A few solid details about Google’s cloud-based storage service are starting to emerge.
According to a report on Thenextweb.com, Google Drive will offer 5 GB of storage capacity to users, free of charge.
“The cloud” is all the rage these days, with companies from every side of the technology spectrum coming on board. The Xbox 360 lets users store their save files to the cloud, Microsoft’s next version of Office will be fully cloud-optimized, and Amazon has pioneered an MP3 service that doesn’t require users to ever download a music file again.
Those are all very specialized uses of the cloud. What Google Drive poses the greatest threat to are the full-service file-hosting sites, like Dropbox.
Dropbox is one of the most successful cloud pioneers, but it obviously doesn’t have anywhere near the name recognition of Google. Google Drive can replace pretty much everything that Dropbox offers. Dropbox’s free account only gives users 2 GB of storage.
Knowing this was the case, Dropbox hasn’t just been sitting on its thumbs. It’s been doing everything it can to keep itself differentiated in the marketplace.
Among the recently released new features are the ability to seamlessly share documents with friends over social networks, as well as make content uploading and downloading a much simpler process on mobile devices through the Dropbox app.
The big question is whether those initiatives will mean anything. That kind of stuff would be easy for Google to implement, so we’ll have to see exactly what bells and whistles Google Drive plans to bring to the table.
