http://www.engadget.com/2011/02/27/gmail-accidentally-resetting-accounts-years-of-correspondence-v/
(hope this is the right place)
The cloud scares me...
Gmail accidentally resetting accounts, years of correspondence vanish into the cloud?
- Thread starter defyalllogic
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(hope this is the right place)
The cloud scares me...
Clouds are ephemeral, by definition. I've got a free Gmail account, but nothing out there on the cloud I'd mind losing. OTOH, If people have paid accounts with Gmail, I can understand people being upset. Does Gmail have paid accounts?
They'll probably be able to restore from server backups anyway. Probably much ado about nothing, although as a cautionary tale, it's a great public service.
They'll probably be able to restore from server backups anyway. Probably much ado about nothing, although as a cautionary tale, it's a great public service.
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Probably. To me its just some silly nonsensical slogan Microsoft uses in their ads, kind of like the old Calgon commercials. "Cloud, take me away!"
Regardless of the trendy terminology, the major point is that on-line storage isn't 100% trustworthy. At bottom, somebody else is in charge of your stuff.
Agreed. Multiple backups across multiple mediums is the way to go. Yay for extra redundancy.
You can use IMAP and keep local copies of your email via mail.app or Thunderbird or another email client.
Alternatively, you can POP all your mail for a local copy. Or POP it to an alternate email account as a backup.
Alternatively, you can POP all your mail for a local copy. Or POP it to an alternate email account as a backup.
Umm... you do realize that "the cloud" does actually have a physical form, right? It's not just information that's floating out in cyberspace with no physical basis or backup.
As Medi said, though, it is wise to back things up on your own as well. I always:
1) E-mail a document to myself (to two different accounts).
2) Save it on my desktop hard drive.
3) Save it to my laptop hard drive.
4) Save it to my external hard drive.
5) Save it to my portable thumb drive.
6) Sometimes burn it to DVD.
7) Sometimes print it out.
Pretty much foolproof
But I'm sure there are even better ways out there.
Thank you, Medievalist. I've seen those acronyms before, but all the explanations I've ever read are for those people who already know what they mean. I'll check that out.
Bah! This new-fangled Ugaritic script and clay tablet stuff is a passing fad! Those tablets can be broken, you know. Ideograms on stone! That's the only reliable future-proofed medium for data-storage! Linear B for life!
Yes, I do. I understand how cloud storage works. It concerns me that first Amazon and now Google have made it painfully clear that through no fault of your own, your "free" storage option isn't actually Yours but theirs to do what they want with or break or share or whatever. It's so easy and normal to keep things in the provided cloud storage that is provided and normally doesn't require a second thought. normally. the concern lies in that fact that it seem more and more companies aren't just leaving that storage space alone, be it general meta data about users being used for tracking and sales and marketing or deleting "inappropriate" content, or just breaking it and losing your stuff.
It works using large versions of the same drives in your desktop and/or latptop computers.
Magnetic media with mechanical motors.
Data is fragile. Don't ever trust any media. Have multiple duplicate redundant backups.
Hell, worse case scenario, have your gmail email all automatically forward to a Yahoo account, as well as a local archive.
Meh. Google gets a lot of flack for tracking user behavior and user-generated content for marketing and sales purposes, but they also do it to improve user experience. Not only that, but they're pretty straightforward about it -- they're not hiding the fact that they do it, which is okay in my book.
Especially because they're offering me a free service. I know translators bitch about how Google uses their translation memory if they opt to use the Google Translator Toolkit, or if the crowd manually improves upon their statistical machine translation memories and Google uses the data for other purposes. Thing is, they don't HAVE to provide these things for free. Gmail, though its simple in terms of user interface, probably cost quadrillions to develop, and will continue to cost more as they improve on its service offering. Not to mention the fact that memory, being magnetic media (to borrow Medi's phrase), costs money. It costs a LOT of money.
It's win-win if you ask me, as long as I know what I'm signing up for. The average internet user is way too entitled for my taste, honestly.
billythrilly7th
Banned
Ugh, scary. I use gmail as my work account, and have years and years of old editorial contacts, old contracts, current assignments (ok, THOSE are backed up) and more stored in there. Hell, I'm not even sure I have my editor's email addy saved anywhere else.
