professional circle, everyone is using Dropbox. Dropbox is doing a great job. There's little incentive to move.
"Yes much like Google+ is a Facebook killer."
So GDrive too is destined to fail?
I guess it's cool to be snarky and earns you some points, but are you trying to make a point here?
Dropbox is good because is ridiculously simple. I've been using Windows 8 + Skydrive full time and well, it's not a sunshine.
It's buggy, and just upload files (not folders) and I don't believe it will get so much better after the official launch.
And yes, Dropbox is probably screwed. I've been using SugarSync just because it gives me more free space.
If google drive is just as good as dropbox, well, you know the drill.
Having the built in Office apps in Skydrive and the ability to have the same word doc available on every computer as well as the phone is very handy.
I believe amount of free space only become competitive advantage after services have the same service quality as competition and the same level of integration with applications using the cloud storage (editing, collaboration, project management, photo sharing, etc.).
As of now Dropbox has way more applications supporting it than SkyDrive so it seems Dropbox is still ahead.
Threat? No. An perfectly viable alternative? Certainly.
Mesh has a nice interface with baked in sync scenarios such as browser favorites and office settings. The quick and easy remote desktop is a good touch as well.
So, no Linux? Then SkyDrive is no threat to Dropbox, at least to my household.
(cID can be found in most SkyDrive URLs).
What % of people use Linux?
Personally, I think DropBox should have had a smaller, paid plan than the $10/50 gigs. I only needed about 5 -7 total.
Problem solved for now, though.
Edit: I should add that my gigs of stuff I uploaded to SkyDrive today took a fraction of the time that my DropBox uploads take (not entirely sure why, but I've always felt DB throttles large files when uploading).
I don't know what the story is with Thurrott. Because of the banning, it sounds like a special case that the mods of HN have ultimately decided on, not just the users. So I'm ok with believing that it's not just a story about factions and groupthink.
I really don't see anything remotely ban worthy on Winsupersite, do you?
I think you may be discounting businesses that actually purchase a lot of Office licences. SkyDrive can be a way of providing file-syncing and sharing that's 'good-enough' for their employees/company. (edit: by which I mean it's a valid strategy to try and protect your turf).
I can see an analogy here with Sharepoint. My (limited) experiences with Sharepoint have been annoying and tedious yet the fact that it integrates with existing MS products and is 'good-enough' has made it very successful for Microsoft [1]. I'm not trying to suggest that SkyDrive could be a $1b business but that we shouldn't write it off so quickly.
[1] http://www.businessinsider.com/microsofts-billion-dollar-bus...
I'm still dubious, especially due to the market penetration Dropbox has, but I guess we'll see :)
Dropbox is familiar to us and the circles we are in, but that doesn't mean it has any traction at all among the middle-America soccer moms using MS Word to make flyers for little league or the pet shelter. (The recent photo sync update should help with this.)
Techies typically "misunderestimate" the traction of entrenched tools among normals and the value of building add-ons for those entrenched tools.