It's not stolen. It's copied. Vmware still has it.
Yes VMWare still has it, except now a new company by the name of "erawmw.cn" is now happy to sell you a copy of their latest "class leading" virtualisation software for US$1.
In theory, you can sync a TrueCrypt vault.
Anyone tried this yet? Works ok on Dropbox, although the initial upload is a beast (file of noise the size of your storage volume). Afterwards, I think it's only syncing the parts that change. Remote access requires downloading the whole file again.
A truecrypt volume works ok on Dropbox, but I doubt it will work on Google Drive.
At least from a cursory observation of the Google Drive client's behaviour, I don't think it is syncing differences via binary diffs yet. It actually would reupload the entire file all over again.
1. Don't use Google Drive. Who's forcing you to? 2. Why not go with Dropbox? Oh, right, they can do the same crawling through your data. 3. Finally, uhm.. Thought about encrypting with TrueCrypt and uploading the entire encrypted file? Ahh, but why think proactively about security on a free service but useful service when it's much easier to complain and bitch.
To be honest I'd actually trust Dropbox quite a bit more than I'd trust Google. Dropbox after all is not in the advertising business, it is not like they'd have any value with my data.
I was actually initially having the same sentiment as GP, but in the end I just threw up my hands in sweet surrender and went along with it. Let's face it, I use Gmail, I use Gtalk, I own an Android phone, I use Google search.
Google already knows more about what I browse on the internet, what sort of links I'd prefer to click, and should they somehow have the ability to weaponise themselves they even have real time GPS coordinates to order a surgical strike on me using some low orbiting satelite mounted laser... courtesy of my Android phone.
Having 5gb more of my reports, resumes, and other various documents (which they probably already have countless duplicates of already thanks to Gmail) is not going to do them much.
Versions count against your storage, trash counts against your storage, Google Docs files do not, shared files do not.
No right-click menu in the desktop client, so no grabbing public links etc.
No ability to name the Google Drive folder, only choose its location (the same as dropbox, but a lot of people were hoping for "pick any folder anywhere").
Speed is a bit faster.
Storage prices a lot cheaper ($9.99/month for 200GB vs $9.99 for 50GB on Dropbox).
There is offline access to Google Docs stuff, not tried that yet.
The Windows client is very very very similar to an old Dropbox version - even down to "Selective Sync" within the Google Drive folder.
Android and iOS apps - no Blackberry app yet.
All in all, I haven't come to a conclusion yet - better in some aspects, worse in others. I think a lot of people were expecting a lot more from Google Drive than this offering.
I actually got a chance to start using it today and I'm kind of disappointed. A few things that bug me:
1) Not using binary diffs when syncing. During the big initial upload/download, I found that when I've moved a folder when it is still downloading on a different machine, the remote machine would actually (!) move those files that were moved into the trash can and retransfer those files again.
Really??! Any first year CS student worth his salt can probably do a bit better! And I thought Google is teeming with PhDs and this Google Drive product has been in the works for years.
2) The status indicator icons don't work correctly on Windows. A small pet peeve, but in comparison to Dropbox it does seems rather awkward.
3) Only ONE BIG queue instead of a separate queue for incoming and outgoing changes that Dropbox has. This actually makes a huge difference when you are working on a system that is currently syncing in a lot of changes that were made remotely. Your modifications actually won't be reflected until the big incoming queue has cleared.
I am sure there is more to come, but from big G I am really surprised how poor things are at the start. Generally mediocre implementation, low storage quotas (in comparison to Skydrive and Dropbox which gives the opportunity for referral bonuses as well as various rewards for participating in betas) and relative lack of polish in desktop client... the only thing going for Google Drive is the Google name.
A budget is just a method of worrying before you spend money, as well as afterward.
