Dropbox, the Y Combinator and Sequoia-funded file synchronization startup that makes it easy to share files across multiple computers at once, just hit a major milestone: it now has over 1 million members. And as the graph below shows, much of that growth has come in the last few months, with over 900,000 signups since the product’s public debut at TechCrunch50 last September.
We don’t hear about Dropbox too often (it seems that they’re a bit too secretive for their own good at times), but their product rocks, and is gaining fans quickly. We’ve been using it around the TechCrunch office for over a year now to collaborate on group projects and keep key files handy regardless of which computer we’re using. And we’re not alone – I often hear about other startups that are using Dropbox for their own projects, including Facebook’s Dave Morin.
Dropbox is going to be introducing a few key features soon, too. One of them is Peer to Peer sharing, which will allow users on the same network to share their files directly through their routers, without having to first upload them to Dropbox’s servers. The service’s web interface also just got a UI refresh, though many people simply use the folders that the Dropbox application integrates directly into your desktop.
CEO Drew Houston wouldn’t talk about how many of Dropbox’s users are paid (the service offers a free version with a limited amount of storage), but he says that the site’s referral program has been driving signups, with the service seeing around 22-25% growth month over month since launch.
The new Twitter… but the biz model seems more apparent.
That’s true. And they can increase share of their paid accounts if they add a feature to allow paid accounts to specify their own private key. Then Dropbox just needs to explain to its users why a private key is more secure, and a lot of free users will switch. I know I will
Maybe for really sophisticated users, but that’s a VERY limited subset of users.
Ever try explaining public key cryptography to the average computer user?
Second! That nice!
Out of the top of my mind, I can’t recall a single web service except Gmail that has made my life so much easier, like Dropbox did.
Dropbox is a utility for me..period.
Yup, use it a lot, introduced a heck of a lot of people to it. But don’t know anyone yet who has paid for the bigger storage option, we just treat it like a virtual flash drive.
Lot of spam there tho
Syncplicity (http:/www.syncplicity.com) for me. Sync’s any folder on my PC, plus online backup.
I use the paid Dropbox service to sync a number of Linux machines and have found it fabulous.
I find Live Mesh much better. You can specify any folder that already exists on your computer to sync to the cloud, not just one folder. and then you can share different folders with different mesh users and have real control over who can do what where.
And that’s also the problem with most of the tools out there. They try to be too much whereas dropbox just does one thing, but in such an elegant way that I sometimes already forget how painful it was before its launch.
aka. Foldershare. yup, works great, and already does peer to peer and doesn’t upload all your files to a central server, so there is no limit to storage.
Didn’t you leave this comment at 1:33PM yesterday?
“The quality of your publication is a joke. Goodbye.”
So what gives? Do you enjoy TechCrunch or hate it?
It makes a great utility for some extra storage and to synchronize the computer from the network at home or the office.
Dropbox kicks ass.
typical bullshit techcrunch comment.
Actually, you’re the problem, and a fucking asshole.
i’ve been looking for something like this. however, i read their terms and conditions, where there is a big spoiler — they reserve the right to sell your personal information.
moving on.
typical retarded techcrunch comment.
Typical spammer.
Dropbox is one of the few startups that I am really excited about. The only MAJOR problem that the service has is that it doesn’t allow you to specify your private key. So, although they encrypt the data getting stored in their servers, that means not much since Dropbox employees can see your data whenever they want (as they own the key).
What an awesome setup. I think I am more interested in how they got so much traffic so quickly. lol. Keep rocking all!
Love it.
I’m a huge dropbox fan. I love how I can quickly share a file with someone else — I just drop it in my public folder and copy the link from the right-click menu. Such an obvious feature, but the competition completely fails on such core scenarios. Microsoft basically ruined foldershare, the last great file sharing startup, by slowly merging it into the ‘live mesh’ or whatever — this has allowed dropbox to soak up the users who just want something simple that works. So much for the Google drive — I predict an acquisition.
You can even sync a virtual machine with dropbox:
http://www.linu...e-with-dropbox/
I have been using drop box for 6 months now, and loving it. This is as important to me as gmail, I might get the pro version later this year. I wish they could release their API (not sure if they have it planned).
No single tool I use has changed the way I use my computer more then dropbox.
“… computer more then dropbox” should be written “…computer more than dropbox”. And please, don’t tell me it’s a typo, as I hear that a lot. Just enjoy the grammar lesson and help the world one letter at a time.
Because bugging people about things like that really helps the world.
And I know I shouldn’t start a sentence with ‘because’. Or ‘and’. And ‘or’.
No single tool I use has changed the way I use my computer more then dropbox.
SugarSync, Syncplicity, Zumodrive – how many can really be supported? And then you’ve got Mozy as well….would love to see a comparison of the different services and relative popularity.
“Out of the top of my mind, I can’t recall a single web service except Gmail that has made my life so much easier, like Dropbox did.”
Agree. So far, these guys have done everything right: truly cross-platform, easy updates, generous free quota, power hidden behind simple interface, smart engineering… the list goes on. The new peer-to-peer function is the icing on the icing on the cake!!
One comment here suggested that dropbox has worked the right to sell your data into their user agreement. Does anyone have a follow up comment, either yea or nay? I think this is an amazing service but I want to know about whether they can sell my data.
I’m pretty sure it’s just bs.
the data stored on dropbox is also for dropbox to use. Please read the term of use agreement.
If it’s too good to be true, you have to look at why it is free. Dropbox said it can share your data to anyone.
this is such crap its funny.
there are hundreds of competitors in this space, it’s likely just competitors spam
I hope no one is actually gullible enough to believe the comment that Dropbox has something in the user agreement saying it can sell user information. Of course it doesn’t. Full disclosure – I’ve contracted with Dropbox in the past (but I am not an employee and have finished my project). But I absolutely love the service and use it every day. Run a Google Trend comparison for Dropbox against any competitor and it’s clear they’ve broken out of the pack. For the USA region (on Google Trends), the top states are Utah and Nebraska, so it has mainstream appeal too. Very exciting company!
Dropbox has become a key component of our IT infrastructure by enabling easy collaboration between dozens of users and automating backup procedures… we definitely recommend to give it a try if you haven’t already
I’ve never had any spam from Dropbox. What others a babbling about is beyond me. Unless they were naive enough to leave their email exposed and/or went into a forum and gave out their email.
That would explain the spam.
I think it’s a fantastic service, I’ve never had any problems syncing. If anything, I’d like to see a web based app for the photo album but I’m sure that’ll come in time.
The Dropbox Terms can be found here >
http://www.getd...opbox.com/terms
and the Privacy info here >
http://www.getd...box.com/privacy
It is kinda obvious to any rational person that Authentication and Authorization require the passing of some type of identity information to the Dropbox backend services (e.g. Amazon S3).
I gather that the only persons posting ridiculous comments about Dropbox Terms and Conditions are actually from competitors of Dropbox.
Thanks for the comments, and thanks to Frank D for the links. For the past few hours I have just been sitting here realizing how many different ways this could be used, and how cool it could be. I now have to figure out if it’s possible for my cousin in _____ and I to both have it installed in such a way that we can simply drop stuff in our respective boxes and have the other person have instant access, without needing to somehow share a password or username or whatever.
With regard to the allegation about selling data, yes, it seemed unlikely but it’s good to hear you guys deriding the idea. I personally don’t know enough about tech to know how this type of thing could be exploited, but I know from reading TechCrunch how Google ‘monetizes’ our emails. I just always want to know how my data is being used.
Sure! Just share a folder with your cousin. There’s no exchange of passwords, etc. Your cousin will connect to that share and you can both collaborate on files in real-time. VERY powerful feature!
Wow. Just figured out that I think I can do what i describe above using the ‘Shared’ folder function!! This is unreal – instant availability?? Just drop it in there and the person with whom I’m sharing opens his dropbox folder and there it is?
Wow.
Sorry guys, I know most of you are tech pros and it’s obvious I’m a noob. I’ll leave this comments section to you guys now : )
I work at a small company; we used dropbox, but run out space, so we purchased a premium account. The catch is that everyone needs to upgrade their account otherwise they’ll be unable to upload anything, or see something like you’re using 250% of space on dropbox (where 100% is your free 2 gb).
This pretty much made dropbox useless for us.
True enough, that’s one weakness of Dropbox. They’re targeting individual users as of now, and will introduce features in the future, namely local network syncing and group accounts, to make the service better suited to small businesses. My guess is that they won’t ever aim to be an enterprise-level solution, though (or would launch it as a separate product sharing some of the technology).
BTW, i’m a Dropbox customer, with a pro (50 GB) account. In my opinion, the service is great, though obviously not perfect.
dropbox rocks. we couldn’t live without it in our office. we changed to it from groove and never looked back
my dropbox is my external hdd.
@Daniel
We use a combination of free and premium accounts, if you think it through you can structure shared folders in a very cost effective way for small-medium deployments
Dropbox spammed my cell phone with text messages earlier this week. I’ve never logged on with them and never will.
Dropbox is great – i use the paid version 50GB of storage and it works fantastic.
The only bug I have noticed is that you can drop files in it and it often goes unsynced. To get around this I have to exit the program and restart it and then it will sync up the files. I found out the hard way when dropping files in there in my office and getting home to work on them to find out I have to drive back to do it again. Sometimes it works perfectly but it really seems like you have to check that it did indeed sync the files. Otherwise this program is perfect.
I agree, dropbox is the best file syncing utility i’ve found for instantly syncing between a Mac and PC. I’ve tried Syncplicity, Zumodrive, & JungleDisk (great for backup). I seems like I’ve tried others but if I have, I can’t think of their names (dropshare and Windows live sync?). I like dropbox because as soon as a file is updated on one machine, any other machines which sync the file are updated. Maybe dropbox uses a push method to sync changed files and the other utilities use a pull method?
DropBox isn’t bad, but I use SugarSync – they have everything DropBox has, plus mobile apps for iPhone, B-Berry, and WimMo devices.
BTW – SugarSync lets you sync any folder from a computer to any folder on another computer – you’re not forced to put the sync’d files in a special folder. I have My Documents sync’d between my work and personal computers.
I need to access data from many folders from my blackberry. Sugarsync works great
Dtopbox is good for peole who are just moving a couple of files and who are willing to manually move them to the special folder. It does not work for me
I heard that they only have about 500 paying subs. Maybe they will start doing ads or selling info to generate revenue
the level of pitiful astroturfing in the comments is incredible.
go build better products instead of trashing the company that’s kicking your ass.
Hi Mike,
We are interested to hear your use case for Blackberry. How can I get in touch with you?
Smith
Sure, I am on the road most of the time. I can access (open and EDIT!) and send all my work related documents with my Bold from everywhere and collaborate with the team using shared folders. It also has photos stuff that I do not use. More info here: https://www.sug...blackberry.html
Why have I not heard of this program before? It’s amazing
Been using Dropbox since beta, it rocks!!!! I use it everyday. Has made my USB drive obsolete.
I use Dropbox for both work and school. The only thing missing is syncing any folder. Then I can truly ditch my dependency on any single computer.
Dropbox f-ing rocks. Seriously. It runs my life.
Not only that, I have creative and finance departments using it to share materials and update commonly used spreadsheets (respectively) at a portfolio company.
I should be getting a commission from them!
These days people have lots of data. A typical computer user has about 30GB of data saved up in his hard drive.
This is great to have all your cloud file in one poit for easy access. But, when disaster strikes, all your data is gone.
It is nice to see such a creative company as DropBox (just don’t understand why they don’t have a domain “dropbox.com”, instead they have “getdropbox.com”) to provide such backup and sync services.
By the way, check out the industry news at this site:
http://friendfe...om/onlinebackup
this was covered in their forums (they are very active)
the owner wanted more than the team is willing to justify at this point in time.
ditto
The big winners here are the guys at Amazon S3 because those are the ones collecting the money from all these free accounts.
Dropbox has proved to be amazingly functional and practical for me. Between my boyfriend and me, we have about 5 computers that we use regularly. This allows us to sync projects we’re working on together and never have to ask, “hey, can you send me that blahblah file?” It’s always just there.
And as a student at UCLA who takes notes on her computer, Dropbox has been the perfect solution for peace of mind. My notes are saved to Dropbox and to each of those computers, so I never have to worry about losing notes. (Who takes handwritten notes anymore anyway?) This is something I really could’ve used when I was taking handwritten notes and left my notebook in another state the day before a final…
Most of my friends now use Dropbox, so I never have to deal with burning them discs of things etc.
I love Dropbox!
DropBox is nice, but a bit too expensive for me. I wonder how many of these users are paying users and why they want to keep that number secret.
Aren’t they just a GUI for Amazon’s S3? I have been using Amazon S3 for back-up, cheaper and no middle man.
Account referral for anyone who wants 250 MB more on their account.
https://www.get...ls/NTEwMDk4ODM5