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It would be even better if BrandonM also commented here ;)

by jxub 9y ago

zerr 9y ago
Not OP, but even today I still don't understand why is Dropbox different except for hype and media coverage - there were many similar services back then (including integrating as a virtual drive on Windows) and we have literally tons of these services now.
- the-dude 9y ago
  > there were many similar services back then Citations please.
  - thisisandyok 9y ago
    I read a quote of Drew's a while back that stuck with me. Just googled and found it: "When Dropbox was getting off the ground in 2007, there were hundreds of small storage companies. It was almost a cliche, the way that many people believe mobile photo sharing is a cliche now, he says. “The important thing was, I would keep asking people if they used any one of these hundred options, and they all said no. These are my favorite problems to solve. You can’t focus on what everyone else is doing — it has to be about what’s really broken and what you can do to fix it.”" http://firstround.com/review/How-to-Win-as-a-First-Time-Founder-a-Drew-Houston-Manifesto/ http://firstround.com/review/How-to-Win-as-a-First-Time-Foun...
    - zerr 9y ago
      He should've said what he did differently - seamless integration (aka virtual drive in Windows) was a selling point, but again, other services also had this.
  - zerr 9y ago
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_file_synchronization_software#Commercial https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_file_synchroniza... You can find when each of these companies were founded by following the links... Don't remember the name, but I remember similar service even in late 90s, when dial-up was popular. You'd pay for some amount of storage hosted on their servers (no "cloud" term back then) and they had Windows client integrated as a drive. Not sure if they had "freemium", maybe dropbox differentiated with this business model.
- rkangel 9y ago
  Dropbox's solution was significantly more streamlined than any of the others. You installed it and it just worked as the saying goes.
  - the-dude 9y ago
    Was the web interface there from the start? If it is the case, you did not even have to install it. Dropbox did not only solve 'local file system'-mirroring, but (legal) file sharing in general.

It would be even better if BrandonM also commented here ;)

by jxub 9y ago

It would be even better if BrandonM also commented here ;)

zerr 9y ago

Not OP, but even today I still don't understand why is Dropbox different except for hype and media coverage - there were many similar services back then (including integrating as a virtual drive on Windows) and we have literally tons of these services now.

the-dude 9y ago
> there were many similar services back then Citations please.
- thisisandyok 9y ago
  I read a quote of Drew's a while back that stuck with me. Just googled and found it: "When Dropbox was getting off the ground in 2007, there were hundreds of small storage companies. It was almost a cliche, the way that many people believe mobile photo sharing is a cliche now, he says. “The important thing was, I would keep asking people if they used any one of these hundred options, and they all said no. These are my favorite problems to solve. You can’t focus on what everyone else is doing — it has to be about what’s really broken and what you can do to fix it.”" http://firstround.com/review/How-to-Win-as-a-First-Time-Founder-a-Drew-Houston-Manifesto/ http://firstround.com/review/How-to-Win-as-a-First-Time-Foun...
  - zerr 9y ago
    He should've said what he did differently - seamless integration (aka virtual drive in Windows) was a selling point, but again, other services also had this.
- zerr 9y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_file_synchronization_software#Commercial https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_file_synchroniza... You can find when each of these companies were founded by following the links... Don't remember the name, but I remember similar service even in late 90s, when dial-up was popular. You'd pay for some amount of storage hosted on their servers (no "cloud" term back then) and they had Windows client integrated as a drive. Not sure if they had "freemium", maybe dropbox differentiated with this business model.
rkangel 9y ago
Dropbox's solution was significantly more streamlined than any of the others. You installed it and it just worked as the saying goes.
- the-dude 9y ago
  Was the web interface there from the start? If it is the case, you did not even have to install it. Dropbox did not only solve 'local file system'-mirroring, but (legal) file sharing in general.