Would you place your only copy of extremely important documents on top of a dormant volcano. No indication the volcano will become active.
Logically, I think the answer is yes. I mean, why not? Assuming the documents are protected and surveilled properly, the location being a dormant volcano that has shown no sign of becoming active has no bearing on anything, really. I mean, itās just a place, nothingās going to happen. Then again, I feel like that would be very silly. What if the volcano does become active? I canāt afford to lose my documents, so even though I think thereād be no issue with having them there, I will still choose to have them somewhere else, somewhere I perceive to be safer or less risky.
I feel like cloud storage is similar to this. I know that Google Drive isnāt just going to lose my data, neither is Mega or Dropbox. But it has happened. It has happened that a dormant volcano suddenly erupted and it has happened that important data was lost. At the end of the day, the cloud is just someone elseās computer, and I donāt want my stuff on someone elseās computer because I donāt know what the hell theyāre gonna do with it.
Whatās the alternative?
Have it on your own computer, of course. That does defeat the point though, doesnāt it? I mean, the whole point of having your stuff in the cloud is that you donāt have to have it on your computer. I see two primary benefits in cloud storage: backups and transferability. Backups are great because, sometimes, you want to really make sure you donāt lose something important. Your pen drives can stop working, your PC can get fried, the world can end! That last one would also end Google Drive, Iād assume, but the other ones do have cloud storage as a viable way to backup your data. Itās not really a matter of replacing other backup methods, itās just something else you can also do to be safer.
Transferability, though, is what I really value. Backups are nice, sure, but I backup things physically anyway. Thatās the kind of person I am, and I really donāt trust Google Drive more than a pen drive for backups. Being able to see my photos on my computer and my phone though, thatās the real juice. Oh thatās nice, thatās really nice. I mean, thereās other ways to do this, sure, but usually theyāre a pain in the ass and they take a long while. A service that monitors your files and automagically syncs them on several devices is just amazing. Itās so convenient. Not to mention the fact that you can get a new device and the photos are still there. Thatās crazy, actually. Itās really good.
But itās a dormant volcano.
I really donāt want my stuff on the dormant volcano.
SyncThing is probably the most popular alternative to the typical cloud storage services. Itās free and open-sourceāalways a good thingāand itās actually easy to use, in relative terms. Itās much harder to use than Google Drive but itās not difficult by any stretch of the imagination. The problem with SyncThing is the same as the problem with Google Drive though: the cloud is just a computer. In Driveās case, itās someone elseās (Googleās) computer, in SyncThingās case itās yours. Thatās good, because youāre not a volcano, but you do also need another computer. Actually, you need a computer and you need it to be online all the time. Thatās a pain in the ass for people like me. I like to keep things tidy, I like to have few things, and I donāt have an extra computer lying around to do this. Thatās really annoying, but I donāt see any other possibility.
Truth be told, I have a lot of things I want to do. Having a server would be convenient for more than just cloud storage, so Iām strongly considering investing in a Raspberry Pi for this. Itās small, relatively cheap, easy to set up and useā¦ Why not, right? I donāt know. I just might, I just might. OneDrive isnāt enough, Google Drive isnāt enough, and I really donāt want my stuff spread out across a thousand different services. Really, I donāt want my stuff on any āserviceā. I want my stuff on MY computer. Yeah, yeahā¦ Iāll think about it, really consider it. Weāll see how it goes.
I did manage to read a chapter of Babel, yesterday. It was good, too good. It was almost jolly in tone. I hate that, not because I hate jolly but because Iāve read enough dramas to know what the fuck happens after jolly enters the stage: tragedy. Shit if about to hit the fan, I can feel it. I canāt wait!
TimeSuck was a fantastic discovery, I really wish I remembered where I saw itā¦ I listened to their episode on Elvis Presley. It was great.
Also, I started writing a little document about minimalism. IRL itemization. Iām having fun.
Iāll read more Babel today, I think. Weāll see how it turns out.