Media News - Wednesday, November 28, 2007

Google plans service to store users’ data

Google Inc. wants to offer consumers a new way to store their files on its hard drives, in a strategy that could accelerate a shift to Web-based computing and intensify the Internet company's competition with Microsoft Corp. Google is preparing a service that would let users store on its computers essentially all of the files they might keep on their personal-computer hard drives - such as word-processing documents, digital music, video clips and images, say people familiar with the matter. The service could let users access their files via the Internet from different computers and mobile devices when they sign on with a password, and share them online with friends. It could be released as early as a few months from now, one of the people said. The Mountain View, Calif., company plans to provide some free storage, with additional storage allotments available for a fee, say the people familiar with the matter. The effort - at one point known internally at Google as ‘My Stuff’ - could add to the challenges facing Microsoft's core Windows operating system and Office productivity software businesses by speeding a shift toward Web-based computing. It also has the potential to affect the economics and usage of home computers, lessening consumers' need to buy big hard drives to store and back up all of their files, for example. Google will likely have to address copyright issues. Allowing consumers to share different types of files such as music with other users could trigger the sort of copyright complaints the company already faces over videos on its YouTube video sharing site. (Wall Street Journal)

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