Competition in the Storage, Collaboration Business
Watch out Google Docs. I read about a service from Box.net (offered via a company called Increo Solutions that Box.net has acquired) that allows users to upload and view the content of a wide variety of files as well as share and embed files across the Internet.
There’s also an embedded viewer that lets you see all the files, just like you’d see in Google Docs (Personally, I like the above viewer better).
Why is embedding files anywhere on a website news-worthy or notable? As noted on readwriteweb.com, it’s one thing to upload and share documents online, but downloading them carries issues for companies and end-users.
For one, a company, out of concern for privacy, may not want their documents to be downloaded. Another: sometimes end-users just want the convenience of viewing something online, and that’s the extent of it – they don’t want to download it. They’re the ‘less-is-more’ kind. They don’t even like to carry around thumb drives.
But today’s workforce is different from that of even a few years ago. There are more home-based workers, and, much to Apple’s delight, iPhone sales (and other smart phones) are going through the roof. In short, people now have easier ways to access and collaborate on documents. That’s why these tools, from the likes of Box.net and Google are so important – and needed—these days.
Apparently, this ability to store, upload, collaborate and download (if one so chooses), is being called “cloud content management” by Box.net, yet another cloud buzzword.
If cloud content management (permit me to invent the acronym: CCM.) works smoothly, that gives enterprises and end-users a tremendous boost of confidence in the cloud, and I applaud that. But there are plenty of IT folks at both growing and large companies alike that still have reservations about the soundness and security of the cloud – whether it’s over the reliability of a platform or the safety of data.
So, even as these CCM tools multiply, so will services like cloud data center and cloud platform monitoring.
