iMav
The Devil's Advocate
Google to Offer Free Online Storage
Google is looking to take that concept and transform it into a full featured service independent from GMail. The Wall Street Journal first broke the story about this development yesterday.
Google has not announced how much storage users will get, but it is safe to assume it will be more than GMail’s 5 GB. It has been announced that additional space will be available in addition to the baseline amount, for a small fee.
The move will likely be expensive for Google, as it will require more storage infrastructure. However, it seems a logical one. The more information users store on the internet, the more they will be dependent on the internet and internet services in their daily computer usage. In effect this will shift users away from the desktop OS environment, dominated by Microsoft and into the internet services realm, dominated by Google.
For the user it is an exciting idea too, as they get more free space to store or back up their files.
One sticky issue raised by the new development actually stems from an objective Google has for its new service -- to allow users to share their files with a friend, similar to shared space on a Local Area Network. This will likely bring up unpleasant copyright issues for the company, whose subsidiary YouTube is already facing a bizarre legal onslaught from the rock-and-roller Prince. According to The Wall Street Journal, Google is currently in talks with copyright holders about how to approach this issue and avoid more legal troubles.
Google is looking to take that concept and transform it into a full featured service independent from GMail. The Wall Street Journal first broke the story about this development yesterday.
Google has not announced how much storage users will get, but it is safe to assume it will be more than GMail’s 5 GB. It has been announced that additional space will be available in addition to the baseline amount, for a small fee.
The move will likely be expensive for Google, as it will require more storage infrastructure. However, it seems a logical one. The more information users store on the internet, the more they will be dependent on the internet and internet services in their daily computer usage. In effect this will shift users away from the desktop OS environment, dominated by Microsoft and into the internet services realm, dominated by Google.
For the user it is an exciting idea too, as they get more free space to store or back up their files.
One sticky issue raised by the new development actually stems from an objective Google has for its new service -- to allow users to share their files with a friend, similar to shared space on a Local Area Network. This will likely bring up unpleasant copyright issues for the company, whose subsidiary YouTube is already facing a bizarre legal onslaught from the rock-and-roller Prince. According to The Wall Street Journal, Google is currently in talks with copyright holders about how to approach this issue and avoid more legal troubles.
