
Interview with Drew Houston, CEO of Dropbox - happy-go-lucky
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-06-08/drew-houston-on-how-dropbox-bounced-back
======
manigandham
Dropbox still has the best syncing app and integration, but is terrible with
multiple accounts and any business use. Paper is also useless.

Box offers great controls for businesses, better API and built in workflow
engine, but has crappy syncing app. Box Notes also useless.

OneDrive is just shit in every way possible and acts more like an unwanted
virus in new Windows installations.

Google Drive has solid syncing with built-in search and google docs
integration which is the best office suite other than MS office. Their Team
Drives feature is finally doing things right for businesses, although it still
has a broken permissions system and issues with desktop integration.

There's also Apple, Amazon, Egnyte, Quip, etc for other niches. Overall, we
are nowhere near perfect with any service. All of these companies will
continue to grow since there's no singularly great option yet.

~~~
danielodio
Completely disagree re: Paper. It's one of the most-used tools at our company,
and we love it.

~~~
manigandham
Why? Google Docs or Office 365 can give you real-time collaborative editing
that's faster, more stable and more reliable - along with all the other
features like built-in file sync.

What does Paper do for you that's so much better?

------
neolefty
Whether or not you personally like Dropbox, they are an example of going up
against the largest competitors on the planet and surviving.

And not just an example in general, but an example in detail -- decisions and
efforts they made at every point, from engineering to corporate finance --
have been factors in that story.

~~~
8ytecoder
A better characterization would be "the first mover fighting off large
competitors". (Unless I'm misremembering) There was no direct equivalent of
Dropbox at the time. I had tried everything from Skydrive to rsync. Dropbox
solved a real problem with storage at that time.

(I don't use them anymore because they are too expensive but good for them
that they are able to charge so much)

------
pdog
_> There are dozens of cloud-based tools aimed at business users. Can all
these apps coexist?_

 _> It's a mess. You have all these new tools like Slack, but they're totally
disconnected from the old ones, so people are constantly toggling back and
forth. This fragmented experience wastes a lot of time, and it makes it really
hard to focus._

The proliferation and fragmentation of SaaS apps is a huge problem for
businesses. When Drew Houston says it's a mess, you know there's a massive
startup idea here.

~~~
jpalomaki
It's a mess and also gets fairly expensive quickly when you put
$10-20/month/user to several services.

One way forward is consolidated services like Bitrix. They may not be as good
as Slack, Dropbox, Asana etc for some specific tasks, but may provide more
integrated service with smaller price tag.

Another option would be for "best of breed" companies to team up to offer
package deals.

~~~
jszymborski
> Another option would be for "best of breed" companies to team up to offer
> package deals.

That's a great idea, and I can't imagine why I haven't seen it in a meaningful
way. I'd be very much on board to buy a "web office" bundle with
Dropbox/Slack/Github/Trello or something like that if it meant upwards of a
15% discount.

It's obviously easier to make a personal budget for one re-occuring SaaS bill
than 6 $5-10/mo SaaS bills.

Another obvious advantage is that a lot of these little folk have common
enemies with MS/Google/Amazon, and this is a great way for them to achieve
similar lock-in with almost zero investment.

Finally, Dropbox/Slack/GitHub/etc... all have awesome integrations that either
already exist in each-others products or are super easy to implement.

I have a vague feeling there was a lesson about this in In Search of Stupidity
[0], but I can't be sure.

[0]
[https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1191767.In_Search_of_Stu...](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1191767.In_Search_of_Stupidity)

------
threepipeproblm
I recently started moving away from Dropbox after realizing I am not
comfortable with how aggressive and anti-user this software is.

Last year the story broke about very questionable tactics of Dropbox Mac to
gain root access.

This year I had a client whose machine was crippled because of a fun Dropbox
default where, upon inserting any USB device Dropbox will automatically copy.
The user inserted a camera with 4GB of hunting pics and it basically downed
his machine. Now maybe he clicked on something to technically approve of this.
But I surveyed the user base whom I had asked to install Dropbox and more than
one had experienced a problem with this "feature". In one case the employee
almost got in trouble for personal use of a machine, because she had connected
her phone and didn't realize all her personal pictures were copied there. Less
savvy users were involved, but I need to feel comfortable recommending a
product like this to less savvy users.

~~~
ThomPete
I don't see how it's questionable. They did it to improve the user experience.
If anything blame the OS for providing the ability to set it up properly.

~~~
threepipeproblm
I doubt most people are comfortable with deception around root access, in
order to have a better user experience.

This is evidenced by the fact that Dropbox felt the need to apologize and
alter their behavior. Largely through HN activism BTW
[https://techcrunch.com/2016/09/09/dropbox-responds-to-
accusa...](https://techcrunch.com/2016/09/09/dropbox-responds-to-accusations-
its-mac-desktop-client-hacks-os-x-security/)

~~~
ThomPete
Most people have no idea what root access mean.

They explaining themselves is not evidence of what at all.

~~~
threepipeproblm
Did you read the part of the statement where they promised to make changes to
the application disclosures?

Characterizing typical users as unable to understand rooting sidesteps the
point that, when the concept is explained to them, most will not be
comfortable with software companies doing this.

~~~
threepipeproblm
I definitely should have used the subjunctive case there, but I was addressing
an HN audience who does get it. A charitable reader might have responded to
the gist of the criticism.

Are you suggesting that because many of Dropbox's users don't know about the
rooting thing, it's justified by their expansion?

I think the important thing is that, _were_ most users to understand the
rooting issue, they would be upset. Most users could easily understand it, if
explained clearly. This is likely why Dropbox didn't disclose at all until
caught -- and now, presumably, has a techie-sounding disclosure instead of
"can we 0wn your machine?", if they are even still doing this on Macs.

This goes along with my original complaint about Dropbox: defaults that are
ostensibly in Dropbox's interest, but not users'.

~~~
ThomPete
I am suggesting that the rooting was to improve the user experience and that
only technical savy people really care about it.

The potential security issue isn't big enough to claim it's a problem compared
to making it easy to use for most people.

------
exoplanet1
They bounced back by raising prices, after users upload too much data to
switch.

Dropbox for Business launched at $12.50 per user/mo for unlimited storage.
It's now $20.00 per user/mo.

Bait and switch your way to profitability.

~~~
z1mm32m4n
It's impossible to think that the features DfB launched with are equal or less
than what they are now, so some of the price increase can be attributed to DfB
providing more value to the customer.

------
ap46
I open dropbox manually on my Mac & quit it manually after a file has been
synced. I don't see how can they survive any longer except for institutional
customers who should be extra careful about surveillance.

~~~
j_s
I only use the web UI.

~~~
champagnepapi
Same

------
kmfrk
Be great if they could bounce back from using a third of my CPU on basic
indexing.

~~~
alberth
Dropbox is unusable for me due to it pegging my CPU at 100%. And yes, I've
opened mutiple supports tickets over the year.

The problem is I put my Outlook .pst in my Dropbox folder. When I have Outlook
open, which is nearly the entire day, Outlook puts a lock on the .pst file.

Instead of Dropbox ignoring that file and coming back to it later - it's just
gets stuck in some kind of infinitely loop trying to synch the locked file and
can't. Resulting in 100% CPU usage.

~~~
kernelsanderz
I have the same problem. I basically use Dropbox as my work folder and put all
my files in there. As a developer I have millions of small files. It takes 2-3
weeks to sync the dropbox from scratch (currently 285gb of dropbox files). And
my CPU is regularly pegged at 100%. I basically have to switch Dropbox off
when I'm not plugged into power on my Macbook Pro in order to conserve
battery. I've contacted support several times, and their response was
basically "don't".

I'm on one of their top plans (2TB). What's the point in having such large
plans when the number of files you have causes the whole service to break
down?

Been searching for a good alternative to Dropbox. Something that would be CPU
efficient, safe, secure and reliable. I also use their packrat plan (saves a
history of every file ever), which is nice too.

Any other HN readers have any alternatives? I really just want a plug and play
solution, and not have to roll my own.

I don't trust Apple iCloud for one bit as they've been quite inept at running
cloud services. I've tried Google drive with poor results too.

~~~
brianwawok
Yes, why not use git for the code files?

I have a single command on alias that goes and checks out all my git projects,
and does a bit pull on any existing. Can switch between Computers in like 30
seconds. And it's all free git on bitbucket.

Git is much better way to deal with small files. Dropbox is ok for large files
or nontechnical users.

------
mrjasonh
Had the opportunity to listen to Drew speak recently. He seems like a great
guy and very humble. Definitely rooting for them.

------
nilved
That's a shame. Everything on drop-dropbox.com still applies.

------
Simulacra
A lot of my nonprofit clients are using Dropbox for its simplicity, but they
sometimes have trouble locating things, and managing it when someone syncs
their entire computer.

------
comstock
"That said, privacy is our focus, and we have whole teams that scrutinize any
requests from governments to make sure they’re legitimate."

For a company with Condoleezza Rice on the board. A person who helped pioneer
warentless surveillance. This doesn't really ring true:

[http://www.drop-dropbox.com](http://www.drop-dropbox.com)

~~~
seanieb
Maybe judge their record rather than baselessly inferring that Rice has any
say on any of this policy.

[https://www.eff.org/who-has-your-back-government-data-
reques...](https://www.eff.org/who-has-your-back-government-data-
requests-2015)

(Full disclosure I'm ex Dropbox security)

~~~
mockindignant
I don't see where he infers anything. I do see where he notes that the company
says one thing then their actions indicate something else.

Also, that link is from 2015.

------
yuhong
Interestingly, dhouston don't post much on HN nowadays or even on twitter.

------
mmjaa
Dropbox has been, for me, a most disappointing outcome of the whole
Internet'ization of computers.

I truly believe that Dropbox is a lousy solution to a problem created by
ignorance on the part of the OS vendors. There is absolutely no good reason
that the computers of today cannot share media seamlessly between themselves,
without requiring the use or involvement of an external third party - the only
reason its necessary to have Dropbox now, is because OS vendors fell asleep at
the wheel and forgot that they're producing Operating Systems.

I think this will change, though - OS vendors are going to catch up to this
market, and Dropbox will become less and less important as the OS starts to do
its job again, and lead on these kinds of services.

~~~
uberchet
I think you're being a little naive about what really drives features from an
OS vendor here. That $vendor_A _could_ enable seamless sync with $vendor_B is
absolutely true, but the realities of competition and the market mean that
technical feasibility isn't the driving factor.

I can't imagine Apple or MSFT ever offering something that would truly replace
it - anything either does is likely to privilege their own OS over any other,
and Dropbox has no reason to do that.

The other reason that services like Dropbox shine, at least for me, is that by
providing a cloud-mediated sync solution, you don't have to coordinate a
synchronous conversation between the devices in question. That's valuable,
especially since it enables easy sync with > 2 devices (which also opens the
door to selective sharing).

That always-there aspect is also how Dropbox became the de facto mobile file
system for iOS (and Android, maybe? I'm guessing -- I'm an iOS user). It's
also the default mechanism for sharing files too big or numerous for email
(e.g., Aunt Sally's holiday pictures).

My tl;dr is that while Dropbox's initial value prop might not be earthshaking,
it's done what it set out to do very, very well for me since I started using
it 8 years ago, and I'm very glad to pay them for their service.

~~~
mercutio2
This is a head scratcher for me. First: doesn’t Microsoft offer OneDrive which
is functionally equivalent to Dropbox? You seem to be saying MS doesn’t have
incentives to do something they’ve _already done_.

Second: I realize everyone’s experience is different, but the three times I’ve
had the misfortune to interact with Dropbox shared files (once in a corporate
setting, twice with files shared by acquaintances outside work), it just
didn’t work. So the meme that Dropbox is a reliable mechanism for sharing to
others confuses me.

~~~
mmjaa
Yes, I agree. There is what I would call a little more hubris than necessary
in this side of the argument.

After all, it was once totally conceivable that a multi-million dollar company
would be founded on the basis of, basically, a device driver.

We're still doing that sort of thing, its not a new phenomenon that some crack
in the design/methods/ethics of a technology vendor is exploited by some un-
controllable third-party. Gone are the days when Microsoft, by way of example,
would have waged war and just built-in local- and remote- peer discovery,
rsync++, etc. in response to this daring challenger to the hegemony.

I guess, I really do sort of miss that. Dropbox really sucks. I only use it
because my friends do.

~~~
uberchet
Just for clarity: do you mean it sucks politically, e.g. for privacy reasons?
I'm familiar with those objections for sure, but if you're saying it sucks at
some other level I'd love to hear why.

~~~
mmjaa
It sucks from the perspective of the usurpation of agency in pursuit of
luxury, which in my mind has led to decadence.

~~~
uberchet
Um.

In what way is Dropbox more guilty of this than any other tool/service
provided by a third party?

------
marklyon
Six questions, two about politics.

~~~
jameskilton
Not sure if you mean to be negative here, but they are two very relevant
questions to everyone in tech. I love his answer regarding immigration:

> Well, it’s really important—and it hits close to home for us. My co-founder
> Arash Ferdowsi’s parents immigrated here from Iran. If these policies were
> in effect back then, there would be no Dropbox.

~~~
mc32
Who's to say he would not have developed it in Iran or some other third
country? Or is he saying the secret sauce is US + foreign talent and that that
formula is atomic?

I would posit that that is false as there are many world class tech companies
which did not begin in the US nor need the US to succeed.

To be clear, I'm glad they both successfully founded the company and that it
contributes to the economy, but that's altogether a different topic.

~~~
oblio
I'm going to stretch the comparison a lot, but a great deal of the people
working on the Manhattan Project were not born in the US.

What the US is doing right now puts it at a competitive disadvantage, IMO.

~~~
mc32
True enough. Both the US and USSR benefitted from raiding foreign talent as
well as from taking in sympathizers to our/their ideologies. Fortunately we
got some of the best, however, we did not have a right to them. It was
circumstance, a good circumstance for us. Better would have been that it had
been unnecessary to acquire the talent in order to win wars, prevent further
suffering and vanquish miserable ideologies.

Interestingly, we didn't raid Japan for talent so much and maybe that
contributed to their post war performance.

------
801699
rdiff is free, open source and gives control to the user.

dropbox is large, binary-only, obfuscated code, built on FOSS (uses same
library as rdiff), makes some people very wealthy and gives third party
control over user's files.

i have never used dropbox. no need.

