Is Dropbox still the best for cloud storage?

[Razeus]

... communicate, publish, publicly perform, publicly display and distribute such content.

That's quite clear. They can do basically ANYTHING with your data. PERIOD. Microsoft TOS says that they can access your data, scan it, and use it to improve their services, but no where does it say that they can publish it, distribute it, or make it publicly available. Dropbox, doesn't have anything like these, in fact they need your permission to do just about anything with it.

Sorry, not all services are as bad as Google's TOS'. You have Picasa on your machine, guess what, they can scan the pictures on your computer and do what they want with them. You have Chrome installed; they can monitor everything you do online and even what you do on your computer!

Oh really, I suggest you read it again? How else are they able to take your upload photos and distribute them to your phone. And if you give someone the link to a photo to make it publicly available? How do you think that happens? Read their TOS again.

 

[CylonGlitch]

Oh really, I suggest you read it again? How else are they able to take your upload photos and distribute them to your phone. And if you give someone the link to a photo to make it publicly available? How do you think that happens. Read their TOS again.

Where does it say that they WON'T do that? Look at it from their stand point or from a lawyer stand point. If they wanted to, they can do whatever they want with your information. You've given them that permission. Sure they may not use it, and likely won't use it. But that doesn't mean that they won't change their mind in the future. Are you willing to risk that? Are you willing to say, oh well, I wrote a book, music, song, etc and google is now using it. That's OK.

It could be that a musician write a new song, puts it on his account for his friend to review. After that it is released by the studio only to find that Google decided to release it as well since it's a hit and are making millions off of it; giving nothing back to him. According to the TOS they are more then capable of it. Will they do it? Hopefully not, but there is nothing there from stopping them from doing it.

If you're just storing homework assignments or something trivial, most likely you'll never have a problem. But what happens if that student storing his homework there becomes the next Einstein. They now have the rights to sell all his previous works.

I'm not willing to play with my privacy, not willing to give it up. There are other services out there that don't have such TOS', so using one of those is a better option.

 

[Robisan]

They can do basically ANYTHING with your data. PERIOD.

The rights you grant in this license are for the limited purpose of operating, promoting, and improving our Services, and to develop new ones.

So, not "ANYTHING."

 

[CylonGlitch]

The rights you grant in this license are for the limited purpose of operating, promoting, and improving our Services, and to develop new ones.

So, not "ANYTHING."

Which comes right after you giving them full rights to do anything they want with it. Which if you read it from a legal stand point, can be ANYTHING. Advertising, marketing, research, planning, anything including selling it (could be classified as promoting). That line you quoted is so vague, and open, it means nothing.

 

[Robisan]

Which comes right after you giving them full rights to do anything they want with it. Which if you read it from a legal stand point, can be ANYTHING. Advertising, marketing, research, planning, anything including selling it (could be classified as promoting). That line you quoted is so vague, and open, it means nothing.

Right. Because "ANYTHING" the mind could conceive without boundary or limitation and "limited purpose of operating, promoting, and improving (Google's) Services, and to develop new ones" are EXACTLY THE SAME.

 

[BenTrovato]

Does anyone use OwnCloud?

 

[viizi]

I like copy.com because of the storage space, however the web browser file management is pretty crappy but then again it is still early days for copy.com

 

[Ann P]

Does anyone prefer Box, over Dropbox? I have a massive 50GB of storage over there.

 

[simonsi]

I'm converting to BitTorrent Sync - uses just your own devices and is unlimited AND free....I can see I will keep free Dropbox and BTSync....

 

[Hammie]

I've converted a lot of my documentation to OneDrive. I only use DropBox for apps that do not have integration with OneDrive. I have 30GB due to a Office 365 University subscription.

I do not see much difference in performance other than it integrates perfectly with the Office for iPad apps.

 

[rctlr]

I've been using iFiles on iPhone and iPad to integrate Dropbox, Box, and Onedrive.

I've started to move away from Dropbox (26gb free), for the day-to-day stuff to box (unlimited - it says I've got a Petabyte)

 

[tech4all]

... communicate, publish, publicly perform, publicly display and distribute such content.

That's quite clear. They can do basically ANYTHING with your data. PERIOD. Microsoft TOS says that they can access your data, scan it, and use it to improve their services, but no where does it say that they can publish it, distribute it, or make it publicly available. Dropbox, doesn't have anything like these, in fact they need your permission to do just about anything with it.

Sorry, not all services are as bad as Google's TOS'. You have Picasa on your machine, guess what, they can scan the pictures on your computer and do what they want with them. You have Chrome installed; they can monitor everything you do online and even what you do on your computer!

Yea corporations always tell the truth and abide by the rules.

Microsoft has your data. Apple has your data. Google has your data. DropBox has your data. Etc. They all know who you are and what you do.

 

[viizi]

I have nothing to hide, no bad things to catch me on. I do however have a need to upload some of my work that is very valuable to anyone. I would hate for some sticky fingers (admin of dropbox etc) to get their hands on something and leak it for profits.

I'd love to just rely on local back ups but having stuff in the cloud that can be accessed anywhere in the world with just an internet connection and also the peace of mind that even if my house burned down I would still have these assets saved.

Think I am sticking with dropbox since it is the most mature platform. I have 5.35gb or something, it is enough for now.

 

[BadaBing!!]

I have nothing to hide, no bad things to catch me on. I do however have a need to upload some of my work that is very valuable to anyone. I would hate for some sticky fingers (admin of dropbox etc) to get their hands on something and leak it for profits.

I'd love to just rely on local back ups but having stuff in the cloud that can be accessed anywhere in the world with just an internet connection and also the peace of mind that even if my house burned down I would still have these assets saved.

Think I am sticking with dropbox since it is the most mature platform. I have 5.35gb or something, it is enough for now.

I also have some documents I don't want anyone to see as it's work related. I really love the Dropbox flexibility though so for these files, I use Viivo by PKWARE which is free for personal use and encrypts a folder in Dropbox on the fly. I've been using it on desktops (mac and pc) for few months now and it's flawless. There is also a mobile client which I tried once but don't use regulary.

For me, it's a good combination.

 

[ianj1972]

Does anyone use OwnCloud?

I'm looking into this on a colo Mac mini, I want my data back from the big corps.

 

[viizi]

I also have some documents I don't want anyone to see as it's work related. I really love the Dropbox flexibility though so for these files, I use Viivo by PKWARE which is free for personal use and encrypts a folder in Dropbox on the fly. I've been using it on desktops (mac and pc) for few months now and it's flawless. There is also a mobile client which I tried once but don't use regulary.

For me, it's a good combination.

super good info there mate, thanks a bunch!

 

[BenTrovato]

I also have some documents I don't want anyone to see as it's work related. I really love the Dropbox flexibility though so for these files, I use Viivo by PKWARE which is free for personal use and encrypts a folder in Dropbox on the fly. I've been using it on desktops (mac and pc) for few months now and it's flawless. There is also a mobile client which I tried once but don't use regulary.

For me, it's a good combination.

Isn't this only good for providing an encryption key to make it more difficult for snoopers to get at your data when you're using the cloud? Wouldn't Dropbox still have full access to your data?

 

[BadaBing!!]

super good info there mate, thanks a bunch!

Glad you appreciate!

Isn't this only good for providing an encryption key to make it more difficult for snoopers to get at your data when you're using the cloud? Wouldn't Dropbox still have full access to your data?

No. Viivo encrypts the file so Dropbox can't access the content. They can see filenames though.

 

[csixty4]

Does anyone use OwnCloud?

I used it for a while. Frankly, it reminded me of when I ran Linux on my desktop years back. It was cool to show off all the things it could do, and I loved having complete control over my data and access to the ownCloud source code. But I couldn't ignore the fact a bunch of iOS and even Mac apps have Dropbox support built-in.

If you just need basic file synching & calendars, get yourself an old Mac Mini, a Raspberry Pi, or a $5/mo Digital Ocean account and give ownCloud a try. It works great. But if you want your iOS text editor to load & save right to your cloud storage, you're stuck on Dropbox for now.

 

[simonsi]

After several weeks of testing/observation I've moved my Dropbox content that isn't shared over to my BitTorrent Sync "self-cloud". I have drives at home and work, plus my MBP synced, with apps on iPad and iPhone to access content if required. No fees, no storage limits other than the drives' sizes and no-one else holds my data on their servers.

I'll continue to use DB for sharing data.

BitTorrent is very flexible you can sync one-to-one or one-to-many as you need. If you have machines at home and work then very easy to come up with a geo-redundant configuration that safeguards your data.

 

[viizi]

I wonder when Dropbox will become more competitive with their free space give away. Copy.com give 20Gb from a referral and a further 5GB per referral. Dropbox is what? 2GB with 250mb referrals? lol

 

[simonsi]

I wonder when Dropbox will become more competitive with their free space give away. Copy.com give 20Gb from a referral and a further 5GB per referral. Dropbox is what? 2GB with 250mb referrals? lol

This has been debated in this thread. Many people can live within the free DB 2GB or easily-achievable-with-referrals (I have 5GB or so).

Lots of people value the integration vs the other options.

I've tried them all and settled on doing my own cloud with BitTorrent Sync.

 

[alphaod]

I'm a Dropbox Pro user. I have been using paying for 100GB for the past couple years and to me it's good value.

The only issue is now I'm in China and their website is blocked. Weirdly the apps all still work and I can sync things without an issue. I can share links to stuff, but personally can't verify if the links work or not (though I've never had anyone complain, so I guess they're not an issue).

 

[jgbr]

Hi

Are you allowed to upgrade to pro for a month and then cancel? i only need to bump up my storage for about 4 weeks.

Thanks

 

[iMacBooked]

Dropbox still does it for me. I definitely prefer it over Google Drive and the others. And as long as we haven't got the actual iCloud drive, it's certainly always going to be DB for me. After the public release of Yosemite, I'd maybe compare it to the iCloud drive, but even that probably won't change my mind, the way Dropbox works serves me well enough. Love it's simplicity.