Tim Bray on local storage:
In fact, I’m increasingly convinced that any data whose permanent canonical home is on a device that lives in your pocket and can fall into a toilet or the hands of a thief means You’re Doing It Wrong.
This is a lesson Apple really needs to get. I don’t think iTunes makes a better permanent home than the device itself does.
April 26, 2010 at 11:48 am
Except that after something like the Sidekick debacle, we know the cloud’s not perfect either. I like Apple, and I think the iTunes permanent home isn’t great, but I don’t think .mac/.me is ready for cloud prime time and I don’t trust it as a permanent home for my data. Google has better answers on this one but I really think the answer is, unfortunately, we’re all going to lose data sometimes.
April 26, 2010 at 1:45 pm
It’s true. I guess in an ideal world, it’s on my device and in the cloud and I can restore from either place.
April 26, 2010 at 2:05 pm
I think that’s the trick. Lots and lots and lots of synchronization, with the local version authoritative.
i.e. the Steam model.
As the wireless network improves in coverage, speed, and reliability that will matter less.
The big problems with cloud storage for everything are 1) privacy leaks and 2) search warrants. It’s becoming more and more difficult to prevent services from correlating various sources of data about you, regardless of consent, and data mining in that information reveals things you may not want revealed or realize you were revealing; and storage in the cloud gives an ideal opportunity for search warrants and other governmental data mining to take place without even the possibility of you receiving notice.
April 26, 2010 at 9:55 pm
I simply don’t trust large corporations enough to store much of my info in the cloud.
After all, they have availed themselves so well of trust over the past few years.
April 27, 2010 at 10:24 am
Apple’s purchase of lala.com makes it a likely contender for a web-based iTunes.