The Online Storage War: Microsoft vs. Google.
The Online Storage War: Microsoft vs. Google.
August 22, 2007: It isn’t often that giants such as Microsoft and Google lock horns together in open confrontation, but that’s exactly what has spilled over in the online storage war.
Make no mistake, warfare has definitely erupted in the realm of online storage, the collective muscle is coming into play as the industry giants trying to push each other out of this important market.
Microsoft was the first to show their hand when they announced its Microsoft Skydrive was hitting beta testing. The Skydrive was announced with 500mb of free storage and can be used as a virtual hard drive on your desktop.
Currently Googles’ Gmail service has allowed free online storage of up to 2.8 GB of data and has slowly been increasing. This gravy train is coming to an end with the announcement of its pricing structure for online storage. For $20 per year users can add an extra 6 GB on top of the free 2.8 GB currently given out for free.
Not to be outdone, Microsoft has announced that its email offering, Hotmail will have its free storage limit increased to 5 GB and 10 GB for paid users, taking it far ahead of Google’s free 2.8 GB. Both of these offerings fall short of Yahoo’s unlimited email storage limit; however Yahoo flags any accounts being used for online storage and shuts them down.
According to a February TechCrunch report, Yahoo still held the lead in online email with 250 million users compared to Hotmail’s 228 Million and Gmail’s 51 million. The battle lines have been drawn in the last few weeks between Microsoft and Google, surprisngly Yahoo has been absent from the conflict.
This is by no means the last we have heard from either side as the marketplace starts to heat up. The jostling for position of Microsoft with its Hotmail and Skydrive versus Google’s Gmail and photo storage site Picasa has only one winner at the moment, the consumer. Money really isn’t an issue for these two industry giants as they attempt to gain the edge in such an important market.