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I don't really get the business model. An open source stack makes sense for products targeted towards programmers. Out of curiosity I checked Dropbox: https:/

I don't really get the business model. An open source stack makes sense for products targeted towards programmers. Out of curiosity I checked Dropbox: https://www.dropbox.com/plans/storage https://www.dropbox.com/plans/storage 9 USD per month gives you 2TB storage (vs. 500GB here) I don't really get what justifies the 4x price (some of the features look like what you can get from a Gallery app like Aves) So it's looking kinda DOA to me. The intersection of people that care about open source and people that want to backup their photos also seems really minuscule. If Dropbox goes rogue and you need to switch providers.. that doesn't seem like a big deal? It's nice here that you can in theory selfhost and keep using it.. but that doesn't seem like "a big win" either. Most people that back up their pics in ~the cloud~ won't have the technical skills to do self-host EDIT: There is a comparison: https://ente.io/compare/ente-vs-dropbox/ https://ente.io/compare/ente-vs-dropbox/ It seems like the added feature boils down to automatically encrypting files. With Dropbox I guess you could accomplish the same, but you'd need to encrypt manually. Maybe for people with a lot of dick pics or illegal material this product is worth the 4x price

sofixa 3y ago
> Most people that back up their pics in ~the cloud~ won't have the technical skills to do self-host And that's probably better for them, because it's much easier to lose data from your own NAS than it is for a cloud storage provider to do so.
Sayrus 3y ago
> I don't really get the business model. An open source stack makes sense for products targeted towards programmers. > Most people that back up their pics in ~the cloud~ won't have the technical skills to do self-host Which is why they are offering a managed service as well. Even people with the technical skills are not always inclined to selfhost. > With Dropbox I guess you could accomplish the same, but you'd need to encrypt manually. Maybe for people with a lot of dick pics or illegal material this product is worth the 4x price Privacy is for criminals and storing CSAM, right? Why would you even want Dropbox at this point, Google Drive is all you need. Unless you wanted to help diagnose your child[1] and unfortunately the photo was synchronized to Drive and flagged. You have every right to expect your photos to stay private. Even if those are just a landscape. Why should you be obligated to have an AI scan them for offending content or scan them to detect who you met and when (surely so they can build a yearly recap for you, how kind!)? Did you ever get consent from everyone on your photos for this sharing and processing? You may not be interested in E2EE or open source, and that's absolutely fine. But you shouldn't actively undermine it by associating encryption and privacy with crimes. [1] https://www.theverge.com/2022/8/21/23315513/google-photos-csam-scanning-account-deletion-investigation https://www.theverge.com/2022/8/21/23315513/google-photos-cs...
- contrarian1234 3y ago
  You're getting butthurt about stuff that's not relevant. The point is the encryption is: 1 - trivial to layer yourself 2 - not a viable business model You just need to look at Signal. It's at the same price ($0) as its competition (not 4x). And messages you can't really encryption yourself. It's still struggling to get a market foothold. Yeah, it'd be great to have Google/Dropbox/etc with privacy. Sure. Nothing wrong with that. But you also have to pay the bills and feed your babies. This isn't a charity. Maybe I'm missing something, but this product make no sense in the market. They can't even match the market prices. They're toast
  - Philipp2398 3y ago
    [dead]
  - jacooper 3y ago
    > 1 - trivial to layer yourself If you are techy, this is made to be shared with families and friends, which won't do that.
    - contrarian1234 3y ago
      Agreed, but the market of people that are not tech, care about their photos not being mined, and are willing to pay 4x the price I think is miniscule
- nprateem 3y ago
  The GP isn't undermining it, they're talking about the strength of the need. Clearly someone facing threat of punishment has a greater need for encryption than those who aren't. Obviously there's a question of whether people in the latter group may end up in the former, perhaps by mistake, but would that risk be sufficient to make them pay 4x?
lewiscollard 3y ago
> The intersection of people that care about open source and people that want to backup their photos also seems really minuscule. This seems like a lack of imagination, which is not to be confused with any deficiency of the software or its business model. As for me, I think this completely rules.

sofixa 3y ago

> Most people that back up their pics in ~the cloud~ won't have the technical skills to do self-host And that's probably better for them, because it's much easier to lose data from your own NAS than it is for a cloud storage provider to do so.

Sayrus 3y ago

> I don't really get the business model. An open source stack makes sense for products targeted towards programmers. > Most people that back up their pics in ~the cloud~ won't have the technical skills to do self-host Which is why they are offering a managed service as well. Even people with the technical skills are not always inclined to selfhost. > With Dropbox I guess you could accomplish the same, but you'd need to encrypt manually. Maybe for people with a lot of dick pics or illegal material this product is worth the 4x price Privacy is for criminals and storing CSAM, right? Why would you even want Dropbox at this point, Google Drive is all you need. Unless you wanted to help diagnose your child[1] and unfortunately the photo was synchronized to Drive and flagged. You have every right to expect your photos to stay private. Even if those are just a landscape. Why should you be obligated to have an AI scan them for offending content or scan them to detect who you met and when (surely so they can build a yearly recap for you, how kind!)? Did you ever get consent from everyone on your photos for this sharing and processing? You may not be interested in E2EE or open source, and that's absolutely fine. But you shouldn't actively undermine it by associating encryption and privacy with crimes. [1] https://www.theverge.com/2022/8/21/23315513/google-photos-csam-scanning-account-deletion-investigation https://www.theverge.com/2022/8/21/23315513/google-photos-cs...

contrarian1234 3y ago
You're getting butthurt about stuff that's not relevant. The point is the encryption is: 1 - trivial to layer yourself 2 - not a viable business model You just need to look at Signal. It's at the same price ($0) as its competition (not 4x). And messages you can't really encryption yourself. It's still struggling to get a market foothold. Yeah, it'd be great to have Google/Dropbox/etc with privacy. Sure. Nothing wrong with that. But you also have to pay the bills and feed your babies. This isn't a charity. Maybe I'm missing something, but this product make no sense in the market. They can't even match the market prices. They're toast
- Philipp2398 3y ago
  [dead]
- jacooper 3y ago
  > 1 - trivial to layer yourself If you are techy, this is made to be shared with families and friends, which won't do that.
  - contrarian1234 3y ago
    Agreed, but the market of people that are not tech, care about their photos not being mined, and are willing to pay 4x the price I think is miniscule
nprateem 3y ago
The GP isn't undermining it, they're talking about the strength of the need. Clearly someone facing threat of punishment has a greater need for encryption than those who aren't. Obviously there's a question of whether people in the latter group may end up in the former, perhaps by mistake, but would that risk be sufficient to make them pay 4x?

lewiscollard 3y ago

> The intersection of people that care about open source and people that want to backup their photos also seems really minuscule. This seems like a lack of imagination, which is not to be confused with any deficiency of the software or its business model. As for me, I think this completely rules.