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I don't think the consumer space is something Dropbox is really interested in. I don't blame them and they probably have the numbers to back up their decision t

I don't think the consumer space is something Dropbox is really interested in. I don't blame them and they probably have the numbers to back up their decision to drop photo galleries. I thought Carousel was going to be a big success[1] but it didn't hit the mark like I suspected. Even if it did I doubt it would generate any meaningful revenue for them. Google has figured out the consumer photo space with Google Photos. Their general approach was simply better than Carousel which was too focused on socializing. Even there they would have been outdone by Google Photos; not to mention the crazy AI which comes along with Google Photos. Shameless plug for an open source EXIF-based photo workflow automation tool[2][3] I wrote and used with Dropbox but now use with Google Drive / Google Photos / Synology. [3] http://github.com/jmathai/elodie http://github.com/jmathai/elodie [2] https://medium.com/@jmathai/introducing-elodie-your-personal-exif-based-photo-and-video-assistant-d92868f302ec https://medium.com/@jmathai/introducing-elodie-your-personal... [1] https://medium.com/@jmathai/thoughts-on-dropbox-carousel-e5aad177400a https://medium.com/@jmathai/thoughts-on-dropbox-carousel-e5a...

skinnymuch 9y ago
Google is pushing out new features for Google Photos at an impressive rate through now as well. Hope that doesn't. If they didn't shut Carousel down before, they would probably be shutting it down by now with Google Photos, Apple Photos, Amazon, taking so much of the space up.
- toomuchtodo 9y ago
  What happens when Google Photos shuts down?
  - jmathai 9y ago
    I'm glad you asked :). Here's how I get all the benefits of Google Photos without relying on the service to be around in order to have my photos. https://medium.com/@jmathai/introducing-elodie-your-personal-exif-based-photo-and-video-assistant-d92868f302ec https://medium.com/@jmathai/introducing-elodie-your-personal...
    - Jabbles 9y ago
      Isn't _the_ benefit of Google Photos (over any other storage service) the ability to search your photos for keywords e.g. "mountain"?
      - jmathai 9y ago
        Yes. That's why I use Google Photos. By separate from Google Photos (because I don't know if I'll use it forever) I have all my photos automatically organized into a customized folder structure with consistent file names. Both the ability to search/experience my photos and preserve them are important to me. I rely on Google Photos for the former. Consider this my PRD :) -- https://medium.com/vantage/understanding-my-need-for-an-automated-photo-workflow-a2ff95b46f8f https://medium.com/vantage/understanding-my-need-for-an-auto...
      - Angostura 9y ago
        Actually, Apple Photos is getting pretty good at this now
        skinnymuch 9y ago
        Do you prefer it over Google Photos?
        Angostura 9y ago
        I do, but that's largely because I'm fully embedded in the Apple ecosystem so haven't really evaluated the Google approach properly.
  - skinnymuch 9y ago
    Yes...Photos have always been so difficult to organize well, I'm fine with holding my breath. Overall, my photos in general are pretty organized luckily.
  - Spooky23 9y ago
    The safer bet is Apple, as the smarts are local software vs service.
    - jmathai 9y ago
      I'm a big proponent of local software but the problem with Apple/iPhoto is that everything is stored in a proprietary database. I think a good compromise is smarts in the cloud vs. local copy. I do this with Google Photos / Google Drive / Synology [1]. Apple does do this to an extent with iCloud but I haven't used that to be able to comment on how well it works. [1] https://medium.com/@jmathai/introducing-elodie-your-personal-exif-based-photo-and-video-assistant-d92868f302ec#89e2 https://medium.com/@jmathai/introducing-elodie-your-personal...
      - Spooky23 9y ago
        I don't know why we're both getting downvoted here! There were other apps similar to iPhoto/Photos like Picassa that were less properietary. But... Google's interests didnt align with the consumer. Apple loses points for a wonky proprietary format, but their interest in providing the product are in alignment with my interest as a consumer. And if that changes, the software doesn't go away. The only cloud services that I'm interested in are pure commodity plays like disk, email, etc. Everything else comes with that high transition cost.
        jmathai 9y ago
        I agree with regard to cloud services. Google Photos + Google Drive is the killer combo.
  - xbmcuser 9y ago
    Has Gmail shut down yet. Google photos is not going to shut down. Why? Because of data photos are data billions of megabytes of data that is being uploaded to Google every week. I don't think Google would want to miss out on it.
    - dx034 9y ago
      Gmail makes a lot of money with paying customers and with ads for non-paying customers. I don't think Google photos makes money on its own. It could easily happen that Google comes up with a new product they think should replace Google Photos so that they shut down photos to force-migrate users. Wouldn't be the first time.
      - qqg3 9y ago
        Google photos is a good impetus to pay for upgraded storage as you'll quickly blow past the limit.
        skinnymuch 9y ago
        16 megapixel photos and 1080 videos are free. The amount of people who need limits above that are pretty slim. It'll be 1-2 years before top phones go above 16 megapixels photos. So even longer for a more than small percentage of people to have those phones. Among those that do, including me, I'd be okay with most photos being downsized to 16 megapixels from say 21 megapixels in 3 years. Google Photos might also increase the free limit in a few years like they did once before. If they don't increase the free limit, I could see people like me wanting the full size photos and videos in maybe 4-5 years. Quite a long game for Google to be playing when they have been keen on cutting spending in recent years and increasing profit. I hope they do commit to Google Photos growth momentum over profit seeking, but hard to be optimistic these days based on their recent record (and no I'm not talking about Google Reader).
    - skinnymuch 9y ago
      Don't think they are the same. Google's major world wide consumer famous products are Google search, Gmail, YouTube. Second tier would be Google Docs, Google Drive. Google Photos is pretty small in comparison to any of them.
hari_seldon_ 9y ago
They are in a tough bind because they used to be interested in that space and were slow to move on enterprise, allowing Box and others to have more momentum in that space. Now with Google and others dominating the photo storage consumer space, where should Dropbox focus its efforts?
skinnymuch 9y ago
Oh wow your elodie tool, and the blog posts are great! Can't wait to start using them this weekend.
bane 9y ago
Woah, this is excellent. It basically is almost exactly how I organize my photos today. Looking forward to adopting this as part of my workflow.

skinnymuch 9y ago

Google is pushing out new features for Google Photos at an impressive rate through now as well. Hope that doesn't. If they didn't shut Carousel down before, they would probably be shutting it down by now with Google Photos, Apple Photos, Amazon, taking so much of the space up.

toomuchtodo 9y ago
What happens when Google Photos shuts down?
- jmathai 9y ago
  I'm glad you asked :). Here's how I get all the benefits of Google Photos without relying on the service to be around in order to have my photos. https://medium.com/@jmathai/introducing-elodie-your-personal-exif-based-photo-and-video-assistant-d92868f302ec https://medium.com/@jmathai/introducing-elodie-your-personal...
  - Jabbles 9y ago
    Isn't _the_ benefit of Google Photos (over any other storage service) the ability to search your photos for keywords e.g. "mountain"?
    - jmathai 9y ago
      Yes. That's why I use Google Photos. By separate from Google Photos (because I don't know if I'll use it forever) I have all my photos automatically organized into a customized folder structure with consistent file names. Both the ability to search/experience my photos and preserve them are important to me. I rely on Google Photos for the former. Consider this my PRD :) -- https://medium.com/vantage/understanding-my-need-for-an-automated-photo-workflow-a2ff95b46f8f https://medium.com/vantage/understanding-my-need-for-an-auto...
    - Angostura 9y ago
      Actually, Apple Photos is getting pretty good at this now
      - skinnymuch 9y ago
        Do you prefer it over Google Photos?
        Angostura 9y ago
        I do, but that's largely because I'm fully embedded in the Apple ecosystem so haven't really evaluated the Google approach properly.
- skinnymuch 9y ago
  Yes...Photos have always been so difficult to organize well, I'm fine with holding my breath. Overall, my photos in general are pretty organized luckily.
- Spooky23 9y ago
  The safer bet is Apple, as the smarts are local software vs service.
  - jmathai 9y ago
    I'm a big proponent of local software but the problem with Apple/iPhoto is that everything is stored in a proprietary database. I think a good compromise is smarts in the cloud vs. local copy. I do this with Google Photos / Google Drive / Synology [1]. Apple does do this to an extent with iCloud but I haven't used that to be able to comment on how well it works. [1] https://medium.com/@jmathai/introducing-elodie-your-personal-exif-based-photo-and-video-assistant-d92868f302ec#89e2 https://medium.com/@jmathai/introducing-elodie-your-personal...
    - Spooky23 9y ago
      I don't know why we're both getting downvoted here! There were other apps similar to iPhoto/Photos like Picassa that were less properietary. But... Google's interests didnt align with the consumer. Apple loses points for a wonky proprietary format, but their interest in providing the product are in alignment with my interest as a consumer. And if that changes, the software doesn't go away. The only cloud services that I'm interested in are pure commodity plays like disk, email, etc. Everything else comes with that high transition cost.
      - jmathai 9y ago
        I agree with regard to cloud services. Google Photos + Google Drive is the killer combo.
- xbmcuser 9y ago
  Has Gmail shut down yet. Google photos is not going to shut down. Why? Because of data photos are data billions of megabytes of data that is being uploaded to Google every week. I don't think Google would want to miss out on it.
  - dx034 9y ago
    Gmail makes a lot of money with paying customers and with ads for non-paying customers. I don't think Google photos makes money on its own. It could easily happen that Google comes up with a new product they think should replace Google Photos so that they shut down photos to force-migrate users. Wouldn't be the first time.
    - qqg3 9y ago
      Google photos is a good impetus to pay for upgraded storage as you'll quickly blow past the limit.
      - skinnymuch 9y ago
        16 megapixel photos and 1080 videos are free. The amount of people who need limits above that are pretty slim. It'll be 1-2 years before top phones go above 16 megapixels photos. So even longer for a more than small percentage of people to have those phones. Among those that do, including me, I'd be okay with most photos being downsized to 16 megapixels from say 21 megapixels in 3 years. Google Photos might also increase the free limit in a few years like they did once before. If they don't increase the free limit, I could see people like me wanting the full size photos and videos in maybe 4-5 years. Quite a long game for Google to be playing when they have been keen on cutting spending in recent years and increasing profit. I hope they do commit to Google Photos growth momentum over profit seeking, but hard to be optimistic these days based on their recent record (and no I'm not talking about Google Reader).
  - skinnymuch 9y ago
    Don't think they are the same. Google's major world wide consumer famous products are Google search, Gmail, YouTube. Second tier would be Google Docs, Google Drive. Google Photos is pretty small in comparison to any of them.

hari_seldon_ 9y ago

They are in a tough bind because they used to be interested in that space and were slow to move on enterprise, allowing Box and others to have more momentum in that space. Now with Google and others dominating the photo storage consumer space, where should Dropbox focus its efforts?

skinnymuch 9y ago

Oh wow your elodie tool, and the blog posts are great! Can't wait to start using them this weekend.

bane 9y ago

Woah, this is excellent. It basically is almost exactly how I organize my photos today. Looking forward to adopting this as part of my workflow.