On-line backup options: TeleRead
David Rothman points out some on-line storage options based on a recent story from Walt Mossberg. I currently use Box.net, but may check out Mozy as that seems to be a recommended option. Mozy provides 2 GB of storage, but if you ante up $4.95 a month, you get unlimited capacity. David’s point of view on this is the storage of digital eBook content, which really hit home with me recently.
I purchased two digital eBooks in PDF format about 18 months ago from Amazon and they’re no longer in my Digital Download Locker at Amazon. I thought I was lucky because I had saved a copy of both books locally on my older Toshiba M205 Tablet. Unfortunately, when trying to read them on any other machine, I encounter access rights & DRM activation issues. The error message indicates I should go back to the vendor I purchased the books from, but Amazon no longer carries these, so I’m stuck. The on-line storage options David mentions wouldn’t have helped in my particular situation, but saving that digital content in an very accessible place sure comes in handy!
All the dead wood books I purchased about 18 months ago are still on my bookshelf and readable. Oh, make that 18 years. I am a geek and like gadgets as much as anyone here. But until the industry can’t guarantee me convenient, reliable access to my purchased books and songs pretty much forever on whatever device I happen to to own, I won’t purchase ebooks or DRM’ed music.
Kevin – I was just about to call you out on the Mozy statement. I’ve been using Mozy since it was in Beta, although I’m using the free version. And up until recently you only got 10 or 30Gb with the $4.95/month plan. But I do see the ulimited plan is now out there for $4.95/month (per computer). That is awesome!
I am also a big fan of Mozy. Even though I am using the free version, thanks to the referral link on my blog I already have 19 Gb of free storage available
Unfortunately my 1 MB adsl line is way to slow to fill all this space!
Amazon buying Mobipocket was the worst thing that happened to all of my Amazon ebooks.
I’ve since learned the wonders of Virtual Machines (VMWare/Parallels) and how helpful they are at protecting your DRM content. DL the content using your VM, then upload the VM image someplace for safe keeping. You are now safe from hardware loss and hardware upgrades.
Kevin,
The DRM stuff really hurts, especially if you’re a guy doing the right thing and not stealing content. See my post…
http://jwzone.dynip.com/JWBlog/BlogPost.aspx?BlogIDNum=122
Mozy is wonderful. I have used it for over a year and it has never failed me.
By the way, Mozy has a referral feature where if you enter a current user’s code on signup, both get extra space for free. Could someone please use my code? We’ll both get an extra 256 megs of room! Here is the link:
https://mozy.com/?ref=LDBPV7
…or just use LDBPV7 as the referral code. Thank you!