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I think one of the opportunities Dropbox missed was being unwilling to replace FTP. I've built dozens of HTML/Flash/Java uploaders on dozens of different infra
by padobson 9y ago
I think one of the opportunities Dropbox missed was being unwilling to replace FTP.
I've built dozens of HTML/Flash/Java uploaders on dozens of different infrastructures, and there's always a host of issues that need to be dealt with. When a product's UX doesn't work with FTP, it requires a lot of extra engineering.
But allowing your customers to move files around with their Dropbox account completely eliminates this problem. The HTML5 File API has largely solved this (though it still exists, I still have to occasionally restart YouTube uploads. YouTube!), but Dropbox could have been the solution, and I can't imagine how many startups weren't built on top of Dropbox because they didn't want to be in the replacing-FTP business.